Jane Austen

Listed in "People Weekly"s "Most Intriguing People" list. (December 25, 1995/January 1, 1996 issue)

Was fluent in French.

The Prince Regent was such a fan of her work that he asked her to dedicate her next book to him, which she did.

In July of 2002 a first edition of "Pride and Prejudice" was auctioned and sold for 40,000, nearly doubling the previous record set for an Austen novel in 2001 of 23,500.

Her books have never been out of print since they were first published.

Between 1900 and 1975, there were more than 60 radio, television and stage productions of Austen novels. The first film adaptation was of "Pride and Prejudice" in 1940, although there had been a television version two years previously.

Her brother Edwards descendant married the daughter of Louis Mountbatten (aka Lord Mountbatten; assassinated in 1979 by the IRA), who in turn was a descendant of Queen Victoria.

Anne Hathaway portrayed her in Becoming Jane .

Seventh generation aunt (through her brother Edward) of actress Anna Chancellor , who appeared in Janes favored romance "Pride and Prejudice" mini-series and who also narrates the documentary The Real Jane Austen .

The film Clueless is based on her novel "Emma".

Her eight times great niece is actress Anna Chancellor.

Her novel, "Northanger Abbey" at the Lifeline Theatre in Chicago, Illinois was nominated for a 2017 Non-Equity Joseph Jefferson Award for Musical Production.

If any one faculty of our nature may be called more wonderful than the,rest, I do think it is memory. The memory is sometimes so retentive, so,serviceable, so obedient--at others, so bewildered and so weak--and at,others again, so tyrannic, so beyond control! We are to be sure a,miracle every way--but our powers of recollecting and of forgetting, do,seem peculiarly past finding out.

[her last words, when asked by her sister Cassandra if there was,anything she wanted] Nothing, but death.

[when asked why her heroines always flawed] Pictures of perfection make,me sick and wicked.

One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession,of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.

In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.

The more I know of the world, the more I am convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much!,I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.

If I could but know his heart, everything would become easy.

There could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison,Oh, Lizzy! do anything rather than marry without affection.

She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me, and I am in no humor at present to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men.

There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart.

Had I been in love, I could not have been more wretchedly blind. But vanity, not love, has been my folly.

I come here with no expectations, only to profess, now that I am at liberty to do so, that my heart is and always will be. . . yours.

They were within twenty yards of each other, and so abrupt was his appearance, that it was impossible to avoid his sight. Their eyes instantly met, and the cheeks of each were overspread with the deepest blush. He absolutely started, and for a moment seemed immoveable from surprise; but shortly recovering himself, advanced towards the party, and spoke to Elizabeth, if not in terms of perfect composure, at least of perfect civility.

To wish was to hope, and to hope was to expect,You are mistaken, Mr. Darcy, if you suppose that the mode of your declaration affected me in any other way, than as it spared the concern which I might have felt in refusing you, had you behaved in a more gentlemanlike manner. " (Elizabeth Bennett),Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death.

Is not general incivility the very essence of love?,One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.

How quick come the reasons for approving what we like.

Without music, life would be a blank to me.

. . . when pain is over, the remembrance of it often becomes a pleasure.

Do not give way to useless alarm; though it is right to be prepared for the worst, there is no occasion to look on it as certain.

Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other or ever so similar beforehand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.

And to all this she must yet add something more substantial, in the improvement of her mind by extensive reading.

The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.

I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.

Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings.

Stupid men are the only ones worth knowing after all.

I cannot speak well enough to be unintelligible.

It is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are they the result of previous study?,Yes, vanity is a weakness indeed. But pride - where there is a real superiority of mind, pride will be always under good regulation.

And pictures of perfection, as you know, make me sick and wicked.

my good qualities are under your protection, and you are to exaggerate them as much as possible; and, in return, it belongs to me to find occasion for teasing and quarreling with you as often as may be. . .

There is one thing, Emma, which a man can always do if he chooses, and that is his duty; not by manoeuvring and finessing, but by vigour and resolution. - Mr. Knightley,Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised or a little mistaken.

Every impulse of feeling should be guided by reason; and, in my opinion, exertion should always be in proportion to what is required.

