stories of the past.  Few of his novels are the entire creations of his own mind; but he used every hint and suggestion he could find as the basis of his work.  In this, George Eliot is no more a realist than either of her great predecessors.  Even Goldsmith and Fielding were no more creative and original than she, for they depended as much as she on the occurrences of real life for their plots.  All genuine novelists have drawn their materials from the life about them, and they could not attain success otherwise.  All depends, however, on how the material thus used is made to bear its results.  If Charlotte Bronte borrowed more from actual life of event and scenery, yet she was not more a realist; rather her power lies in something higher than realism, in that subtle insight and creative power which gives originality to her work.  She was an idealist keeping close to the actual; and in this fact is to be found her superiority to George Eliot in certain directions.  George Eliot studied life accurately and intimately, but she did not tie herself to any individual occurrences or persons.  She had so absorbed the spirit of the life amidst which she lived, as to give a true expression to it under an almost purely fictitious garb.

There is less of distinct teaching in the Scenes of Clerical Life than in George Eliot’s later novels.  Yet even in these earlier stories there is to be found many a clear indication of her thought.  In “Amos Barton” she has especially set forth her sympathy with humble life.  This fundamental canon of her art is presented more distinctly in this story, and dwelt upon more fully, than in any of her subsequent novels.  It would be difficult to discover any special teaching in “Mr. Gilfil’s Love Story;” and this is perhaps the only production of George Eliot’s pen which has not some distinct object beyond the telling of the story itself.  The religious motif is strong in Janet’s Repentance, and not to be mistaken by any attentive reader who now for the first time takes up the story.  The value of religion as a reforming force is plainly inculcated, as well as that the main and only value of that force is altruistic.  It presents a fine picture of the Evangelical movement and its work, though mainly on its humanitarian side.  Its deeper spirit of devotion, its loftier religious ideal, its craving after a more intimate realization of the divine presence, is not portrayed.  The real purport of the story is contained in its closing words, where the reader is told that the true memorial left behind him by Edgar Tryan is to be found in a life saved to all noble thing’s by his efforts.

It is Janet Dempster, rescued from self-despair, strengthened with divine hopes, and now looking back on years of purity and helpful labor.  The man who has left such a memorial behind him must have been one whose heart beat with true compassion, and whose lips were moved by fervent faith.

These Scenes of Clerical Life surpass all George