Litchfield enquirer., 1880-12-30
George Eliot =

Thursdays papers brought intelligence Of
the death OF Marian c. Cross. better known
as George Eliot, at her home in London or
Wednesday last. She was born in 1920, the
daughter Of Warwicksnire minister. and re-
ceived an excellent education, of decidedly
'fsolid" kind She began her career as writer
| of heavy rather than light literature. and was
the associate though not pupil Of Herbert
Spencer. BY his advice she Tried her hand II
imaginative writing, sending Scenes from Cier-
ical Life" to Black Wood ina857 HerEes,ntstian
| as novelist was not made, however, till the
publication of adam Bede" two years later,
when she was near forty years of age. Since
then the novels she has written have not been
many, but great. She has also published two
poems: THE Spanish GYPSY" and THE
Legend of Jubal. For a time, alsn, she was
an associate editor of the Westminster Repiew,
the organ of Mill and the ''materialists," aud
translated Strauss life ofJesus" and Feuerr-
bachs Essence of Christianity
Miss Evans, some twenty years since, enter
ed into connection with Mr. George II.
Lewes. also a noted writer, which: has occa
stoned much severe criticism. Lewes had
wife with whom he could not live, yet from
whom as the law then was he could get no
divorce. She had, indeed, given him the
most serious possible ground for a divorce,
but he could not avail himself of it because of
what is termed in law bis ''condonation" of
10 LaA \,
man, forever, if we are not mistaken, before
he knew Miss Evans. Onmaking heracquaint..
ance, they became greatly attached to each
other, determined to live together as man and
wife, and did SO until his death some two
years since Last summer, she married
London merchant named Cross. He: death
was very sudden. She was seized with a
chill on Sunday. but was not thought serious
ly i'll till few hours before her decease.
For many years past, since the death of
Thackeray, George Eliot" has been the great
est of living English novelists. She was a
very slow, careful worker. and never fell into
successful novelists. Her art. was an honest
art, and her work always the best of which
she was capable. If there is any fault, it is
that of over-elaboration, of putting more phil
osophY into the novel than the novel can we'll
carry. As her critics have not been slow to
observe, she has sometimes failed in her male
characters, notably in that unaccountable
piece of perfection, Daniel Deronda," but
her women are unapproachable. Not only are
they true to nature but true to nature at her
grandest.
What the permanent place of "Adam
Bsde," of "Romola," of 1.-THE Mill on the
Floss, of ''Mddemarch," of ''Daniel Deron-
da, and Of the other less popular works of
this auther,3 whl be ID Epglish literature, it is
idle to predict. She. was not champion sto-
ry-teller like Scott ;'nor the greatest Of Carl
caturists like Dickens; uor so markedly the
satirist as Thackeray; but, in hel way, she
has had no equal. Young people will never
enjoy her as they do writer's whose inspira-
lions are mainly the mere overflow Of animal
spirits; but, unless we are greatly mistaken,
mature, thoughtful, cultured minds will al
ways find food for abundant reflection. and
will always enjoy art in its highest form, in
the works OF this greatest of woman novel;
lists.