GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Weimar, 31 October [1854]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Weimar, 31 October [1854]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Weimar, 31 October [1854]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Sara Sophia Hennell
Date(s)
- 1854-10-31
Place
Weimar
Letter Content
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Weimar, 31 October [1854]
MS: Yale. Hitherto unpublished.
Kaufgasse, Weimar | Tuesday October 31.
My dear Sara
The mode in which you and Cara have interpreted both my words and my silence makes me dread lest in writing more I should only give rise to fresh misconceptions. I am so deeply conscious of having had neither the feeling nor the want of feeling which you impute to me that I am quite unable to read into my words, 534 quoted by you, the sense which you put upon them. When you say that I do not care about Cara's or your opinion and friendship it seems much the same to me as if you said that I didn't care to eat when I was hungry or to drink when I was thirsty. One of two things: either I am a creature without affection, on whom the memories of years have no hold, or, you, Cara and Mr. Bray are the most cherished friends I have in the world. It is simply self-contradictory to say that a person can be indifferent about her dearest friends; yet this is what you substantially say, when you accuse me of "boasting with what serenity I can give you up," of "speaking proudly" etc. The only reply I can give to such an accusation is an absolute denial that I have been actuated by such a spirit as you describe with regard to any one thing which I have written, done, or left undone.
You say: "You" shew that "you wish to have communication with Charles only." The reason why I wrote to Mr. Bray and not to you and Cara is simply this. Before I left England, I communicated, by Mr. Lewes's desire, certain facts in strict confidence to Mr. Bray and Mr. Chapman and I did so for special reasons which would not apply to any female friend. After your kind letters came to me, we heard much painful news from London as to reports which were partly a perversion of the truth, partly pure falsehood. I cannot, even now, see that I did anything deserving so severe a reproach as you send me, in writing to Mr. Bray who was already in possession of the main facts, and in intimating that my silence to you arose from no want of affection, but from what I, falsely perhaps, but still sincerely, regarded as the very reverse of pride and a spirit of boasting.
There is now no longer any secrecy to be preserved about Mr. Lewes's affairs or mine, and whatever I have written to Mr. Bray, I have written to you. I am under no foolish hallucinations about either the present or the future and am standing on no stilts of any kind. I wish to speak simply and to act simply but I think it can hardly be unintelligible to you that I shrink from writing elaborately about private feelings and circumstances. I have really felt it a privation that I have been unable to write to you about things not personal, in which I know you would feel a common interest, and it will brighten my thoughts very much to know that I may do so. Cara, you and my own sister are the three women who are tied to my heart by a cord which can never be broken and which really pulls me continually. My love for you rests on a past which no future can reverse, and offensive as the words seem to have been to you, I must repeat, that I can feel no bitterness towards you, however you may act towards me. If you remain to me what you have ever been, my life will be all the happier, and I will try not to be unworthy of your love so far as faithfulness to my own conscience can make me worthy of it.
I have written miserably ill, and I fear all the while I am writing that I may be giving rise to some mistake. But interpret my whole letter so as to make it accord with this plain statement -- I love Cara and you with unchanged and unchangeable affection, and while I retain your friendship I retain the best that life has given me next to that which is the deepest and gravest joy in all human experience.
Marian Evans.
MS: Yale. Hitherto unpublished.
Kaufgasse, Weimar | Tuesday October 31.
My dear Sara
The mode in which you and Cara have interpreted both my words and my silence makes me dread lest in writing more I should only give rise to fresh misconceptions. I am so deeply conscious of having had neither the feeling nor the want of feeling which you impute to me that I am quite unable to read into my words, 534 quoted by you, the sense which you put upon them. When you say that I do not care about Cara's or your opinion and friendship it seems much the same to me as if you said that I didn't care to eat when I was hungry or to drink when I was thirsty. One of two things: either I am a creature without affection, on whom the memories of years have no hold, or, you, Cara and Mr. Bray are the most cherished friends I have in the world. It is simply self-contradictory to say that a person can be indifferent about her dearest friends; yet this is what you substantially say, when you accuse me of "boasting with what serenity I can give you up," of "speaking proudly" etc. The only reply I can give to such an accusation is an absolute denial that I have been actuated by such a spirit as you describe with regard to any one thing which I have written, done, or left undone.
You say: "You" shew that "you wish to have communication with Charles only." The reason why I wrote to Mr. Bray and not to you and Cara is simply this. Before I left England, I communicated, by Mr. Lewes's desire, certain facts in strict confidence to Mr. Bray and Mr. Chapman and I did so for special reasons which would not apply to any female friend. After your kind letters came to me, we heard much painful news from London as to reports which were partly a perversion of the truth, partly pure falsehood. I cannot, even now, see that I did anything deserving so severe a reproach as you send me, in writing to Mr. Bray who was already in possession of the main facts, and in intimating that my silence to you arose from no want of affection, but from what I, falsely perhaps, but still sincerely, regarded as the very reverse of pride and a spirit of boasting.
There is now no longer any secrecy to be preserved about Mr. Lewes's affairs or mine, and whatever I have written to Mr. Bray, I have written to you. I am under no foolish hallucinations about either the present or the future and am standing on no stilts of any kind. I wish to speak simply and to act simply but I think it can hardly be unintelligible to you that I shrink from writing elaborately about private feelings and circumstances. I have really felt it a privation that I have been unable to write to you about things not personal, in which I know you would feel a common interest, and it will brighten my thoughts very much to know that I may do so. Cara, you and my own sister are the three women who are tied to my heart by a cord which can never be broken and which really pulls me continually. My love for you rests on a past which no future can reverse, and offensive as the words seem to have been to you, I must repeat, that I can feel no bitterness towards you, however you may act towards me. If you remain to me what you have ever been, my life will be all the happier, and I will try not to be unworthy of your love so far as faithfulness to my own conscience can make me worthy of it.
I have written miserably ill, and I fear all the while I am writing that I may be giving rise to some mistake. But interpret my whole letter so as to make it accord with this plain statement -- I love Cara and you with unchanged and unchangeable affection, and while I retain your friendship I retain the best that life has given me next to that which is the deepest and gravest joy in all human experience.
Marian Evans.
Signature
Marian Evans.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Weimar, 31 October [1854], 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/94137