A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

118.
If facts about the moral world can become as distinct and as directly
. available to our· apprehension as the "so :.idity of objects," these f'acts
become features of public discourse, objective, subject to public consensus,
and not w~tters
of individual, private and inevitably egoistic
judgement. Intuitionism also provides a convenient escape from the
fact/value connundrum cited by Hume, when he comments on the frequency
with which His" statements are converted into lIought" statements without
any warning. 78 Again, if there are objectively discoverable
truths, we can see the f'orce of that disputed position of Plato and
Socrates which declares that it does not make sense to state that a man
can know what is right and still choose not to do it ..
It provides a
certainty that cannot be rejected. Intuitionism thus presents a moral
solution which frees at least some of our moral jUdgc;ments from the distorting
bias of egoistic desire. If there are infallible, objective
moral truths, then in the case of disagreement between two people, one
of them can be charged either with insincerity, or more damagingly
moral blindness. VIe can see with a certe.in irony, George Eliot herself
resisting the charge of insincerity in !the following somewhat acerbic
rebuke to Cara Bray at the time of her setting up house with Lewes.
No one can be better aware than yom"self that it is possible for
two people to hold different opinions 'On momen,:,QUS subjects with
equal sincerity and an equally earnest con\~ction that their
respective opinions are alone the truly moro.l ones. If' we differ
on the subject of the moral , I at least cO.n "believe of you
that 'you cleave to v/hat you believe to be Good, and I donlt
know of' anything in the nature of your views that should prevent
you from believing the same of me. 79
I view this letter with a certain irony because we have here an example
of George Eliot in her ovm life requiring and insisting on'
sanctity
of her .subjective, individualistic moral decision, a liberty, as we
shall see la'eer, she does not readily grant the charact ers 1m her
novels. A discussion of intuitionism by Jonathan Harrison provides a