Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte is the classic novel about a plain young woman in the early nineteenth century. She is born an orphan and outcasted by her only known living family as early as she can remember. Jane is sent to Lowood, a boarding school with rueful circumstances and lacking the bare necessities of the health of its students. Throughout Jane’s stay at Lowood its condition improves, with the help of local wealthy benefactors, and she eventually decides to leave the boundaries of Lowood. She takes a job as a governess at the Thornfield estate and falls in love with its master, Mr. Rochester, and agrees to marry him. As complications arise and the consequences of their love seeming to become increasingly apparent to Jane, if she were to marry him, she leaves. Her leaving brings her to meet her cousins, by chance. Finally, she ends up back with Mr. Rochester and spends the rest of her life with him. Throughout the novel, Bronte seems to have an indistinct, yet very significant, theme: religion. Bronte uses Jane Eyre to represent Christianity as a source of hope.
An important character in Jane Eyre is Helen Burns. Helen is the only student Jane ever mentions to have befriended while at Lowood*** . Bronte first establishes Helen’s character before she explains her piety, “I saw the girl with whom I had conversed in the verhanda dismissed and disgraced, by Miss Scatcherd from a history class and sent to stand in the middle of the large school-room. The punishment seemed to me in a high degree ignominious, especially for so great a girl—she looked thirteen or upward. I expected she would show signs of great distress and shame; but, my surprise, she neither wept nor blushed. Composed though grave she stood the central mark of all eyes.” (54) It was important for Bronte to establish Helen’s character before describing her relationship with God because it represented that Helen was much different from other girls her age. Jane expects that Helen “would show signs of great distress and shame.” Helen maintains a “composed but grave” appearance while accepting a punishment that Jane sees as something deserving embarrassment. Throughout her time at Lowood, Helen is reproached constantly and harshly for considerably petty things, such as not cleaning her nails. She never disobeys or shows any sign of rebellion to her punishments. This makes it so that when Bronte finally does introduce the importance of religion to Helen, it creates a specific initial impression for the reader when Helen’s devotion to religion is revealed. It makes her piety more profound to the reader.
Jane was punished by standing on a stool in front of the entire classroom and, unlike the aforementioned reaction that Helen had, Jane is embarrassed and ashamed. She is later comforted by Helen. Helen tells Jane that Christianity will heal her if she follows its teachings, “‘It is not violence that best overcomes hate—nor vengeance that most certainly heals injury.’ ‘What then?’ ‘Read the New Testament, and observe what Christ says, and how he acts—make his word your rule and his conduct your example.’ ‘What does he say?’ ‘Love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do good to them that hate you and despitefully use you.’” (61) Bronte uses Helen to represent religion as a source of hope. This is the reason why the establishment of the harsh punishments she receives and her reactions is significant to the introduction of religion. Despite everything that she has been put through, she still strongly believes in the teachings of Christianity and tries to relate this to Jane. Bronte gives Helen confidence when she talks to Jane about religion and this could represent how strong her belief is. Helen’s strong and steady belief, throughout all of her hardship, always has Christianity. Her devotion to God is what guides her through her short lifetime and presents her hope and happiness in devoting herself to Christianity.
After Lowood, Jane becomes a governess at the Thornfield estate and falls in love with the owner, Mr. Rochester. When complications in their relationship arise, Jane leaves Thornfield with only a loaf of bread and only enough money to get her to the nearest town. Without any plan, she becomes starving, hungry and homeless until she comes to the doorstep of Moor House. After being rejected by Hannah, the servant, St. John Rivers admitted her into their household and gave her shelter, food and care while she recovered. Jane eventually learned that she was a cousin to St. John and his sisters, Diana and Mary.
Jane was always able to connect with Diana and Mary and enjoyed their company. However she was not able to establish this same connection with St. John. St. John is a complex character. As Bronte describes St. John’s initial relationship with Jane, “He seemed of a reserved, an abstracted, and even a brooding nature. Zealous in his ministerial labors, blameless in his life and habits, he yet did not appear to enjoy that mental serenity, that inward content, which should be the reward of every sincere Christian and practical philanthropist.” (408) Bronte seems to establish the character of St. John in a similar way that she described Helen Burns, first describing Jane’s initial impression of them and then introducing the intensity of their belief in Christianity. The way that Bronte introduces these characters gives the reader a different perspective of the effects that their piety has on the overall character.
Earlier in the novel Jane describes the first sermon she heard, given by St. John, “Throughout there was a strange bitterness; an absence of consolatory gentleness; stern allusion to Calvinistic doctrines—election, predestination, reprobation—were frequent; and each reference to these points sounded like a sentence pronounced for doom. When he had done, instead of feeling better, calmer, more enlightened by his discourse, I experienced an inexpressible sadness.” (409) This could relate to St. John’s own perception of Christianity. “‘Election’ and ‘reprobation’ refer to God’s predetermination of salvation and damnation.” (Susan Ostrov Weisser) This perception of Christianity could represent that St. John considers “election, predestination, and reprobation” very important in religion. His view is realistic and does not represent religion as an escape from life or as a promise of a better life. The reader could interpret this as the absence of hope. However, further on in the novel she explains more about St. John’s relationship with religion.
From what Bronte tells about St. John, he has had a miserable life up until he decides to become a missionary, “After a season of darkness and struggling, light broke and relief fell; my cramped existence all at once spread out to a plain without bounds—my powers heard a call from Heaven rise, gather their full strength, spread their wings and mount beyond ken. God had an errand for me; to bear which afar […]. A missionary I resolved to be. From that moment my state of mind changed; the fetters dissolved and dropped from every faculty, leaving nothing of bondage but its galling soreness—which time only can heal.”(420) Before religion Bronte describes St. John’s life as being full of “darkness and struggling” and, when looking back, St. John did not receive relief until he “resolved to be a missionary.” Bronte uses St. John’s experiences to portray the immediate relief and that which can come from devotion to God. The way she constructs the aforementioned text implies that religion immediately brought hope, or a “light,” into his life. For St. John, Christianity freed his mind and allowed him to have a better life after all the “darkness and struggling.” Bronte represents Christianity as a source of hope for St. John and provides him with contentedness, simply in exchange for his piety.
Religion as a source of hope seems to be an underlying concept in Jane Eyre. However, the reader could infer that it is a very powerful theme. The last lines of the novel concern St. John’s approaching death and how he does not fear or avoid it, but welcomes it as a sign from God, “his master.” While the rest of Jane Eyre seems to be more about the romance between Mr. Rochester and Jane, the last lines of the novel do not conclude their story. They conclude the meaning of God and Christianity, as interpreted by Bronte. After everything that happens to Helen and St. John, each facing a death not occurring from old age, religion still provides hope for both. A punishment for Helen is a chance for self improvement. Hardships for St. John eventually became a chance for to triumph. And for each, death was not an ending, but a calling from God. Bronte uses St. John and Helen to represent the hope that religion can provide.
***One could infer that Helen actually affects Jane’s perception of religion for the rest of her life. She was Jane’s close friend during her childhood and she was always content and confident with her God. This could have inspired Jane and affected her perception and involvement in religion. Helen’s friendship with Jane being a very positive influence on her childhood probably morphed her idea of religion from the time of their friendship to the rest of her life because Helen most likely had the most influence on Jane at the instrumental stage of her childhood development.