"Never…” said he, as he ground his teeth. “Never was anything at once so frail and so indomitable. A mere reed she feels in my hand! I could bend her with my finger and thumb… and what good would it do if I bent, if I uptore, if I crushed her? Consider that eye. Consider the resolute, wild, free thing looking out of it… defying me, with more than courage… with a stern triumph. Whatever I do with its cage, I cannot get at it, the savage, beautiful creature! If I tear, if I rend the slight prison, my outrage will only let the captive loose. Conqueror I might be of the house; but the inmate would escape to heaven before I could call myself possessor of its clay dwelling- place. And it is you, spirit, with will and energy, and virtue and purity, that I want: not alone your brittle frame. Of yourself you could come with soft flight and nestle against my heart, if you would: seized against your will, you will elude the grasp like an essence—you will vanish ere I inhale your fragrance. Oh! come, Jane, come!"
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
