GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 22 November 1839
Title
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 22 November 1839
Title
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 22 November 1839
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Maria Lewis
Date(s)
- 1839-11-22
Place
GRIFF
Letter Content
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 22 November 1839
MS: Yale. Address: Miss Lewis | The Revd L. Harper's | Burton Latimer | near Northampton. Postmark: COVENTRY | NO 24 | 1839. Extracts published: Cross, I, 61.
Griff November 22d 1839.
My dear Friend,
As I have a trip to London for a week in prospect I am induced to allot the residue of an unfavourable evening to you, lest the accumulation of little matters of business consequent on such an absence from home duties should deprive me of the pleasure of writing to you for some time after my return. I have emerged from the slough of domestic troubles, or rather to speak quite clearly, malheurs de cuisine, and am beginning to take a deep breath in my own element, though with a mortifying consciousness that my faculties have become superlatively obtuse during my banishment from it. I am surrounded with unread books and like Addison's ass between two bundles of hay, I am held in suspense by two equally alluring bonnes bouches and so taste neither. I have just swallowed without much mastication "The Doctrine of the deluge," by the Revd V. Harcourt, 149 -- a work containing much information though too allusive and elliptical to be appreciated by those who have not previously trodden the path of which it notes only prominent objects and characteristics. After tracing the image of the Ark and Mt. Ararat through the faded tapestries that line the temple of mythological history, until one is ready to fancy one sees the first in a linen chest and the last in Vandyke's frills, just as objects in which we have long gazed remain on the retina when we would fain be rid of them, the author deduces from the doctrine of the deluge that of baptismal regeneration and I humbly opine supports or rather shakes a weak position by weak arguments.
I have been so self-indulgent as to possess myself of Wordsworth at full length, and I thoroughly like much of the contents of the first three volumes which I fancy are only the low vestibule to the three remaining ones. 150 What I could wish to have added to many of my favorite morceaux is an indication of less satisfaction in terrene objects, a more frequent upturning of the soul's eye. I never before met with so many of my own feelings, expressed just as I could <wish> like them.
Have you seen a nice little book, especially for boys, entitled the Autobiography of Thomas Platter, 151 a schoolmaster in the sixteenth century? I shall be quite grateful if you will introduce me to the famed knight errant, 152 and I need not tell you I shall be heartily glad if any of my little stock of books will be acceptable to you as a loan. Before I quit the subject of books I should like to direct your attention to Ward's Library of Standard Divinity, and another series of publications on the same plan called the Christian Library, 153 (the publisher of this I have forgotten). I have just received Archb[isho]p Leighton's
Theological lectures, 154 one of the former set and am charmed with the perfection of the type and paper and last, not least, the moderate price. Only sixteen pence, to adopt a well known style, only sixteen pence for 60 pages of theology more precious than the gold of Ophir! O to find it like Jonathan's honey! 155
The distress of the lower classes in our neighbourhood is daily increasing from the scarcity of employment for weavers, and I seem sadly to have handcuffed myself by unnecessary expenditure; a sad reflection, and yet often unproductive of wisdom and self denial when the gratification of our own desires decks itself in the part of consideration for others. May I obtain that spiritual mind that judgeth all things and that needs not the check strings of rules and systems of my own originating. I beg you once more to overlook the flaws in a hasty letter, written between 9 and 10, and among others the wretched paper which is almost an insult to you. Only let the impression left by my scribble be that I am still as erst
Your sincerely affectionate
Mary Ann Evans.
To day is my twentieth birthday.
MS: Yale. Address: Miss Lewis | The Revd L. Harper's | Burton Latimer | near Northampton. Postmark: COVENTRY | NO 24 | 1839. Extracts published: Cross, I, 61.
Griff November 22d 1839.
My dear Friend,
As I have a trip to London for a week in prospect I am induced to allot the residue of an unfavourable evening to you, lest the accumulation of little matters of business consequent on such an absence from home duties should deprive me of the pleasure of writing to you for some time after my return. I have emerged from the slough of domestic troubles, or rather to speak quite clearly, malheurs de cuisine, and am beginning to take a deep breath in my own element, though with a mortifying consciousness that my faculties have become superlatively obtuse during my banishment from it. I am surrounded with unread books and like Addison's ass between two bundles of hay, I am held in suspense by two equally alluring bonnes bouches and so taste neither. I have just swallowed without much mastication "The Doctrine of the deluge," by the Revd V. Harcourt, 149 -- a work containing much information though too allusive and elliptical to be appreciated by those who have not previously trodden the path of which it notes only prominent objects and characteristics. After tracing the image of the Ark and Mt. Ararat through the faded tapestries that line the temple of mythological history, until one is ready to fancy one sees the first in a linen chest and the last in Vandyke's frills, just as objects in which we have long gazed remain on the retina when we would fain be rid of them, the author deduces from the doctrine of the deluge that of baptismal regeneration and I humbly opine supports or rather shakes a weak position by weak arguments.
I have been so self-indulgent as to possess myself of Wordsworth at full length, and I thoroughly like much of the contents of the first three volumes which I fancy are only the low vestibule to the three remaining ones. 150 What I could wish to have added to many of my favorite morceaux is an indication of less satisfaction in terrene objects, a more frequent upturning of the soul's eye. I never before met with so many of my own feelings, expressed just as I could <wish> like them.
Have you seen a nice little book, especially for boys, entitled the Autobiography of Thomas Platter, 151 a schoolmaster in the sixteenth century? I shall be quite grateful if you will introduce me to the famed knight errant, 152 and I need not tell you I shall be heartily glad if any of my little stock of books will be acceptable to you as a loan. Before I quit the subject of books I should like to direct your attention to Ward's Library of Standard Divinity, and another series of publications on the same plan called the Christian Library, 153 (the publisher of this I have forgotten). I have just received Archb[isho]p Leighton's
Theological lectures, 154 one of the former set and am charmed with the perfection of the type and paper and last, not least, the moderate price. Only sixteen pence, to adopt a well known style, only sixteen pence for 60 pages of theology more precious than the gold of Ophir! O to find it like Jonathan's honey! 155
The distress of the lower classes in our neighbourhood is daily increasing from the scarcity of employment for weavers, and I seem sadly to have handcuffed myself by unnecessary expenditure; a sad reflection, and yet often unproductive of wisdom and self denial when the gratification of our own desires decks itself in the part of consideration for others. May I obtain that spiritual mind that judgeth all things and that needs not the check strings of rules and systems of my own originating. I beg you once more to overlook the flaws in a hasty letter, written between 9 and 10, and among others the wretched paper which is almost an insult to you. Only let the impression left by my scribble be that I am still as erst
Your sincerely affectionate
Mary Ann Evans.
To day is my twentieth birthday.
Signature
Mary Ann Evans.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 22 November 1839, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92906