re: forgiveness is the salve
Posted by Sherry on October 16, 1997 at 14:18:47:
In response to I think he did it to salve his own conscious! , written by Cassia on October 16, 1997 at 13:34:45
That he is gruff and hard I agree with. In the course of the novel he made many bad choices after a single disagreeable event (his marriage) was thrust upon him. I think it was his reaction to what happened to him that makes me not like the man. He chose a life of dissipation, no one made him do that, he chose to deceive Jane at the risk of distroying her character which was the very thing that attracted him. No where does it mention if he sought legal remedy to rid himself of his wife which while costly (in addition to legal fees, most likely it would have cost him his wife's estate), was possible but no one could argue he didn't have grounds. It seems to me he went into a decades long sulk, only to emerge from it when he met Jane.
Firstly.... Your subject line admits that Rochester has a conscious.
Secondly... I do not know for sure but I do not believe insanity was grounds for divorce back then. For better or worse were taken much more seriously. Someone else may be able to set this point straight.
Thirdly...".Since nothing we intend is ever faultless, nothing we attempt ever without error and nothing we achieve without some measure of finitude and fallability we call humaness, we are saved by forgiveness."
I forgive Rochester his humaness and so does Jane. He is cruel but it comes from being lost and afraid. It is to his credit when he sees the way back, he grasps it like a man dying of thirst grasps a glass of water. It is this that allows Rochester to decieve Jane. He knows she is his salvation. He is loathe to lose her. It's so sad.
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