It has sunk him, I cannot say how much it has sunk him in my opinion. So unlike what a man should be!-None of that upright integrity, that strict adherence to truth and principle, that distain of trick and littleness, which a man should display in every transaction of his life.

But to live in ignorance on such a point was impossible.

My Emma, does not every thing serve to prove more and more the beauty of truth and sincerity in all our dealings with each other?,It does not come to me in quite so direct a line as that; it takes a bend or two, but nothing of consequence. The stream is as good as at first; the little rubbish it collects in the turnings is easily moved away.

I can feel no sentiment of approbation inferior to love.

Angry people are not always wise.

…one half of her should not be always so much wiser than the other half…,Biti dobro upućen u stvari znači lišiti druge mogućnosti da udovolje svojoj taštini, što će pametan čovek uvek nastojati da izbegne.

Till I have your disposition, your goodness, I never can have your happiness. ”~ Jane Austen (Pride & Prejudice),I must learn to be content with being happier than I deserve.

I am the happiest creature in the world. Perhaps other people have said so before, but not one with such justice. I am happier even than Jane; she only smiles, I laugh.

You must be the best judge of your own happiness.

A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.

Why not seize the pleasure at once? -- How often is happiness destroyed by preparation, foolish preparation!,[I]t is well to have as many holds upon happiness as possible.

He will make you happy, Fanny; I know he will make you happy; but you will make him everything.

She was happy, she knew she was happy, and knew she ought to be happy.

How often is happiness destroyed by preparation, foolish preparation!,…she had nothing to do but to forgive herself and be happier than ever…,But there was happiness elsewhere which no description can reach.

Happiness must preclude false indulgence and physic.

Yet some happiness must and would arise, from the very conviction, that he did suffer.

She had received ideas which disposed her to be courteous and kind to all, and to pity every one, as being less happy than herself.

…for I look upon the Frasers to be about as unhappy as most other married people.

The Very first moment I beheld him, my heart was irrevocably gone.

We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man; but this would be nothing if you really liked him.

It would be mortifying to the feelings of many ladies, could they be made to understand how little the heart of a man is affected by what is costly or new in their attire. . . Woman is fine for her own satisfaction alone. No man will admire her the more, no woman will like her the better for it. Neatness and fashion are enough for the former, and a something of shabbiness or impropriety will be most endearing to the latter.

She had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequel of an unnatural beginning.

She certainly did not hate him. No; hatred had vanished long ago, and she had almost as long been ashamed of ever feeling a dislike against him, that could be so called. The respect created by the conviction of his valuable qualities, though at first unwillingly admitted, had for some time ceased to be repugnant to her feelings; and it was now heightened into somewhat of a friendlier nature, by the testimony so highly in his favour, and bringing forward his disposition in so amiable a light, which yesterday had produced. But above all, above respect and esteem, there was a motive within her of good will which could not be overlooked. It was gratitude. --Gratitude not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough, to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister. Such a change in a man of so much pride, excited not only astonishment but gratitude--for to love, ardent love, it must be attributed; and as such its impression on her was of a sort to be encouraged, as by no means unpleasing, though it could not exactly be defined.

She understood him. He could not forgive her,-but he could not be unfeeling. Though condemning her for the past, and considering it with high and unjest resentment, though perfectly careless of her, and though becoming attached to another, still he could not see her suffer, without the desire of giving her relief. It was a remainder of former sentiment; it was an impuse of pure, though unacknowledged friendship; it was a proof of his own warm and amiable heart, which she could not contemplate without emotions so compounded of pleasure and pain, that she knew not which prevailed.

They had no conversation together, no intercourse but what the commonest civility required. Once so much to each other! Now nothing! There had been a time, when of all the large party now filling the drawing-room at Uppercross, they would have found it most difficult to cease to speak to one another. With the exception, perhaps, of Admiral and Mrs. Croft, who seemed particularly attached and happy, (Anne could allow no other exception even among the married couples) there could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so simliar, no feelings so in unison, no countenances so beloved. Now they were as strangers; nay, worse than strangers, for they could never become aquainted. It was a perpetual estrangement.

