A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

90.
offers various ways in which they struggle upwards. Some grow through
BufTering; others adopt an ideal self towards which they strive. The
most characteristic way, however, in which George Eliot has one character
"eracrae from moral stupidity" 7 is by means of the influence on her
of some stronger, morally more sensitive person. In an atmosphere of
openness and trust, similar to the confessional, the lesser charaoter
achieves moral growth. In this technique of depicting character growth,
George Eliot reveals the similarity between her thought and that of
Ludwig Feuerbach, whose The Essence of Christianity she v:ras translating
during the crucial time when she was deciding to set up house. openly
with Lewes. Her compassionate concern for the individual and the importance
she gave to interpersonal relationships show that she belongs to
that tradition of humanistic ethical writers which contains such diverse
figures as Butler, Feuerb8.ch, Ms.rcel, Buber, and Kierkegaard.
This brief analysis of George Eliot's moral thought shoVls something
of the importance of her belief in the possibility of moral growth. We
have ranged from a more impersonal and general world of evolutionary
ethics to an intensely personal and individual world where the effeot
of one personality on another is paramount.
Let us now oXIlr:line in greater detail the nineteenth century attempt
to find moral sanctions outside the traditional confinements of the
Christian religion.