naturally. However it dawned upon me now and again that in Moll Flanders the Daniel Defoe was fabricating tragedies for the sake of tragedies.The two heroines resembled each other closely. They both had distinctive mental changes, which resulted from the varying circumstances they had experienced. One eye-catching change of Jane Eyre concerned her religious belief. It was not until she met Helen Burns in Lowood that the idea of God occurred to her. Before then she had no fear. However since then she had been converted to a Christian gradually, especially in her romance with Mr. Rochester. Helen’s religious belief exerted a profound influence on her. She kept practicing what Helen told her so as to comfort herself later. The change might have something to do with her characters. She was self-isolated and was unwilling to bare too much of herself to others. Therefore she was quite lonely. She had no one to turn to for help except God. She attributed all her weal and woe to the will of God. The change reached the climax after she met St. John. His pious devotion shaped her belief. It’s not a coincidence that she happened to meet a missionary. It went naturally with her change of religious belief. The reader could see how devout she became from the way she expressed her hearty gratitude to God after she went back to her sweetheart. Moll Flanders’ change was even more obvious. She got rid of the nave self in her painstaking struggle against the tough life. She grew from an innocent girl to a shameless whore, then to an experienced thief. In spite of all the changes, something remained unchanged and unchangeable in the two heroines. They were both dying for love throughout their lives. Though Moll married more than half a dozen of times for money, in her inner heart the burning desire for true love never ceased to torture her. Nevertheless in the end their dream came true. The two novels shared a lot of similarities. They ga...