Oh!" cried Anne eagerly, "I hope I do justice to all that is felt by you,and by those who resemble you. God forbid that I should undervaluethe warm and faithful feelings of any of my fellow-creatures! I should deserve utter contempt if I dared to suppose that true attachmentand constancy were known only by woman. No, I believe you capableof everything great and good in your married lives. I believe you equalto every important exertion, and to every domestic forbearance,so long as--if I may be allowed the expression--so long as you havean object. I mean while the woman you love lives, and lives for you. All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one;you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existenceor when hope is gone.

We must not be so ready to fancy ourselves intentionally injured. We must not expect a lively young man to be always so guarded and circumspect. It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us. Women fancy admiration means more than it does.

Have you any other objection than your belief of my indifference?"- Elizabeth Bennet,But I hate to hear you talking so like a fine gentleman, and as if women were all fine ladies, instead of rational creatures. We none of us expect to be in smooth water all our days.

I have been used to consider poetry as the food of love.

Te aseguro que no soy de las que quieren a medias. Mis sentimientos siempre son profundos y arraigados". . .

They danced again, and when the assembly closed, parted, on the lady’s side at least, with a strong inclination for continuing the acquaintance. Whether she thought of him so much while she drank her warm wine and water and prepared herself for bed as to dream of him when there, cannot be ascertained; but I hope it was no more than in a light slumber, or a morning doze at most, for if it be true, as a celebrated writer has maintained, that no young lady can be justified in falling in love before the gentleman’s love is declared, it must be very improper that a young lady should dream of a gentlemen before the gentleman is first known to have dreamed of her.

It is your turn to say something now, Mr. Darcy. I talked about the dance, and you ought to make some kind of remark on the size of the room, or the number of couples.

All the privilege I claim for my own sex, is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone.

Every moment has its pleasures and its hope.

but a sanguine temper, though for ever expecting more good than occurs, does not always pay for its hopes by any proportionate depression. it soon flies over the present failure, and begins to hope again.

…told herself likewise not to hope. But it was too late. Hope had already entered…,I have been used to consider poetry as "the food of love" said Darcy. "Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what isstrong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, Iam convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away.

However, he wrote some verses on her, and very pretty they were. ” “And so ended his affection,” said Elizabeth impatiently. “There has been many a one, I fancy, overcome in the same way. I wonder who first discovered the efficacy of poetry in driving away love!” “I have been used to consider poetry as the food of love,” said Darcy. “Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away.

she thought it was the misfortune of poetry, to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who enjoyed it completely; and that the strong feelings which alone could estimate it truly, were the very feelings which ought to taste it but sparingly.

I have been used to consider poetry as the food of love,I could not sit seriously down to write a serious Romance under any other motive than to save my life, & if it were indispensable for me to keep it up & never relax into laughing at myself or other people, I am sure I should be hung before I had finished the first chapter. No - I must keep my own style & go on in my own way; and though I may never succeed again in that, I am convinced that I should totally fail in any other.

[I]f a book is well written, I always find it too short.

A woman, especially if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.

She was heartily ashamed of her ignorance - a misplaced shame. Where people wish to attach, they should always be ignorant. To come with a well−informed mind is to come with an inability of administering to the vanity of others, which a sensible person would always wish to avoid. A woman especially, if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.

Facts or opinions which are to pass through the hands of so many, to be misconceived by folly in one, and ignorance in another, can hardly have much truth left.

Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.

There is, I believe, in every disposition a tendency to some particular evil, a natural defect, which not even the best education can overcome. ""And your defect is a propensity to hate everybody. ""And yours," he replied with a smile, "is wilfully to misunderstand them.

The advantages of natural folly in a beautiful girl have been already set forth by the capital pen of a sister author; and to her treatment of the subject I will only add, in justice to men, that though to the larger and more trifling part of the sex, imbecility in females is a great enhancement of their personal charms, there is a portion of them too reasonable and too well informed themselves to desire anything more in woman than ignorance.

There certainly was some great mismanagement in the education of those two young men. One has got all the goodness, and the other all the appearance of it.

A fondness for reading, properly directed, must be an education in itself.

My idea of good company, Mr. Eliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.

She looked back as well as she could; but it was all confusion. She had taken up the idea, she supposed and made everything bend to it.

