This chapter highlights the differences in personality between Jane and St. John; while he is so cold "no fervour infects" him, Jane is "hot, and fire dissolves ice." For icy St. John, reason is more important than feeling, but for fiery Jane, feeling predominates. Relating her story, St. John expects Jane's primary concern will be to know why Briggs has been searching for her; instead, she's more interested in Rochester's fate, worrying that he has returned to his life of dissipation in Europe. After learning of the inheritance, Jane is sorry to hear her uncle, a man she's never met, is dead, and wishes she had a "rejoicing family" to share the money with, rather than her isolated self. So discovering she has three cousins is heavenly for Jane. In fact, the blessing of relatives is "exhilarating — not like the ponderous gift of gold: rich and welcome enough in its way, but sobering from its weight." St. John believes Jane is neglecting the essential points (the money) for the trifles (family). For a clergyman, St. John's lack of understanding of or caring for people is shocking. Sharing the wealth, Jane will transform it from an unwanted weight into a "legacy of life, hope, enjoyment," but her comment that the money will help her win "to myself lifelong friends," sounds as if she is planning to buy friendship with the legacy. Jane says she is happy to indulge her feelings, something she seldom has the opportunity to do. Jane values family and feeling above all else, while St. John thinks only of the opportunities, if she keeps the inheritance, that Jane will have to take her place in society.
