Thanks to the authors of the past

When I was a teen, in my English class I learned about the Bronte sisters. I decided for a major report I was assigned, to read Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte pictured below. I LOVED it!!! I also read Wuthering Heights and loved it!!! I also read Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice around the same time and...wait for it....loved it!!! I noticed recently that there is a movie out about Jane Eyre and wanted to reread the book. So, I started last night. I got it for free on my Kindle. :-) I got a few paragraphs into the preface and was already hooked. I think Jane Eyre was the first full length novel I read of any real depth. I think the themes of morality, faith, independence, love, atonement, forgiveness, and family all spoke to me.

I am so excited to dig into Jane Eyre and then see the movie and probably be disappointed. :-) Here is the quote that grabbed me, written under the pen name of Currer Bell.

"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."

Can't wait to get my chores done and get back to it.

If you like this post, please share.