A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

20.
The intricacies of human nature, the fact, for instance, as George
Eliot tells us, that "our speech even when we are most single-minded
can never ta.ke its line absolutely from one impulse," 48 and the complex
inter-relationships within society are neither "homogeneCAls" nor
"commensurable." Thus they produce emergent effects. There is always
likely to be some undetectable factor which complicates our understanding
of the p:rocessof interaction, or leaves us in doubt as to i:ts
result. In a similar vein, Francois Jacob, describing the increasing
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sophistication of response in living organisms, ,~ites
that
Together with the capacity of response to stimi1i, the degrees
of freedom left to the organism in the choice of responses also
increase. In man, the number of possible responses becomes so
high that one can speak of the "free will" so dear to philOsophers.
But flexibility has its limits. Even when the programme
gives the organism only an ability, that of learning, for
instance, it imposes restrictions on what can be learnt, on when
learning is to take place and under what conditions •••• man must
still be in a favourable environment at a certain stage of his
development in order to fulfil this potential. 49
As Jacob indicates, in biological terms, unlimited freedom is an i11us-
ion. Greater sophistication of response does not confer freedom. We still
have to obey certain laws which prescribe how, when, and where development
can take place. He also reveals that there is a precariousness, that there
are manifold ways in which environment may not be favourable and deve10pment,
as a result, may be inhibited or stunted.
George Eliot gives a striking instance of this precariousness in
Romolawhe:re we learn that the heroine's potential for growth was lying
dormant until she came under the charismatic spell of Savonarola's persona1ity.
"Romola had had contact with no mind that could stir the larger
possibilities of her nature; they lay folded and crushed like embryonic
wings, making no element in her consciousness beyond an occasional vague
uneasiness p " 50 The possibility far spiritual growth was there but it had
to wait foX' the right "conditions."