In Chapter 2, Eliot compares Silas Marner's desire for gold to his need for sustenance using simile, personification, and sensory language. Silas has been hoarding his earnings for so long that just having the pot of gold coins and watching the pile grow is the most satisfying thing he does:
He began to think it [the money] was conscious of him, as his loom was, and he would on no account have exchanged those coins, which had become his familiars, for other coins with unknown faces. He handled them, he counted them, till their form and colour were like the satisfaction of a thirst to him; but it was only in the night, when his work was done, that he drew them out to enjoy their companionship.
The money has ceased to be just a pile of physical objects to Silas; the coins themselves are precious to him individually. Each coin is a friend. Eliot says he would "on no account" trade or exchange them, as he feels that the money is self-aware, and the pile's growing size brings him comfort. The reader can sense how intensely he feels about his treasure as he fondles and coos over it, craving its presence. It is of note here that Eliot contrasts a very tangible, touchable thing (coins, not "wealth") with thirst, a need of Silas's physical body. This association between the real and the psychological pervades the whole passage. Three verbs describing obsession appear one after the other—"handled," "counted," "drew"— all words which refer to both mental and physical action. Through this tactile language, the reader sees that accumulating and protecting the gold has consumed Silas body and soul.
The way that Eliot personifies the gold in this passage also emphasizes the weaver's loneliness. Silas's work isolates him from the world, and his reliance on the gold for "company" is a sad substitute for human love. When Eppie enters the story as Silas's replacement "treasure," she brings him happiness and real companionship. She is a real solution to Silas's problem, whereas the gold only made his detachment from society worse.
