Do you think I can stay to become nothing to you? Do you think I am an automaton?—a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong!—I have as much soul as you,—and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh;—it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God’s feet, equal,—as we are!”
The soul, fortunately, has an interpreter—often an unconscious, but still a truthful interpreter—in the eye. My eye rose to his; and while I looked in his fierce face I gave an involuntary sigh; his gripe was painful, and my over-taxed strength almost exhausted.
The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.
“You will not come? You will not be my comforter, my rescuer? My deep love, my wild woe, my frantic prayer, are all nothing to you?”
“Little Jane’s love would have been my best reward,” he answered; “without it, my heart is broken. But Jane will give me her love: yes—nobly, generously.”
Up the blood rushed to his face; forth flashed the fire from his eyes; erect he sprang; he held his arms out; but I evaded the embrace, and at once quitted the room.
“Farewell!” was the cry of my heart as I left him. Despair added, “Farewell for ever!”
The grace and harmony of beauty are quite wanting in those features.”
Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilised by education: they grow there, firm as weeds among stones.
the pleasure arising from perfect congeniality of tastes, sentiments, and principles.
Whether is it better, I ask, to be a slave in a fool’s paradise at Marseilles—fevered with delusive bliss one hour—suffocating with the bitterest tears of remorse and shame the next—or to be a village-schoolmistress, free and honest, in a breezy mountain nook in the healthy heart of England?
God has given us, in a measure, the power to make our own fate; and when our energies seem to demand a sustenance they cannot get—when our will strains after a path we may not follow—we need neither starve from inanition, nor stand still in despair: we have but to seek another nourishment for the mind, as strong as the forbidden food it longed to taste—and perhaps purer; and to hew out for the adventurous foot a road as direct and broad as the one Fortune has blocked up against us, if rougher than it.
as sweet features as ever the temperate clime of Albion moulded; as pure hues of rose and lily as ever her humid gales and vapoury skies generated and screened, justified, in this instance, the term. No charm was wanting, no defect was perceptible; the young girl had regular and delicate lineaments; eyes shaped and coloured as we see them in lovely pictures, large, and dark, and full; the long and shadowy eyelash which encircles a fine eye with so soft a fascination; the pencilled brow which gives such clearness; the white smooth forehead, which adds such repose to the livelier beauties of tint and ray; the cheek oval, fresh, and smooth; the lips, fresh too, ruddy, healthy, sweetly formed; the even and gleaming teeth without flaw; the small dimpled chin; the ornament of rich, plenteous tresses—all advantages, in short, which, combined, realise the ideal of beauty, were fully hers. I wondered, as I looked at this fair creature: I admired her with my whole heart. Nature had surely formed her in a partial mood; and, forgetting her usual stinted step-mother dole of gifts, had endowed this, her darling, with a grand-dame’s bounty.
As she patted the dog’s head, bending with native grace before his young and austere master, I saw a glow rise to that master’s face. I saw his solemn eye melt with sudden fire, and flicker with resistless emotion. Flushed and kindled thus, he looked nearly as beautiful for a man as she for a woman. His chest heaved once, as if his large heart, weary of despotic constriction, had expanded, despite the will, and made a vigorous bound for the attainment of liberty. But he curbed it, I think, as a resolute rider would curb a rearing steed. He responded neither by word nor movement to the gentle advances made him.
暖冬cool夏 发表评论于
回复 '7grizzly' 的评论 : I am not surprised if you read it at college, and forgot most of it now. It is very well written, I shall say, and worth reading again in the future. I finished The old Man and the Sea yesterday, and was actually very puzzled how that book is a classic too, if there is no symbolism in the novel. The language is plain, and the plot is simple:)
Right, the definition of love changes throughout our life phases. Equality is a new concept at the time. Thanks, my friend, for your visits and comments.
7grizzly 发表评论于
I read it when I was in college, too ;-) and forgot most of it. In general,
I think the concept of "love" changes a lot as one goes through life.
One thing that stuck in mind was what the guy said to Jane: "My wife is here because my equal is here." something like that. Pretty smart.
又读到暖mm的文评，好开心。这两天还在理疗，不敢多用手机。虽然是旧话题，但《简爱》这部经典作还是有很多可以探讨的地方的。恕我直言，她最后选择留下，是因为罗残废了，她感觉他们平等了，心里踏实了，而且在某种程度上有了点救世主的高尚感，所以能做到义无反顾。别骂我这么说。：）我觉得年轻时在没有安全感的时候爱上一个人，那一定是真爱；随着年龄的增长，尤其是在彼此一起走过很长一段路后，能在某个瞬间，突然拉过你的手，说一句“I love you!” 我觉得这一定也是真爱。暖mm，我只是举了很多例子中的一个，其实真爱有很多定义的。你摘录的那些句子太美了，能写出这样美的句子肯定因为心里有一份真爱。：）相信暖mm写这篇评文时心里也涌动着一种情愫。。。
