Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre

by Charlotte Bronte

PREFACE

A preface to the first edition of "Jane Eyre" being unnecessary,
I gave none:  this second edition demands a few words both of
acknowledgment and miscellaneous remark.

My thanks are due in three quarters.

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

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

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

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

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

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

These things and deeds are diametrically opposed:  they are
as distinct as is vice from virtue.  Men too often confound them:
they should not be confounded:  appearance should not be mistaken
for truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate and
magnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-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 of separation between them.

The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has been
accustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make external
show pass for sterling 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 reveal charnel relics:  but hate as it will, it
is indebted to him.

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

There is a man in our own days whose words are not framed to tickle
delicate ears:  who, to my thinking, comes before the great ones
of society, much as the son of Imlah came before the throned Kings
of Judah and Israel; and who speaks truth as deep, with a power
as prophet-like and as vital -- a mien as dauntless and as daring.
Is the satirist of "Vanity Fair" admired in high places?  I cannot
tell; but I think if some of those amongst whom he hurls the Greek
fire of his sarcasm, and over whom he flashes the levin-brand
of his denunciation, were to take his warnings in time -- they or
their seed might yet escape a fatal Rimoth-Gilead.

Why have I alluded to this man?  I have alluded to him, Reader,
because I think I see in him an intellect profounder and more unique
than his contemporaries have yet recognised; because I regard him
as the first social regenerator of the day -- as the very master
of that working corps who would restore to rectitude the warped
system of things; because I think no commentator on his writings
has yet found the comparison that suits him, the terms which rightly
characterise 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 genius that the mere lambent
sheet-lightning playing under the edge of the summer-cloud does to
the electric death-spark hid in its womb.  Finally, I have alluded
to Mr. Thackeray, because to him -- if he will accept the tribute
of a total stranger -- I have dedicated this second edition of
"JANE EYRE."

CURRER BELL.

December 21st, 1847.

NOTE TO THE THIRD EDITION