GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 6-8 November 1838
Title
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 6-8 November 1838
Title
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 6-8 November 1838
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Maria Lewis
Date(s)
- 1838-11-06–<br /> 1838-11-08
Place
GRIFF
Letter Content
GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 6-8 November 1838
MS: Yale. Address: Miss Lewis | The Revd L. Harper's | Burton Latimer | Northamptonshire. Postmarks: COVENTRY | NO 9 | 1838. NORTHAMPTON | NO 10 | 1838. Extracts published: Cross, I, 42-44.
Griff | November 6th 1838.
My very dear Friend,
Vain as I am I did not imagine that I had such a claim on your remembrance as to entitle me to an earlier proof of it than the welcome one I received yesterday; indeed had I not felt that quantity is scarcely a compensation for inferiority of quality I should have endeavoured (although not oppressed with leisure) to send you a second sheetful of scribble long ago. Your over exertion and consequent illness are no more than my fears had pictured; but I can hardly repress a sort of indignation towards second causes -- that your time and energies should be expended in ministering to the petty interests of those far beneath you in all that is really elevating is about as bienséant as that I should set fire to a goodly volume to light a match by. Shall you spend Christmas solely with Mrs. Russel? 79 You know how glad we shall be to have you at any time. I always think that friendship would be much disencumbered if such feelings were made mere et ceteras to it, taken for granted and acted on without being expressed.
I have had a very unsettled life lately -- Michaelmas with its onerous duties and anxieties, much company (for us), and little reading, so that I am ill prepared for corresponding with profit or pleasure. I am generally in the same predicament with books as a glutton with his feast, hurrying through one course that I may be in time for the next and so not relishing or digesting either; not a very elegant illustration, but the best my organs of ideality and comparison 80 will furnish just now, it is partly owing to this mismanagement that I have not read Mr. Craig's lectures on Jacob 81 farther than the first of them, and I think I must even give them up and send them to you as soon as I possibly can, for I am now in the midst of Archbishop Leighton's Commentary on St. Peter, 82 a work by the bye that you would I am sure enjoy if you have not enjoyed it already.
November 7. I am obliged to take up my letter at any odd moment so you must excuse its being rather a patchwork, or to try to appear learned a tesselated or mosaic affair. I am obliged too to put down the thoughts that happen to be in view for if I staid long to meditate the opportunity would be past. Do you know a sweet hymn of Dr. Ryland's on those words of the Psalmist "All my times are in thy hand"? 83 I have felt this morning a kind of awe in reflecting after reading the sixteenth Psalm, that the exact place and time of my faith, temporal condition and spiritual advantages were and are the appointment of God. It seems to me the resort of those who say to the Almighty, "Depart from us, we desire not the knowledge of thy ways," 84 rather than the fruit of a humble spirit, to consider our insignificance as mere atoms in the universe a reason for not daring to believe that we are the objects of the special and particular care of our Maker. I cannot help thinking that the chief design of the Almighty in creating those microscopic objects whose delicate and complicated conformations so astonish us was to leave us no plea for entertaining what are really dishonouring, low, and narrow ideas of God, though they assume an opposite character.
Are you fond of the study of unfulfilled prophecy? The vagaries of the Irvingites 85 and the blasphemies of Joanna Southcote 86 together with the fanciful interpretations of more respectable names have been regarded as beacons, and have caused many persons to hold all diving into the future plans of Providence as the boldest presumption; but I do think that a sober and prayerful consideration of the mighty revolutions ere long to take place in our world would by God's blessing serve to make us less grovelling, more devoted and energetic in the service of God. Of course I mean only such study as pigmies like myself in intellect and acquirement are able to prosecute; the perusal and comparison of Scripture and the works of pious and judicious men on the subject. I wonder if you have read Mr. Williams's account of his missionary enterprises in the South Seas. 87 It is deeply interesting; truly the "isles are submitting to the Lord" and literally "wailing for His law" for in many islands the parting request of the inhabitants was "Do send us a teacher." If you have not seen the book and have an opportunity of choosing one for your society I think I may venture to say that it could not fail to interest any person of taste to say nothing of religion. Mr. W. is a dissenter but the B[isho]p of Chester 88 highly commended his work in a speech at a meeting of the Bible Society and it has since been purchased by all denominations. If you have any bigots near you there could not be a better book for them.
