A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

63 ..
circumstances of any kind whatever necessary "co the existence of
each determined organism. 20
The harmony between the living being and the correspondingmediu~
(as I shall call its environment) evidently characterises the
fundamental condition of life ••• one of the main distinctions between
the organic and the inorgeJ1ic regions is that inorganic phenomena,
from their greater simplicity and genm~ality, are produced
under almost any external influences which adrrdt of their existence
at all; while organic bodies are, from their complexity, and
the variety of actions always proceeding, very closely dependent
on the influences around them. Alldthe higher we ascend in the ranks
of organic bodies, the closer is this dependence, in proportion
to the diversity of functions; though, as we must bear in mind, the
power of the organism in modifying the influences of the medium
rises in proportion •••• At the other extremity we find Man, who
can live only by the concurrence of the most complex exterior
coniitions, atmospherical and terrestrial, under various physical
and chemical aspects; but, by an indispensable compensation, he
can endure, in all these conditions, much wid:r differences than
inferior organisms could support, because he has a superior power
of reacting on the surrounding system. 21
Comte ... vas a theorist, one of those whom Gall would have castigated
for working "in a closet."
22
Spencer we.s equally so, Vie can sympathise
with Darwin's complaint that "his conclusions never::;onvince me; and over
and over again I have said to myself, after reading.me of his descriptions,
tHere would be a fine subject for half a dozen year: t" work. t II 23 Spencer's
"metaphysical" 24 theories of evolution anticipated. ·s.rwin t s genuinely
scientific theories by several years. In an essay conceived in 18,54 and
published in the Westminster Review in 857 with the title "Progress: Its
b.awandCause"', he propounded. his belief, based on tLa theories of the
German embryologist K. E. von Baer, that all organis;u3 are evolvir..g towards
state:;> of increasing complexity. He writes that lIit is settled
beyond dispute that organic progress consists in a change from the homogeneous
to the heterogeneous. II 25 His optimism recB.'.ls William Paley's
argument from de~dgn for the existence ':>f God and tl:
beings", the air, the earth, the water all "teem:;i.ng
existence." 26 He tells us conf'idently, for example,
"myrian.s of happy
with delighted
that "this law of
organic progress is the law of all prog:::'ess.1/ 27 He then proceeds to
list the vast area to which this 18.W a.P?lies. 'tl,vheth!:;r it be in the