GE to Martha Jackson, Griff, 14 January [1840]
Title
GE to Martha Jackson, Griff, 14 January [1840]
Title
GE to Martha Jackson, Griff, 14 January [1840]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Martha Jackson
Date(s)
- 1840-01-14
Place
GRIFF
Letter Content
GE to Martha Jackson, Griff, 14 January [1840]
Text: Composite from Bookman, 3 (October 1892), 19-20, and Poet-Lore, 6 (1894), 184-185.
Griff, | January 14th, 10 o'clock p.m.
My dear Classical Friend,
"Deeds not words" 156 -- that motto is so rapidly rising in my estimation that I am likely to begin to wish life a mere pantomime. I am inclined to calculate the weight of feeling inversely to that of expression, and lest you should have adopted the same mathematics, I will secure myself against the suspicion of indifference to you by not once telling you that I was glad to see your delegate this morning, and by liquidating my debt to you "incontinent," as Knox would say, prove that I am desirous to have further traffic with you. It is true that all my cash is just now copper, and the payment is likely to prove both to you and me a heavy one; but if I waited till I could send you gold, you might confidently book mine as a bad debt. As I write after my faculties have done their day's work, I must make this sheet my diary, or I shall sit gazing on vacuity for lack of thoughts that "will not come when I do call for them." 157
My mind today has been an excellent match to the atmosphere, very hazy and cheerless, and my pace in my studies about equal to that of my feet through the mud. Now for an inventory of the additional goods and chattels that have gained admission through the windows of my house to-day -- for you must know that the two portals in most frequent use in other dwellings have in mine well-nigh lost the power of completely opening for want of employment. Item: a fragment of Milton's Ode on the Nativity, learned while dressing. You of course know that beautiful Ode, if not get an introduction to it. Item: a work on Baptism, on which, as I think my classical friend is no controversialist, I will not dilate further than to observe that I studied it after the peripatetic system. Item: a book by Mrs. Jameson, entitled [Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada,] 158 a lively book, by a clever authoress, but I fear of no fixed religious principles, if I may judge from an apparent affectation of a liberalising, philosophising manner of speaking about religion and morals. Voil'e0 tout! To save my character, if I have any worth preserving, I must assure you that all my days pass not so "fuliginously" as Dr. Young 159 has taught me to say; as well as that my morning was nearly engrossed by filial and domestic duties, and a large portion of my afternoon by a visit received and one paid. I am rather aghast to find myself nearly in the third page of my letter without having written a word worth reading.
I read about a week ago Moore's [Prosaic Epicurean,] 160 and was so epicurean myself as to make a single meal of the philosopher, preserved as he is in spirits after Moore's patent. I was enchanted as completely as if I had been in the clutches of the Egyptian Priests. Enough of nonsense. I am right glad to read of your enjoyments, past, present, and prospective, and of your determination to study, though, by the bye, it is hardly fair of you to trench on my field; I shall have you publishing metaphysics before my work is ready, a result of the superior development of a certain region of your brain over that of my poor snailship. I begin to despair of mending my ways, but there is a moral in all things, and that of my letter is very clearly "Begin well" and trust not the false adage "All is well that ends well." Well, my dear Martha, two serious thoughts I have lingered over to-day; two which, albeit obvious to all, can never be too trite to repeat. I have reflected on the duty of perfect contentment with such things as we have, whether gifts of nature or fortune, to use current but rather heathenish language, of the frequent injunctions concerning it, and ensamples of it in Scripture, and the blessedness, the calm sunshine it sheds on the soul. To my restless, ambitious spirit it seems of very difficult exercise -- but so are all graces to the natural man. We must stretch out the hand for this and all other spiritual wealth to Him from whom cometh every good gift. . . .
Your heartily affectionate
Mary Ann.
Text: Composite from Bookman, 3 (October 1892), 19-20, and Poet-Lore, 6 (1894), 184-185.
Griff, | January 14th, 10 o'clock p.m.
My dear Classical Friend,
"Deeds not words" 156 -- that motto is so rapidly rising in my estimation that I am likely to begin to wish life a mere pantomime. I am inclined to calculate the weight of feeling inversely to that of expression, and lest you should have adopted the same mathematics, I will secure myself against the suspicion of indifference to you by not once telling you that I was glad to see your delegate this morning, and by liquidating my debt to you "incontinent," as Knox would say, prove that I am desirous to have further traffic with you. It is true that all my cash is just now copper, and the payment is likely to prove both to you and me a heavy one; but if I waited till I could send you gold, you might confidently book mine as a bad debt. As I write after my faculties have done their day's work, I must make this sheet my diary, or I shall sit gazing on vacuity for lack of thoughts that "will not come when I do call for them." 157
My mind today has been an excellent match to the atmosphere, very hazy and cheerless, and my pace in my studies about equal to that of my feet through the mud. Now for an inventory of the additional goods and chattels that have gained admission through the windows of my house to-day -- for you must know that the two portals in most frequent use in other dwellings have in mine well-nigh lost the power of completely opening for want of employment. Item: a fragment of Milton's Ode on the Nativity, learned while dressing. You of course know that beautiful Ode, if not get an introduction to it. Item: a work on Baptism, on which, as I think my classical friend is no controversialist, I will not dilate further than to observe that I studied it after the peripatetic system. Item: a book by Mrs. Jameson, entitled [Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada,] 158 a lively book, by a clever authoress, but I fear of no fixed religious principles, if I may judge from an apparent affectation of a liberalising, philosophising manner of speaking about religion and morals. Voil'e0 tout! To save my character, if I have any worth preserving, I must assure you that all my days pass not so "fuliginously" as Dr. Young 159 has taught me to say; as well as that my morning was nearly engrossed by filial and domestic duties, and a large portion of my afternoon by a visit received and one paid. I am rather aghast to find myself nearly in the third page of my letter without having written a word worth reading.
I read about a week ago Moore's [Prosaic Epicurean,] 160 and was so epicurean myself as to make a single meal of the philosopher, preserved as he is in spirits after Moore's patent. I was enchanted as completely as if I had been in the clutches of the Egyptian Priests. Enough of nonsense. I am right glad to read of your enjoyments, past, present, and prospective, and of your determination to study, though, by the bye, it is hardly fair of you to trench on my field; I shall have you publishing metaphysics before my work is ready, a result of the superior development of a certain region of your brain over that of my poor snailship. I begin to despair of mending my ways, but there is a moral in all things, and that of my letter is very clearly "Begin well" and trust not the false adage "All is well that ends well." Well, my dear Martha, two serious thoughts I have lingered over to-day; two which, albeit obvious to all, can never be too trite to repeat. I have reflected on the duty of perfect contentment with such things as we have, whether gifts of nature or fortune, to use current but rather heathenish language, of the frequent injunctions concerning it, and ensamples of it in Scripture, and the blessedness, the calm sunshine it sheds on the soul. To my restless, ambitious spirit it seems of very difficult exercise -- but so are all graces to the natural man. We must stretch out the hand for this and all other spiritual wealth to Him from whom cometh every good gift. . . .
Your heartily affectionate
Mary Ann.
Signature
Mary Ann.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Martha Jackson, Griff, 14 January [1840], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92933