The Motif of Eyes

I am going to be honest; I do like Emma much more now that I have a deeper understanding of the novel.  Now that I have a firmer grasp on who the characters truly are, I feel as if they are much more relatable.  However, I do not understand Emma’s pull toward Harriet.  In fact, Harriet’s eye seem to be the main focal point of her character.  The narrator says, “those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces, should not be wasted on the inferior society of Highbury, and its connections” (20).  After this mention of Harriet’s eyes, I began circling every time I saw the word “eyes.”  I noticed this word does come up many times after Harriet has entered the novel.  “‘The expression of the eye is most correct’” (41), “‘If I had set my heart on Mr. Elton’s marrying Harriet, it would have been very kind to open my eyes’” (58), “she cast her eye over it” (64), “May its approval beam in that soft eye” (64), “soft is the very word for her eye” (64), and “You soft eyes shall choose their own time for beaming” (68) are but a few examples of this word used everywhere.  It seems almost as if every time Harriet is mentioned, her eyes are described first.  The word “soft” often accompanies the eye.  Since the eyes are the windows to the soul, this could mean that Harriet’s soul is in fact soft.  Soft can also be described as moldable.  As we have seen throughout the novel so far Harriet follows everything Emma tells her and lets Emma manipulate her as a sculptor manipulates moldable clay.  She is young and impressionable so that could be the reason why her eyes, and therefore her soul, is soft.  The irony of the line, “those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces” is the fact that the softness of Harriet’s eyes are what have led her to be almost completely unnatural.  Harriet without the influence of Emma could be described as her pure and natural form, but now that Emma has changed her and manipulated her into being the person Emma wants to see, Harriet could now be described as unnatural since she is technically no longer herself.  I might be crazy for following the descriptions of eyes that seem to be everywhere, or I might still be in Hamlet-mode since we only just finished the play, but I believe there is something very significant about Harriet’s eyes that we have not found yet.  I feel as though maybe with closer analyzation I will find some deeper meaning that the softness referring to her easily-change soul and personality, but for now I have sadly found nothing other than that.  There is a possibility that Part II will continue with this motif until I finally complete this puzzle or crack this code, at least I hope so since this word is will be playing on my mind until I figure out why it is everywhere in the novel.