"
The lesson comes to us in the quiet unselfish love, the sweet hourly self-
devotion of the "Milly" of Amos Barton, so touchingly free and full that
it never recognises itself as self-devotion at all. In "Mr Gilfil's Love-
Story" we have it taught affirmatively through the deep unselfishness of
Mr Gilfil's love to Tina, and his willingness to offer up even this, the
one hope and joy of his life, upon the altar of duty; negatively, through
the hard, cold, callous, self-pleasing of Captain Wybrow--a type of
character which, never repeated, is reproduced with endless variations
and modifications in nearly all the author's subsequent works. It is,
however, in "Janet's Repentance" that the power of the author is put most
strongly forth, and also that what we conceive to be the vital aim of her
works is most definitely and firmly pronounced. Here also we have
illustrated that breadth of nature, that power of discerning the true and
good under whatsoever external form it may wear, which is almost a
necessary adjunct of the author's true and large ideal of the Christian
life.
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