George Eliot makes a bold statement about wealthy Mr. Glegg’s goodness of heart, until you get to the closing clause.  She has many such subtle ways of revealing human failing, which she records but rarely condemns overtly. Her writing also cautions readers against getting on their moral high horses to look down on the failings of others.

See a related quotation regarding Mr. Glegg’s excellent wife.

‘There was no humbug or hypocrisy about Mr. Glegg; his eyes would have watered with true feeling over the sale of a widow’s furniture, which a five-pound note from his side-pocket would have prevented.’

Source: George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), p. 129

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