George Eliot; a Critical Study of Her Life, Writings and PhilosophyCooke, George Willis
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George Eliot; a Critical Study of Her Life, Writings and Philosophy
Cooke, George Willis
Eliot, George, 1819-1880; Novelists, English -- 19th century -- Biography
"I have always been thinking of the different ways in which
Christianity is taught, and whenever I find one way that makes it a
wider blessing than any other, I cling to that as the truest--I mean
that which takes in the most good of all kinds, and brings in the most
people as sharers in it."
Of the same character is the belief which comforts Dorothea, and takes the
place to her of prayer.
"That by desiring what is perfectly good, even when we don't quite know
what it is and cannot do what we would, we are a part of the divine
power against evil--widening the skirts of light and making the
struggle with darkness narrower."
Mr. Tryan, in _Janet's Repentance_, is a most ardent disciple of
Evangelicalism, and accepts all its doctrines; but George Eliot contrives
to show throughout the book, that all the value of his work and religion
consisted in the humanitarian spirit of renunciation he awakened.
George Eliot does not entirely avoid the supernatural, but she treats it as
unexplainable. Instances of her use of it are to be found in Adam Bede's
experience while at work on his father's coffin, in the visions of
Savonarola, and in Mordecai's strange faith in a coming successor to his
own faith and work. For Adam Bede's experience there is no explanation
given, nor for that curious power manifest in the "Lifted Veil." On the
other hand, the spiritual power of Savonarola and Mordecai have their
explanation, in George Eliot's philosophy, in that intuition which is
inherited insight. In her treatment of such themes she manifests her
appreciation of the great mystery which surrounds man's existence, but she
shows no faith in a spiritual world which impinges on the material, and
ever manifests itself in gleams and fore-tokenings.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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