It is singularity which often makes the worst part of our suffering, as it always does of our conduct.

We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be,It is not time or opportunity that is to determine intimacy;—it is disposition alone. Seven years would be insufficient to make some people acquainted with each other, and seven days are more than enough for others.

Time will explain.

Time did not compose her.

Time will generally lessen the interest of every attachment not within the daily circle.

I frequently observe that one pretty face would be followed by five and thirty frights.

I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of any thing than of a book! -- When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.

but for my own part, if a book is well written, I always find it too short.

It is only a novel. . . or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language,If a book is well written, I always find it too short.

How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book!,Books--oh! no. I am sure we never read the same, or not with the samefeelings. ""I am sorry you think so; but if that be the case, there can at least beno want of subject. We may compare our different opinions.

. . . I will not allow books to prove any thing. ""But how shall we prove any thing?""We never shall.

Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree the pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything.

With a book he was regardless of time.

And Marianne, who had the knack of finding her way in every house to the library, however it might be avoided by the family in general, soon procured herself a book.

The evils arising from the loss of her uncle were neither trifling nor likely to lessen; and when thought had been freely indulged, in contrasting the past and the present, the employment of mind and dissipation of unpleasant ideas which only reading could produce made her thankfully turn to a book.

There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.

I am no novel-reader -- I seldom look into novels -- Do not imagine that I often read novels -- It is really very well for a novel. " Such is the common cant. "And what are you reading, Miss -- ?" "Oh! It is only a novel!" replies the young lady, while she lays down her book with affected indifference, or momentary shame. "It is only Cecilia, or Camilla, or Belinda"; or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language.

Which of all my important nothings shall I tell you first?,Business, you know, may bring money, but friendship hardly ever does.

My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company. ""You are mistaken," said he gently, "that is not good company; that is the best. Good company requires only birth, education, and manners (. . . ),You are in a melancholy humour, and fancy that any one unlike yourself must be happy. But remember that the pain of parting from friends will be felt by every body at times, whatever be their education or state. Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience — or give it a more fascinating name, call it hope.

You feel, I suppose, that, in losing Isabella, you lose half yourself: you feel a void in your heart which nothing else can occupy.   Society is becoming irksome; and as for the amusements in which you were wont to share at Bath, the very idea of which without her is abhorrent.   You would not, for instance, now go to a ball for the world.   You feel that you have no longer any friend to whom you can speak with unreserve; on whose regard you can place dependence; or whose counsel, in any difficult, you could rely on.

Elizabeth could never address her without feeling that all the comfort of intimacy was over, and, though determined not to slacken as a correspondent, it was for the sake of what had been, rather than what was.

Oh! you are a great deal too apt, you know, to like people in general. You never see fault in any body. All the world are good and agreeable in your eyes. I never heard you speak ill of a human being in my life. ""I would wish not to be hasty in censuring any one; but I always speak what I think.

But one never does form a just idea of anybody beforehand. One takes up a notion and runs away with it.

To wish was to hope, and to hope was to expect.

It was absolutely necessary to interrupt him now.

Every man is surrounded by a neighborhood of voluntary spies.

She was nothing more than a mere good-tempered, civil and obliging Young Woman; as such we could scarcely dislike her -- she was only an Object of Contempt,. . . and because they were fond of reading, she fancied them satirical: perhaps without exactly knowing what it was to be satirical; but that did not signify. It was censure in common use, and easily given.

For my part, I am determined never to speak of it again to anybody. I told my sister Phillips so the other day.

I have not yet tranquillised myself enough to see Frederica.

I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures. None of us want to be in calm waters all our lives.

She was sensible and clever, but eager in everything; her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of someone or other of their daughters.

You men have none of you any hearts. 'If we have not hearts, we have eyes; and they give us torment enough.

. . . a whole day’s tête-à-tête between two women can never end without a quarrel.