I have just begun the Life of Wilberforce 89 and I am expecting a rich treat from it. There is a similarity, if I may compare myself with such a man, between his temptations or rather besetments and my own that makes his experience very interesting to me. O that I might be made as useful in my lowly and obscure station as he was in the exalted one assigned to him. I feel myself to be a mere cumberer of the ground. May the Lord gi[ve] me such an insight into what is truly good and su[ch] realizing views of an approaching eternity, that I may not rest contented with making Christianity a mere addendum to my pursuits, or with tacking it as a fringe to my garments. May I seek to be sanctified wholly. My nineteenth birthday will soon be here (the 22d) an awakening signal! My mind has been much clogged lately by languor of body, to which I am prone to give way and for the removal of which I shall feel thankful.
If egotism be at any time excusable it is in writing to a friend, and to the charity of so kind a friend as yourself I dare trust for the pardon of all that is tedious and impertinent in this careless letter. After all it is an unspeakable mercy to have our souls at all occupied on our eternal interests, to have commenced in however small a degree to commune with our own hearts. A dear friend said to me the other day and the words made a deep impression on me "A little grace is an inestimable treasure; we should beware of rejecting or refusing to acknowledge what we have because it is so little."
My writing takes up so much room owing to its untidiness 90 that I have no room to answer all your kind enquiries. My dear Sister is quite well and so is her baby. I am not aware that there is any truth in the report you have heard of another member of our family. Dear Father is as well as usual.
We have had an oratorio at Coventry lately, Braham, Phillips, Mrs. Knyvett and Mrs. Shaw, the last I think I shall attend. I am not fitted to decide on the question of the propriety or lawfulness of such exhibitions of talent and so forth because I have no soul for music. "Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth" 91 but for my part I humbly conceive it to be little less than blasphemy for such words as "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ" 92 to be taken on the lips of such a man as Braham (a Jew too!). I am a tasteless person but it would not cost me any regrets if the only music heard in our land were that of strict worship, nor can I think a pleasure that involves the devotion of all the time and powers of an immortal being to the acquirement of an expertness in so useless (at least in ninety nine cases out of a hundred) an accomplishment can be quite pure or elevating in its tendency. Thanks, you will say to the lack of room that prevents this everlasting prate-apace from annoying me farther.
And peace say I to the man whose thought devised a feather bed for it is now nearly 11 o'clock. Good night, my dear Friend. Love and remember
Your affectionate
Mary Ann Evans.
I am dismayed this morning to find many parts of my letter so illegible.
MS: Yale. Address: Miss Lewis | The Revd L. Harper's | Burton Latimer | Northamptonshire. Postmarks: COVENTRY | NO 9 | 1838. NORTHAMPTON | NO 10 | 1838. Extracts published: Cross, I, 42-44.
Griff | November 6th 1838.
My very dear Friend,
Vain as I am I did not imagine that I had such a claim on your remembrance as to entitle me to an earlier proof of it than the welcome one I received yesterday; indeed had I not felt that quantity is scarcely a compensation for inferiority of quality I should have endeavoured (although not oppressed with leisure) to send you a second sheetful of scribble long ago. Your over exertion and consequent illness are no more than my fears had pictured; but I can hardly repress a sort of indignation towards second causes -- that your time and energies should be expended in ministering to the petty interests of those far beneath you in all that is really elevating is about as bienséant as that I should set fire to a goodly volume to light a match by. Shall you spend Christmas solely with Mrs. Russel? 79 You know how glad we shall be to have you at any time. I always think that friendship would be much disencumbered if such feelings were made mere et ceteras to it, taken for granted and acted on without being expressed.
I have had a very unsettled life lately -- Michaelmas with its onerous duties and anxieties, much company (for us), and little reading, so that I am ill prepared for corresponding with profit or pleasure. I am generally in the same predicament with books as a glutton with his feast, hurrying through one course that I may be in time for the next and so not relishing or digesting either; not a very elegant illustration, but the best my organs of ideality and comparison 80 will furnish just now, it is partly owing to this mismanagement that I have not read Mr. Craig's lectures on Jacob 81 farther than the first of them, and I think I must even give them up and send them to you as soon as I possibly can, for I am now in the midst of Archbishop Leighton's Commentary on St. Peter, 82 a work by the bye that you would I am sure enjoy if you have not enjoyed it already.
