This is the last of the Jane Austen Lenten Reflections.  I hope you enjoyed the reprints.  Thank you for reading! – RO

Credit: Molland’s

Jane Bennet of Pride and Prejudice can be an easy target for the skeptics among us. We easy dismiss her rose-colored view of others because we, like her sister Elizabeth, so easily see the faults and foibles of others, and because Jane often refuses to acknowledge evil when present. She not only sees the best in people; she often sees only the best in people, blind to the faults of many.

And yet, in this, Jane shows a special kind of charity that is rare in life. Most people do not give other people the benefit of the doubt, I think. We are too quick to condemn and vilify, without considering the possibility of extenuating circumstances in this or that situation. We too eagerly eat up the propaganda that we call “the news” that gets spread about at the speed of FIOS. In cases where we do not like or agree with a certain party, we are quick to accept any rumor of misdoing as absolute fact.

It’s not good to stick our heads in the sand, like the proverbial ostrich, when it comes to the existence of evil. Evil is real and it must be contended with. Jane Bennet’s weakness is that she avoids acknowledging the truth of evil in other people. However, more often than not the evil that seems so apparent from gossip really isn’t what we think it is.

In Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Wickham is eager to slander the name of Mr. Darcy, as soon as he’s out of the neighborhood. As Mr. Darcy failed to make a good impression in Meryton, everyone was eager to accept Mr. Wickham’s account of injustice wrought. However, Jane Bennet “was the only creature who could suppose there might be any extenuating circumstances in the case, unknown to the society of Hertfordshire; her mild and steady candour always pleaded for allowances, and urged the possibility of mistakes — but by everybody else Mr. Darcy was condemned as the worst of men” (II.1 [24]).

And guess what? Jane’s right.

People have reasons to keep some business private for a period of time. Sometimes information cannot be disclosed because sensitive parties require (or seem to require) having their privacy maintained. We see this in Mr. Darcy’s case. He does not lay open his private affairs to the world because he wants to protect his young, vulnerable sister and because it does no good to expose a man’s sins without good cause and proof. And yet we fail, then and now, to understand this.

A few recent situations close to my heart have brought this point home. Not everything can be known by everyone! And not everything can be known right now. There is a time and a place for everything. Who are we to demand immediate understanding of circumstances outside our purview? Who are we to want to dig into tangled affairs outside our direct interest and demand immediate and full disclosure? Who are we to judge a situation without being privy to the extenuating circumstances that govern said situation? Who are we to demand action with only a cursory knowledge of the demands of justice in that situation? Who are we to think that we know how to fix things when the situation itself is sailing through uncharted waters? Who are we to condemn another when we ourselves are ignorant of the full and complete truth?

Oh, to be a little bit more like Jane! Yes, she can be kind to a fault. But I would welcome a few more Jane Bennets into the world. Heck, I’d welcome a little more Jane into my heart and mind!