GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Munich, 14 June 1858
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Munich, 14 June 1858
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Munich, 14 June 1858
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Sara Sophia Hennell
Date(s)
- 1858-06-14
Place
Munich
Letter Content
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Munich, 14 June 1858
MS: Yale. Extracts published: Cross, II, 44-45.
Luitpold Strasse | Munich | June 14. 58.
Dear Sara
My thoughts were very often with you in conjectures not far from the truth, before your letter came. 1155 It is a long while since it came -- for I have been very poorly and have not had energy to put a letter on paper, though I have been sometimes writing one in my mind. Words are very clumsy things -- I like less and less to handle my friends' sacred feelings with them. For even those who call themselves [intimate] know very little about each other -- hardly ever know just how a sorrow is felt, and hurt each other by their very attempts at sympathy or consolation. We can bear no hand on our bruises. And so I feel I have no right to say that I know how the loss of your mother -- [the only person who ever leaned on you] -- affects you. I only know that it must make a deeply felt crisis in your life, and I know that the better, from having felt a great deal about my own mother and father and from having the keenest remembrance of all that experience. But for this very reason, I know that I can't measure what the event is to you, and if I were near you I should only kiss you and say nothing. I cried over your letter and felt myself with you in all you were telling me about. People talk of the feelings dying out as one gets older -- but at present my experience is just the contrary. All the serious relations of life become so much more real to one -- pleasure seems so slight a thing, and sorrow and duty and endurance so great. I find the least bit of real human life touch me in a way it never did when I was younger.
I hope this letter will be sent to you at Ramsgate. That is a very nice place to take Harriet 1156 to -- it is so full of innocent enjoyment to counterbalance the hoops and the vanity of a watering place. 'abWhat a precious sister you are to her. I don't know any one else who could have fulfilled that duty so bravely and generously as you have done.'bb Cara, I dare say, is like you, worn and in need of rest and change. I hope she means to allow herself some by and bye. Give my best love to her and divide between you twenty kisses.
Mr. Lewes has been suffering a good deal for the last fortnight from his old trouble of singing in the ears and deafness, which often obliges him to leave off work. I am quite well again now, and better pleased with the heat than most people can be; it saves me the trouble of walking after breakfast to warm my feet.
Whenever you can spare me half an hour to tell me something about yourself, you will be doing a good deed.
Ever your affectionate
Marian.
MS: Yale. Extracts published: Cross, II, 44-45.
Luitpold Strasse | Munich | June 14. 58.
Dear Sara
My thoughts were very often with you in conjectures not far from the truth, before your letter came. 1155 It is a long while since it came -- for I have been very poorly and have not had energy to put a letter on paper, though I have been sometimes writing one in my mind. Words are very clumsy things -- I like less and less to handle my friends' sacred feelings with them. For even those who call themselves [intimate] know very little about each other -- hardly ever know just how a sorrow is felt, and hurt each other by their very attempts at sympathy or consolation. We can bear no hand on our bruises. And so I feel I have no right to say that I know how the loss of your mother -- [the only person who ever leaned on you] -- affects you. I only know that it must make a deeply felt crisis in your life, and I know that the better, from having felt a great deal about my own mother and father and from having the keenest remembrance of all that experience. But for this very reason, I know that I can't measure what the event is to you, and if I were near you I should only kiss you and say nothing. I cried over your letter and felt myself with you in all you were telling me about. People talk of the feelings dying out as one gets older -- but at present my experience is just the contrary. All the serious relations of life become so much more real to one -- pleasure seems so slight a thing, and sorrow and duty and endurance so great. I find the least bit of real human life touch me in a way it never did when I was younger.
I hope this letter will be sent to you at Ramsgate. That is a very nice place to take Harriet 1156 to -- it is so full of innocent enjoyment to counterbalance the hoops and the vanity of a watering place. 'abWhat a precious sister you are to her. I don't know any one else who could have fulfilled that duty so bravely and generously as you have done.'bb Cara, I dare say, is like you, worn and in need of rest and change. I hope she means to allow herself some by and bye. Give my best love to her and divide between you twenty kisses.
Mr. Lewes has been suffering a good deal for the last fortnight from his old trouble of singing in the ears and deafness, which often obliges him to leave off work. I am quite well again now, and better pleased with the heat than most people can be; it saves me the trouble of walking after breakfast to warm my feet.
Whenever you can spare me half an hour to tell me something about yourself, you will be doing a good deed.
Ever your affectionate
Marian.
Signature
Marian.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Munich, 14 June 1858, 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/94068