Jane Eyre Education Quotes

Each picture told a story; mysterious often to my undeveloped understanding and imperfect feelings, yet ever profoundly interesting: as interesting as the tales Bessie sometimes narrated on winter evenings, when she chanced to be in good humour; and when, having brought her ironing-table to the nursery-hearth, she allowed us to sit about it, and while she got up Mrs. Reed’s lace frills, and crimped her night-cap borders, fed our eager attention with passages of love and adventure taken from the old fairy tales and older ballads or (as at a later period I discovered) from the pages of Pamela, and Henry, Earl of Moreland.
With Bewick on my knee, I was then happy: happy at least in my way.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 1. From early in her life Jane is eager to learn about the world and she soaks up knowledge from books and tales told to her by her nursemaid Bessie Lee. Bessie shows some kindness by reading to her. This passage emphasies 10-year-old Jane’s isolation as she sits alone in a window seat reading Bewick’s History of British Birds, where each picture has a story to tell her.

I scarcely knew what school was; Bessie sometimes spoke of it as a place where young ladies sat in the stocks, wore backboards, and were expected to be exceedingly genteel and precise; John Reed hated his school, and abused his master: but John Reed’s tastes were no rule for mine, and if Bessie’s accounts of school-discipline (gathered from the young ladies of a family where she had lived before coming to Gateshead) were somewhat appalling, her details of certain accomplishments attained by these same ladies were, I thought, equally attractive. She boasted of beautiful paintings of landscapes and flowers by them executed; of songs they could sing and pieces they could play, of purses they could net, of French books they could translate; till my spirit was moved to emulation as I listened. Besides, school would be a complete change: it implied a long journey, an entire separation from Gateshead, an entrance into a new life.
“I should indeed like to go to school,” was the audible conclusion of my musings.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 3. When apothecary Mr. Lloyd asks Jane if she would like to go to school, she embraces it as an opportunity to escape from the tyranny of Gateshead and begin a new life. She knows little about school, but while John Reed hates it and abuses his teacher, Jane refuses to be ruled by his bad tastes. Instead she learns her understanding of girls’ education from servant Bessie. Bessie’s account of the accomplishments attained by young ladies in school – in painting, singing and studying French books – inspires Jane. Jane sees education as her gateway to freedom from the oppression of the Reeds.

I had meant to be so good, and to do so much at Lowood; to make so many friends, to earn respect, and win affection. Already I had made visible progress: that very morning I had reached the head of my class; Miss Miller had praised me warmly; Miss Temple had smiled approbation; she had promised to teach me drawing, and to let me learn French, if I continued to make similar improvement two months longer: and then I was well-received by my fellow-pupils; treated as an equal by those of my own age, and not molested by any: now, here I lay again crushed and trodden on; and could I ever rise more?

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 8. Education is very important to Jane who is eager to use her time in Lowood School to improve herself in subjects like art and French. She also yearns for respect and affection, which she did not experience while in Gateshead. She reports progress with the help of the kindly and compassionate Miss Temple. But she now feels crushed again by Mr. Brocklehurst’s public humiliation of her.

They conversed of things I had never heard of; of nations and times past; of countries far away: of secrets of nature discovered or guessed at: they spoke of books: how many they had read! What stores of knowledge they possessed! Then they seemed so familiar with French names and French authors: but my amazement reached its climax when Miss Temple asked Helen if she sometimes snatched a moment to recall the Latin her father had taught her, and taking a book from a shelf, bade her read and construe a page of Virgil; and Helen obeyed, my organ of Veneration expanding at every sounding line.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 8. Jane’s love of knowledge and learning is evident in this passage where she describes the lively conversation Miss Temple and Helen have on a range of diverse topics. She pays close attention to and soaks up everything they discuss. She is particularly excited when Helen at Miss Temple’s prompting does a reading from a book by the Roman poet Virgil.

Thus relieved of a grievous load, I from that hour set to work afresh, resolved to pioneer my way through every difficulty: I toiled hard, and my success was proportionate to my efforts; my memory, not naturally tenacious, improved with practice; exercise sharpened my wits; in a few weeks I was promoted to a higher class; in less than two months I was allowed to commence French and drawing. I learned the first two tenses of the verb Être, and sketched my first cottage…on the same day. That night, on going to bed, I forgot to prepare in imagination the Barmecide supper of hot roast potatoes, or white break and new milk, with which I was wont to amuse my inward cravings: I feasted instead on the spectacle of ideal drawings, which I saw in the dark; all the work of my own hands.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 8. After Jane’s name is cleared of the false charges Brocklehurst leveled against her, Jane returns to her studies with a new energy. She quickly rises to a higher class and soon is excelling in French and drawing. That night in bed, she even fantasizes about her drawing homework instead of food.