The conversation soon turned upon fishing, and she heard Mr. Darcy invite him, with the greatest civility, to fish there as often as he chose while he continued in the neighbourhood, offering at the same time to supply him with fishing tackle, and pointing out those parts of the stream where there was usually most sport. Mrs. Gardiner, who was walking arm in arm with Elizabeth, gave her a look expressive of her wonder. Elizabeth said nothing, but it gratified her exceedingly; the compliment must be all for herself. Her astonishment, however, was extreme; and continually was she repeating, "Why is he so altered? From what can it proceed? It cannot be for me, it cannot be for my sake that his manners are thus softened. My reproofs at Hunsford could not work such a change as this. It is impossible that he should still love me.

…for what after all is Youth and Beauty?,Emma has been meaning to read more ever since she was twelve years old. I have seen a great many lists of her drawingup at various times of books that she meant to read regularly through—and very good lists they were—very well chosen, and very neatly arranged—sometimes alphabetically, and sometimes by some other rule. The list she drew up when only fourteen—I remember thinking it did her judgment so much credit, that I preserved it some time; and I dare say she may have made out a very good list now. But I have done with expecting any course of steady reading from Emma. She will never submit to any thing requiring industry and patience, and a subjection of the fancy to the understanding.

. . . And if reading could banish the idea for even half an hour, it was something gained.

With a book he was regardless of time. . .

There is no other enjoyment like reading,Mary wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.

Elinor agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition.

When I look out on such a night as this, I feel as if there could be neither wickedness nor sorrow in the world; and there certainly would be less of both if the sublimity of Nature were more attended to, and people were carried more out of themselves by contemplating such a scene.

To sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment.

I am worn out with civility. I have been talking incessantly all night, and with nothing to say. But with you there may be peace. You will not want to be talked to. Let us have the luxury of silence.

Every line, every word was -- in the hackneyed metaphor which their dear writer, were she here, would forbid -- a dagger to my heart. To know that Marianne was in town was -- in the same language -- a thunderbolt. -- Thunderbolts and daggers! -- what a reproof would she have given me! -- her taste, her opinions -- I believe they are better known to me than my own, -- and I am sure they are dearer.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

An unhappy alternative is before you, Elizabeth. From this day you must be a stranger to one of your parents. Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins, and I will never see you again if you do.

And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light, certainly their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. You will allow that in both man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty each to endeavor to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbors, or fancying that they should have been better off with any one else.

The most incomprehensible thing in the world to a man, is a woman who rejects his offer of marriage!,Without thinking highly either of men or of matrimony, marriage had always been her object; it was the only honourable provision for well-educated young women of small fortune, and however uncertain of giving happiness, must be their pleasantest preservative from want.

I pay very little regard," said Mrs. Grant, "to what any young person says on the subject of marriage. If they profess a disinclination for it, I only set it down that they have not yet seen the right person.

Luck which so often defies anticipation in matrimonial affairs, giving attraction to what is moderate rather than to what is superior.

With such a worshipping wife, it was hardly possible that any natural defects in it should not be increased. The extreme sweetness of her temper must hurt his.

Here are officers enough in Meryton to disappoint all the young ladies in the country.

I am not only not going to be married, at present, but have very little intention of ever marrying at all.

But Catherine did not know her own advantages - did not know that a good-looking girl, with an affectionate heart and a very ignorant mind, cannot fail of attracting a clever young man, unless circumstances are particularly untoward.

Nobody, who has not been in the interior of a family, can say what the difficulties of any individual of that family may be.

A lady, without a family, was the very best preserver of furniture in the world.

Her family had of late been exceedingly fluctuating. For many years of her life she had had two sons; but the crime and annihilation of Edward a few weeks ago, had robbed her of one; the similar annihilation of Robert had left her for a fortnight without any; and now, by the resurrection of Edward, she had one again.

. . . And talking of the dear family party which would then be restored, of their mutual pursuits and cheerful society, as the only happiness worth a wish.

Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their power, which no subsequent connections can supply; and it must be by a long and unnatural estrangement, by a divorce which no subsequent connection can justify, if such precious remains of the earliest attachments are ever entirely outlived.

Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their power, which no subsequent connections can supply.

So long divided and so differently situated, the ties of blood were little more than nothing.

There are secrets in all families, you know.

Between Barton and Delaford, there was that constant communication which strong family affection would naturally dictate;—and among the merits and the happiness of Elinor and Marianne, let it not be ranked as the least considerable, that though sisters, and living almost within sight of each other, they could live without disagreement between themselves, or producing coolness between their husbands.

