he proof that
I share them. How otherwise could I get the discernment?--for even what
we are averse to, what we vow not to entertain, must have shaped or
shadowed itself within us as a possibility before we can think of
exorcising it. No man can know his brother simply as a spectator.

After the second essay Theophrastus disappears, and no further hint is
given that it is he who is the reputed author. This slight fictitious
machinery is too weak to carry the load put upon it. The reader soon feels
that it is George Eliot who is talking, and the opinions put forth, the
sentiments expressed, are recognized as her own. Indeed, it would have been
better, so the reader may probably come to say to himself, if this
attempted disguise had been entirely dispensed with. By the time he has
reached the sixth essay, "Only Temper," the discerning reader, familiar
with George Eliot's books, will be ready to affirm that this is no other
than the author herself speaking very frankly and finely her own
sentiments. In this essay the moral temper of her mind appears, and her
strong inclination to subordinate the individual to the social requirements
of life.

These papers are modelled on those of the great essay-making period in
English literature. Old-fashioned names are adopted, which have a greater
or less significance in connection with the purpose of the essay. The man
with the excitable temper is called Touchwood, while the man who slides
into a deferential acceptance of opinions made for him is Mixtus. This
method of the old essayists seems antiquated, cumbersome and unsuitable to
the subjects discussed. The persons described lose their individuality by
its use, and the reader forgets that they were meant to be creatures of
flesh and blood. For the most part, they are mere abstractions, mere
figures of straw, to be knocked over by the ingenious pen of the author.
Some special fault or sin is given the name of a personality, but it is too
much isolated from actual existence to produce the impression of a living
thing.

These essays much resemble occasional chapters in her novels, and might
have been studies for a new work. They are studies simply, done with a fine
skill and polish, but fragmentary. The large setting of her novels is
needed to give them relief and proportion. They disappoint as they are, for
the satire is too apparent, and we do not see these characters in action,
where their follies would obtain for