JANE EYRE

by Charlotte Bronte

THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

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

Chenaanah 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 Ramoth-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.