Moral Problems in the Major Characters of George Eliot’s Adam Bede

Adam Bede (1859) is the first full length novel written by George Eliot. In this hovel both Hetty and. Arthur suffer for their violating moral principles. Poignant tragedy ensues because of their being creatures of weak moral fibre. This moral weakness results in sin and this is followed by punishment and intense suffering. The Arthur -Hetty story traces the movement from weakness to sin and from sin to nemesis. Hetty’s tragedy is woven through certain episodes that spring from her moral weakness. In the light of these moral issues that the novel, Adam Bede is to be read.

George Eliot's novels are all dramas of moral conflict. She did not believe in the principle of art for art's sake, but in the art for the sake of morality. She believes in the fact that men's deeds determine their ethical impulses as much as men determine their deeds. If we yield to temptation and sin, suffering and nemesis are sure to follow. We have to reap the consequences of our own action. Her characters suffer because they violate some moral codes.
In Adam Bede both Hetty and Arthur suffer for their violating moral principles.
Poignant tragedy ensues because of their being creatures of weak moral fibre. This moral weakness results in sin and this is followed by punishment and intense suffering. The Arthur -Hetty story traces the movement from weakness to sin and from sin to nemesis. Hetty's tragedy is woven through certain episodes that spring from her moral weakness. It Is In the light of these moral issues that the novel, Adam Bede is to be read.
In his book, Twilight of the Idols, the 19th century German philosopher Nietzse criticises George Eliot in the following words: They have got rid of the Christian God, and now felt obliged to cling all the more firmly to Christian morality. Christianity is a system, a consistently thought-out and complete Mr. Irwin may be correct in his argument on the basis of the Christian tenet but it is, in fact, too harsh to demand perfect stoicism from Adam at this moment as his sentiment must be judged sympathetically and this is to be done in the light of the immense mental torture he has experienced. The woman, he hoped to marry, is in danger of being hanged. The blow is so unexpected and sudden that he is shocked and confused.
This episode is quite significant in the study of Adam's character as for the first time True to Mr. Irwin's estimation Arthur proved at last to be a man with a heart and conscience and not coldly selfish. He gets remorsestricken at the sight of Hetty's ordeal. He takes out Hetty's handkerchief whenever he is alone and sheds tears. This is a tangible sign of misery and his inner sufferings. At the end of the fifth book Arthur acknowledges and spells out his guilt to Adam and thus his moral regeneration begins.

The contrast between the two main female characters -Dinah Morris and Hetty
Sorrel, is also carefully developed. Dinah represents the moral centre of the novel. Dinah is more than simply a charismatic personality. Her exceptional disinterestedness impresses everyone, even Hetty. Dinah's power is the power of tact which proceeds from acute and ready sympathy.She is careful not to oppose any feeling, but it is also the power of touch that provides physical reassurance. Dinah grows out of the habit of vision. She moves from inspirational talk to silent feeling. In the scene of the expected execution of Hetty, it is the embrace of Dinah which counts for the trembling Hetty, who clung to her and clutched her as the only visible sign of love and pity. Dinah embodies comfort and solace. Dinah's dealing with Lisbeth Bede and Hetty Sorrel in their moment of distress is truly admirable. It also shows that she never pushes her common sense and feeling into a radical questioning of her faith. It sometimes appears that Dinah is not just one who prays, but herself an object of worship.
On the other hand, in George Eliot's world morally frivolous Hetty plays a vital role.
Hetty, we are told, is entirely uninfluenced either by religious hopes or fears. In fact, her mental life is barely above that of an intelligent animal. www.ijellh.com funeral service, because Arthur does not turn up there. It is only the fear of public criticism which impels Hetty to deceive everyone over her misfortunes . Her guilty mind is always apprehensive of being exposed and so she tries to suppress her baby's cries and finally to cause its death.
In the end the fear of everlasting punishment induces Hetty to speak the truth to Dinah apologises to Adam and forgives Arthur. Apart from the influence of extreme terror Hetty never softens. Hetty Sorrel's negligent abandonment of her tender, helpless and nameless child to its death is an unpardonable crime. Infanticide rouses condemnation stronger than those evoked by any other kind of murder.
Unsympathetic as she is, Hetty Sorrel, however, has one feature on which sympathy may be built, the basic human desire to live. During her wandering in search of Arthur she clings to life only as the hunted brute clings to it. It is due to George Eliot's technique of narration that Hetty's journey to Windsor and subsequent events evoke strong empathy with a figure whose every act is self-centred.Hetty curses her love, hates her baby like a heavy weight.
Just as the narrative in the first book circles round Hetty's physical presence, so after her imprisonment there is a similar indirect circuitous approach to her mind. Her appearance in courts hardly lessens our sense of remoteness. She is no more than an image totally unresponsive except to her uncle's name. The legal evidences give no clue to her inner life, still they are suggestive. In fact truth about her cannot be uncovered by a legal process. Dinah. This embrace is impersonalit simply restores her to human society by making it possible for her to confess. This confession reveals the fact that infanticide is an action of an instinctively subnormal girl who is incapable of maternal affection towards her own baby.
But a modern leader may try to soften Hetty's crime in interpreting it in the light of Hetty's psychological trauma. She is simply torn by agony and compunction.
Though she has the feeling that the world is reproaching her and there is a painful stirring of maternal instinct in her, but the bruise within her is the effect largely of mental emptiness, The horror of this situation is that a barely human creature, who stares at Dinah, is intelligent enough to know that she is going to be hanged.
These two ideas -Hetty's minimal humanity and her impending death -are equally necessary in bringing one of the novel's most important insights into focus. In the last chapter of the second volume George Eliot laments as to why there is so much sorrow in the religion of human beings.
With Hetty's narrow, shallow and hard interior life, she is an atheist. The relentless attention given to her inner emptiness has turned her to be so. Her faith in God has ceased.
She gets so frightned as to understand that she is going to be hanged for killing her baby.
However, Hetty's death at this stage would have made consideration of broader issues very difficult. In the last brilliantly staged encounter between Arthur and Adam, George www.ijellh.com her fiction, George Eliot apparently is able to broaden the range of her teaching in her subsequent novels which will involve intellectual assimilation and assent.