May 15th. “Well, darling, you and I must wait to talk it out about _Jane Eyre_. I shall never be able to write it out. It appears to me you have built up a wall to knock down.[25] I don’t at all ask a different code of morals for men and women. But I do wish a woman to be refined and pure, not because I am conventional, but because I think it essential to self-respect and dignity.... I don’t believe high-toned governesses fall in love with their employers.... I think it _very cruel_ upon the race of governesses to put it into people’s heads they are to fall in love. I always, since I took a district in 1836 felt the tenderest, most motherly pity for any misguided girl.... I certainly never did or will read impure things in books or newspapers. I consider familiarity with impurity rubs the bloom off the plum, which never can be restored. Minds differ, some almost enjoy to read queer things. Impurity does not seem to me to find any response in you: you can come in contact and it runs off like quicksilver—leaves no print. I don’t think that is common.” Footnote 25: The letter has not been preserved. “A letter from Elinor. She talks of enjoying your letters so much.... I am very glad Plumptre has sent you a testimonial you like. I fully expected he would send (if asked) a _very_ handsome one. The world has many kind hearts, has it not?—none like my own child.” And again, talking of a sermon she had heard: “I thought of my precious child when he pictured a strong character with exceeding depth of tenderness and gentleness.” One understands more and more fully the fervour with which S. J.-B. was wont to say in her later years,—“No one ever had such parents as mine!” “How I _wish_ you had known my mother!” * * * * * One naturally treats S. J.-B.’s religious life at this time as something apart from her questionings about dogma, for indeed the two belonged to different categories of her being. The following is one of the few letters of this period that have been preserved: 8 p.m. March 17th, 1862. “DARLING MOTHER,—I know you care to hear all your child’s thoughts and hopes and feelings,—I know you will not condemn for conceit and egotism what might seem so to other people. I want to talk to you,—I feel so sure you want to hear. I want to tell you what a glorious Strength and Power has come out of all the sharp pain,—how I feel that I am a better person, a stronger and more real one, than I ever was before....