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About Hesperian student / (Lincoln [Neb.]) 1872-1885 | View Entire Issue (June 1, 1889)
THE HESPERIAN. tiM? of the armory can he given to an ouisiue organ ization for nothing, while the students are compelled to go down lown and pay ten or fifteen dollars for a hall? Let someone explain. GEORGE ELIOT. KNIGHT TRIZE ESSAY. JESSIE W. GOODEI.L. The present generation lives in the midst of a great out burst of thought and feeling and expression. Since the Renaissance of the Middle Ages, there has been such a grad ual increase in the woiks of literature that the world almost seems to ? nfTer from its fullness. The Humanists appear as giants of literary fame. It is only as the writer fades into the distance of the historical past, that his literary stature becomes gigantic. It is only by time and repute that man appears more than human. In the all-ahsoihing love for the great minds of history, there is little appreciation for the great minds of today. With better advantages, broader ideas, new impulses, new beliefs and more freedom of thought the product of the genius of the present age is greater than that of the past, but its promise and recognition must be in the future. To a century there arc three generations. It is only by the character of its generations that the century can leave its impress upon the world. The present century will live in the pages of history as an age remarkable for the recognition of woman. The chivalric loyalty paid the lady of gentle birth has grown into an cqnal respect for women. The women of today can add to the virtues of womanhood, cour age and learning, and stand as the peer of man. To each and every mind there must appear some one name of repute that exerts upon one a stronger influence than any oilier. I have only to turn to the names of the second generation of this century to point out the one that for me has an untold fascination, the name of George Eliot. She belongs to the present age and time. Let the pres ent generation honor Marion Evans, the woman. George Eliot and her books pass into h story, and future genera tions will worship them through the fallacious haze of time. Marion Evans was born in the year 1820 Ti I elements of her character were manifested while very young. Com bined with an affectionate dispo,'tion was an ambition that often collided with her devotion. From early childhood the eagerness for woik and the hope that she might do some thing, were constantly pressing her onward. The woman that wrote "We would never have loved the earth so well if we fiad had no childhood in it" seems never to have known the innocent childhood of which she speaks. The insatiable desire for learning, and the yearning for love were the inher ent qualities of her nature. Until womanhood, the fear that no one loved her, kept her constantly in moods of sadness. The longing for human love and for masterful ambition, sel dom reaches so high a stage as hers. Read the "Mill on the Floss," and read it with the knowledge that in the character of Maggie Tulliver she is telling to each individual rea'er the secrets of her heart and one will realize the terrible pas sion produced by this combination. Hut by the age of thirty, the ambition to" excel, began to bend to the strontjer emotion of the affection and her most ardent hope was to be given some woman's work. Before this, her book reviews and translations had gained for her a reputation among the literary circles, but did not satisfy her. It was not until Marjan Evans began to write her. novels that her intensely serious nature found an opportunity to accomplish some noble woik. Whatever she did, received her whole attention, and so devoted was she to her labor, that her novels seem almost a part of herself. Her wonder ful power was not so much in the delineation of a character already formed, as of its development. Her works arc studies of life. She has been censured on account of the weakness of her character. Marian Evans did not write trival stories that present irreproachable characters. She did not write j for the sake of showing a comparison between the fictitious and the living character. But she wrote to teach to the world tenderness, goodness, and most of all charity; and she produced human beings that call for tender tolerance, pity and sympathy. She knew the weakness of human nature. In one sad part of her life we can only accord to her the charity that was never refused by her. Her great love for mankind and her clear conception of character recognized the fact that tolcrancy was essential. Conscientious in all her writings, striving for the best good of mankind, despondent lest she should fail, her books embody all that she lclt. But in the words of Dr. Duryea, "Intellect as the end the will as the means ol accomplishing the end," and the result will not be a failure. Marian Evans had the intellect and the will and the result was a success. The product of intelligence and sincerity is logic, and her earnest concentration to her task and her sincere desire to accomplish some good produced the mind of a logician. For many, her refusal to accept religion clouds her otherwise noble life. Her mind was too strnng, too independent, lo conform to what she could not believe; her character too honest to act a part she did not feel. No one, that has been born with the inherent qualities of faith, can know the feel ing of one that earnestly desires to be a Christian and yet cannot. She prayed for light, but it was not given her, and the great love for humanity became her religion. A noted lawyer of this state in his plea for the life of a woman charged with murder, said: "The mind is the passage of the soul on its way to eternity." Marian Evans took the talents given her as trusts from God, aud returned them ten fold. Her field of thought has left many guides for the furtherance of intellectual and moral development. By faithful concentration to her work she has taught the world love, sympathy and charity. Surely her mind would light her soul through the gates of eternity. Well might she have said, "An honest man or woman, a sweet and loving child has nothing to fear cither in this world or the world to come, and upon that rock I stand." Marian Evans was honest. LITERARY. There is no doubt at all, that if the new dictionary that the Century company is publishing, is as goad as they say it is, that the work will meet with great success, for there is great need of such a dictionary in every educational institu tion. A book, or set of books, that will give the etymology, meaning and derivation of a word, together with a complete description of the the thing to which it applies, is certainly a great improvement, and a great convenience. It will be a dictionary and encyclopedia combined. V The worst thing about a book that gains a great notoriety is the flood of imitations that immediately follow. Some one told me not long ago that there had been a book written as a kind of antidote to "Robert Elsmcrc." Such writing as this honk must he has onlv onp ns. Tf "T?ft1ipr Tlemw. 'was a bad book the "antidote" is worse than bad, for unless
