Jane Eyre: Full Text

A preface to the first edition of “Jane Eyre” being unnecessary, Igave none: this second edition demands a few words both of acknowledgment andmiscellaneous remark.

My thanks are due in three quarters.

To the Public, for the indulgent ear it has inclined to a plain tale with fewpretensions.

To the Press, for the fair field its honest suffrage has opened to an obscureaspirant.

To my Publishers, for the aid their tact, their energy, their practical senseand frank liberality have afforded an unknown and unrecommended Author.

The Press and the Public are but vague personifications for me, and I mustthank them in vague terms; but my Publishers are definite: so are certaingenerous critics who have encouraged me as only large-hearted and high-mindedmen know how to encourage a struggling stranger; to them, i.e., to myPublishers and the select Reviewers, I say cordially, Gentlemen, I thank youfrom my heart.

Having thus acknowledged what I owe those who have aided and approved me, Iturn to another class; a small one, so far as I know, but not, therefore, to beoverlooked. I mean the timorous or carping few who doubt the tendency of suchbooks as “Jane Eyre:” in whose eyes whatever is unusual is wrong;whose ears detect in each protest against bigotry—that parent ofcrime—an insult to piety, that regent of God on earth. I would suggest tosuch doubters certain obvious distinctions; I would remind them of certainsimple truths.

Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attackthe first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of thePharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns.

These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they are as distinct as isvice from virtue. Men too often confound them: they should not be confounded:appearance should not be mistaken for truth; narrow human doctrines, that onlytend to elate and magnify a few, should not be substituted for theworld-redeeming creed of Christ. There is—I repeat it—a difference;and it is a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly the line ofseparation between them.

The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has beenaccustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make external show pass forsterling worth—to let white-washed walls vouch for clean shrines.It may hate him who dares to scrutinise and expose—to rase the gilding,and show base metal under it—to penetrate the sepulchre, and revealcharnel relics: but hate as it will, it is indebted to him.

Ahab did not like Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerning him, butevil; probably he liked the sycophant son of Chenaanah better; yet might Ahabhave escaped a bloody death, had he but stopped his ears to flattery, andopened them to faithful counsel.

There is a man in our own days whose words are not framed to tickle delicateears: who, to my thinking, comes before the great ones of society, much as theson of Imlah came before the throned Kings of Judah and Israel; and who speakstruth as deep, with a power as prophet-like and as vital—a mien asdauntless and as daring. Is the satirist of “Vanity Fair” admiredin high places? I cannot tell; but I think if some of those amongst whom hehurls the Greek fire of his sarcasm, and over whom he flashes the levin-brandof his denunciation, were to take his warnings in time—they or their seedmight yet escape a fatal Rimoth-Gilead.

Why have I alluded to this man? I have alluded to him, Reader, because I thinkI see in him an intellect profounder and more unique than his contemporarieshave yet recognised; because I regard him as the first social regenerator ofthe day—as the very master of that working corps who would restore torectitude the warped system of things; because I think no commentator on hiswritings has yet found the comparison that suits him, the terms which rightlycharacterise his talent. They say he is like Fielding: they talk of his wit,humour, comic powers. He resembles Fielding as an eagle does a vulture:Fielding could stoop on carrion, but Thackeray never does. His wit is bright,his humour attractive, but both bear the same relation to his serious geniusthat the mere lambent sheet-lightning playing under the edge of thesummer-cloud does to the electric death-spark hid in its womb. Finally, I havealluded to Mr. Thackeray, because to him—if he will accept the tribute ofa total stranger—I have dedicated this second edition of“JANE EYRE.”

CURRER BELL.

December 21st, 1847.