Project Gutenberg's Critical Miscellanies (Vol 3 of 3), by John Morley

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Title: Critical Miscellanies (Vol 3 of 3)
The Life of George Eliot

Author: John Morley

Release Date: March 9, 2006 [EBook #17954]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CRITICAL MISCELLANIES (VOL 3 OF 3) ***

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CRITICAL

MISCELLANIES

BY
JOHN MORLEY

VOL. III.

Essay 4: The Life of George Eliot

London
MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1904

THE LIFE OF GEORGE ELIOT

On Literary Biography 93

As a mere letter-writer will not rank among the famous
masters 96

Mr. Myers's Essay 100

Letter to Mr. Harrison 107

Hebrew her favourite study 112

Limitless persistency in application 113

Romola 114

Mr. R.W. Mackay's _Progress of the Intellect_ 120

The period of her productions, 1856-1876 124

Mr. Browning 125

An aesthetic not a doctrinal teacher 126

Disliked vehemence 130

Conclusion 131

THE LIFE OF GEORGE ELIOT.[1]

The illustrious woman who is the subject of these volumes makes a remark
to her publisher which is at least as relevant now as it was then. Can
nothing be done, she asks, by dispassionate criticism towards the reform
of our national habits in the matter of literary biography? 'Is it
anything short of odious that as soon as a man is dead his desk should
be raked, and every insignificant memorandum which he never meant for
the public be printed for the gossiping amusement of people too idle to
reread his books?' Autobiography, she says, at least saves a man or a
woman that the world is curious about, from the publ