November 7. I am obliged to take up my letter at any odd moment so you must excuse its being rather a patchwork, or to try to appear learned a tesselated or mosaic affair. I am obliged too to put down the thoughts that happen to be in view for if I staid long to meditate the opportunity would be past. Do you know a sweet hymn of Dr. Ryland's on those words of the Psalmist "All my times are in thy hand"? 83 I have felt this morning a kind of awe in reflecting after reading the sixteenth Psalm, that the exact place and time of my faith, temporal condition and spiritual advantages were and are the appointment of God. It seems to me the resort of those who say to the Almighty, "Depart from us, we desire not the knowledge of thy ways," 84 rather than the fruit of a humble spirit, to consider our insignificance as mere atoms in the universe a reason for not daring to believe that we are the objects of the special and particular care of our Maker. I cannot help thinking that the chief design of the Almighty in creating those microscopic objects whose delicate and complicated conformations so astonish us was to leave us no plea for entertaining what are really dishonouring, low, and narrow ideas of God, though they assume an opposite character.
Are you fond of the study of unfulfilled prophecy? The vagaries of the Irvingites 85 and the blasphemies of Joanna Southcote 86 together with the fanciful interpretations of more respectable names have been regarded as beacons, and have caused many persons to hold all diving into the future plans of Providence as the boldest presumption; but I do think that a sober and prayerful consideration of the mighty revolutions ere long to take place in our world would by God's blessing serve to make us less grovelling, more devoted and energetic in the service of God. Of course I mean only such study as pigmies like myself in intellect and acquirement are able to prosecute; the perusal and comparison of Scripture and the works of pious and judicious men on the subject. I wonder if you have read Mr. Williams's account of his missionary enterprises in the South Seas. 87 It is deeply interesting; truly the "isles are submitting to the Lord" and literally "wailing for His law" for in many islands the parting request of the inhabitants was "Do send us a teacher." If you have not seen the book and have an opportunity of choosing one for your society I think I may venture to say that it could not fail to interest any person of taste to say nothing of religion. Mr. W. is a dissenter but the B[isho]p of Chester 88 highly commended his work in a speech at a meeting of the Bible Society and it has since been purchased by all denominations. If you have any bigots near you there could not be a better book for them.
I have just begun the Life of Wilberforce 89 and I am expecting a rich treat from it. There is a similarity, if I may compare myself with such a man, between his temptations or rather besetments and my own that makes his experience very interesting to me. O that I might be made as useful in my lowly and obscure station as he was in the exalted one assigned to him. I feel myself to be a mere cumberer of the ground. May the Lord gi[ve] me such an insight into what is truly good and su[ch] realizing views of an approaching eternity, that I may not rest contented with making Christianity a mere addendum to my pursuits, or with tacking it as a fringe to my garments. May I seek to be sanctified wholly. My nineteenth birthday will soon be here (the 22d) an awakening signal! My mind has been much clogged lately by languor of body, to which I am prone to give way and for the removal of which I shall feel thankful.
If egotism be at any time excusable it is in writing to a friend, and to the charity of so kind a friend as yourself I dare trust for the pardon of all that is tedious and impertinent in this careless letter. After all it is an unspeakable mercy to have our souls at all occupied on our eternal interests, to have commenced in however small a degree to commune with our own hearts. A dear friend said to me the other day and the words made a deep impression on me "A little grace is an inestimable treasure; we should beware of rejecting or refusing to acknowledge what we have because it is so little."
My writing takes up so much room owing to its untidiness 90 that I have no room to answer all your kind enquiries. My dear Sister is quite well and so is her baby. I am not aware that there is any truth in the report you have heard of another member of our family. Dear Father is as well as usual.
We have had an oratorio at Coventry lately, Braham, Phillips, Mrs. Knyvett and Mrs. Shaw, the last I think I shall attend. I am not fitted to decide on the question of the propriety or lawfulness of such exhibitions of talent and so forth because I have no soul for music. "Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth" 91 but for my part I humbly conceive it to be little less than blasphemy for such words as "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ" 92 to be taken on the lips of such a man as Braham (a Jew too!). I am a tasteless person but it would not cost me any regrets if the only music heard in our land were that of strict worship, nor can I think a pleasure that involves the devotion of all the time and powers of an immortal being to the acquirement of an expertness in so useless (at least in ninety nine cases out of a hundred) an accomplishment can be quite pure or elevating in its tendency. Thanks, you will say to the lack of room that prevents this everlasting prate-apace from annoying me farther.
And peace say I to the man whose thought devised a feather bed for it is now nearly 11 o'clock. Good night, my dear Friend. Love and remember
Your affectionate
Mary Ann Evans.
I am dismayed this morning to find many parts of my letter so illegible.
Signature
Mary Ann Evans.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Maria Lewis, Griff, 6-8 November 1838, 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/92916