l movements, and hence the higher moral life of the
present must be associated with national memories. The glorious
commonplaces of historic teaching, as well as of moral inspiration, are to
be found in the fact "that the preservation of national memories is an
element and a means of national greatness, that their revival is a sign of
reviving nationality, and that every heroic defender, every patriotic
restorer, has been inspired by such memories and has made them his
watchword." To reject such memories, such social influences, she regards as
"a blinding superstition," and says that the moral visions of a nation are
an effective bond which must be accepted by all its members. Two of her
most characteristic books are written to inculcate this teaching. In _The
Spanish Gypsy_ we learn that there is no moral strength and purpose for a
man like Don Silva, who repudiates his country, its memories and its
religion. The main purpose of _Daniel Deronda_ is to show how binding and
inspiring is the vision of moral truth and life which comes from
association even with the national memories of an outcast and alien people.

She wished to see individuals helped and good done in the present. She
makes Theophrastus Such, in the essay on "Looking Backward," speak her own
mind.

"All reverence and gratitude for the worthy dead on whose labors we
have entered, all care for the future generations whose lot we are
preparing; but some affection and fairness for those who are doing the
actual work of the world, some attempt to regard them with the same
freedom from ill-temper, whether on private or public grounds, as we
may hope will be felt by those who will call us ancient! Otherwise, the
looking before and after, which is our grand human privilege, is in
danger of turning to a sort of other-worldliness, breeding a more
illogical indifference or bitterness than was ever bred by the
ascetic's contemplation of heaven."

Again, she says that "the action by which we can do the best for future
ages is of the sort which has a certain beneficence and grace for
contemporaries." And this was not merely the teaching of her books, it was
the practice of her life. Miss Edith Simcox has made it clear that she was
zealously anxious to help men and women by personal effort. She tells us
that "George Eliot's sympathies went out more readily towards enthusiasm
for the discharge of duties than for the assertion of ri