I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had the courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 10. Jane is at a crossroads in her life. Living in Lowood School for eight years, she realizes that she has been cut off from the real world. She sees a wide world out there of life knowledge to be learned and sensations to be experienced for those with the courage to venture forth. She speaks metaphorically of the “field of hopes and fears” that await such people.

“You are genteel enough; you look like a lady, and it is as much as ever I expected of you: you were no beauty as a child…I dare say you are clever, though,” continued Bessie, by way of solace. “What can you do? Can you play on the piano?”
“A little.”
There was one in the room; Bessie went and opened it, and then asked me to sit down and give her a tune: I played a waltz or two and she was charmed.
“The Miss Reeds could not play as well!” she said exultingly. “I always said you would surpass them in learning.”

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 10. Now a teacher at Lowood and aged eighteen, Jane has an unexpected visit from Bessie Lee. The Reeds’ nursemaid is impressed by Jane’s ladylike appearance and her musical accomplishments.

“Oh, don’t fall back on over-modesty! I have examined Adele, and find you have taken great pains with her: she is not bright, she has no talents; yet in a short time she has made much improvement.”
“Sir, you have given me my ‘cadeau’; I am obliged to you: it is the meed teachers most covet; praise of their pupils’ progress.”

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 13. In Rochester’s and Jane’s first conversation in Thornfield, he praises his new governess for being a good teacher to the 10-year-old French girl, Adele, who is daughter to Rochester’s mistress Celine Varens.

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.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 29. Jane says this about old servant Hannah, who at first judged her and refused her shelter when she knocked on the door of Moor House. Jane uses a gardening metaphor and simile to compare the heart to soil, where prejudices can grow like weeds if there is no education to fertilize it.

Diana offered to teach me German. I liked to learn of her: I saw the part of instructress pleased and suited her; that of scholar pleased and suited me no less. Our natures dovetailed: mutual affection – of the strongest kind – was the result. They discovered I could draw: their pencils and colour-boxes were immediately at my service. My skill, greater in this one point than theirs, surprised and charmed them. Mary would sit and watch me by the hour together: then she would take lessons; and a docile, intelligent, assiduous pupil she made.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 30. Being with the Rivers sisters Diana and Mary rekindles Jane’s love of learning. They share an intellectual bond, with Diana teaching Jane German, and Jane in turn giving Mary drawing lessons. Jane observes that Diana’s nature and hers fit together so well.

This morning, the village school opened. I had twenty scholars. But three of the number can read: none write or cipher. Several knit, and a few sew a little. They speak with the broadest accent of the district. At present, they and I have a difficulty in understanding each other’s language. Some of them are unmannered, rough, intractable, as well as ignorant; but others are docile, have a wish to learn, and evince a disposition that pleases me. I must not forget that these coarsely-clad little peasants are of flesh and blood as good as the scions of gentlest genealogy; and that the germs of native excellence, refinement, intelligence, kind feeling, are as likely to exist in their hearts as in those of the best-born. My duty will be to develop these germs: surely I shall find some happiness in discharging that office.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 31. Jane begins her teaching job in Morton. She has twenty students with little education between them. Although they are rough and badly dressed peasants, she believes that they are as good and deserving as the children of the noblest families. She commits to giving them a good education and developing the metaphorical germs of native excellence and intelligence in their hearts.

I felt desolate to a degree. I felt – yes, idiot that I am – I felt degraded. I doubted I had taken a step which sank instead of raising me in the scale of social existence. I was weakly dismayed at the ignorance, the poverty, the coarseness of all I heard and saw round me. But let me not hate and despise myself too much for these feelings: I know them to be wrong – that is a great step gained; I shall strive to overcome them…In a few months, it is possible, the happiness of seeing process, and a change for the better in my scholars, may substitute gratification for disgust.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 31. After her first day teaching at the school in Morton, Jane feels conflicted in her feelings about trying to bring learning to a class of poor, uneducated girls. She is dismayed at the scale of their ignorance and roughness. The task seems more than what she bargained for. But she pledges to remain positive and looks forward to seeing progress in a few months.

Which is better? – To have surrendered to temptation; listened to passion; made no painful effort – no struggle; but to have sunk down in the silken snare; fallen asleep on the flowers covering it; wakened in a southern clime, amongst the luxuries of a pleasure villa: to have been now living in France, Mr. Rochester’s mistress; delirious with his love half my time…But where am I wandering, and what am I saying, and, above all, feeling? Whether it is 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 school-mistress, free and honest, in a breezy mountain nook in the healthy heart of England?

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 31. Jane is speaking metaphorically about her relationship with Rochester and her decision not to stay as his mistress. Describing it as a “silken snare,” she believes that it would have brought her down the path of shame and slavery. It would have been wrong to surrender to temptation and passion, she feels. Better to be a free and honest village school teacher, she tells herself. But Jane isn’t completely happy and doesn’t exactly love her new teaching job.
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