Where people wish to attach, they should always be ignorant. To come with a well−informed mind is to come with an inability of administering to the vanity of others, which a sensible person would always wish to avoid.

Blessed with so many resources within myself the world was not necessary to me. I could do very well without it.

I have not known him long indeed, but I am much better acquainted with him than I am with any other creature in the world.

Esteem him! Like him! Cold-hearted Elinor! Oh! worse than cold-hearted! Ashamed of being otherwise. Use those words again, and I will leave the room this moment.

I feel as if I could be any thing or every thing, as if I could rant and storm, or sigh, or cut capers in any tragedy or comedy in the English language.

I shall ever despise the man who can be gratified by the passion which he never wished to inspire, nor solicited the avowal of.

I do not know where the error lies. I do not pretend to set people right, but I do see they are often wrong.

Yes; he had done it. She was in the carriage, and felt that he had placed her there, that his will and his hands had done it, that she owed it to his perception of her fatigue, and his resolution to give her rest. She was very much affected by the view of his disposition towards her, which all these things made apparent. This little circumstance seemed the completion of all that had gone before. She understood him. He could not forgive her, but he could not be unfeeling. Though condemning her for the past, and considering it with high and unjust resentment, though perfectly careless of her, and though becoming attached to another, still he could not see her suffer, without the desire of giving her relief. It was a remainder of former sentiment; it was an impulse of pure, though unacknowledged friendship; it was a proof of his own warm and amiable heart, which she could not contemplate without emotions so compounded of pleasure and pain, that she knew not which prevailed.

What had she to wish for? Nothing, but to grow more worthy of him whose intentions and judgment had been ever so superior to her own.

Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in theirpower, which no subsequent connections can supply. .

It is a difference of opinion which does not admit of proof. We each begin probably with a little bias towards our own sex, and upon that bias build every circumstance in favour of it which has occurred within our own circle;,On every formal visit a child ought to be of the party, by way of provision for discourse. In the present case it took up ten minutes to determine whether the boy were most like his father or mother, and in what particular he resembled either, for of course every body differed, and every body was astonished at the opinion of the others.

And here is my sweet little Annamaria,’ she added, tenderly caressing a little girl of three years old, who had not made a noise for the last two minutes; ‘And she is always so gentle and quiet—Never was there such a quiet little thing!’ But unfortunately in bestowing these embraces, a pin in her ladyship’s head dress slightly scratching the child’s neck, produced from this pattern of gentleness such violent screams, as could hardly be outdone by any creature professedly noisy. The mother’s consternation was excessive; but it could not surpass the alarm of the Miss Steeles, and every thing was done by all three, in so critical an emergency, which affection could suggest as likely to assuage the agonies of the little sufferer. She was seated in her mother’s lap, covered with kisses, her wound bathed with lavender-water, by one of the Miss Steeles, who was on her knees to attend her, and her mouth stuffed with sugar plums by the other. With such a reward for her tears, the child was too wise to cease crying.

Maria was married on Saturday. In all important preparations of mind she was complete, being prepared for matrimony by a hatred of home, by the misery of disappointed affection, and contempt of the man she was to marry. The bride was elegantly dressed and the two bridesmaids were duly inferior. Her mother stood with salts, expecting to be agitated, and her aunt tried to cry. Marriage is indeed a maneuvering business.

She was stronger alone…,Woe betide him, and her too, when it comes to things of consequence, when they are placed in circumstances requiring fortitude and strength of mind, if she have not resolution enough to resist idle interference . . . It is the worst evil of too yielding and indecisive a character, that no influence over it can be depended on. You are never sure of a good impression being durable; everybody may sway it. Let those who would be happy be firm.

What! Would I be turned back from doing a thing that I had determined to do, and that I knew to be right, by the airs and interference of such a person, or any person I may say? No, I have no idea of being so easily persuaded. When I have made up my mind, I have made it.

the only source whence any thing like consolation or composure could be drawn, was in the resolution of her own better conduct, and the hope that, however inferior in spirit and gaiety might be the following and every future winter of her life to the past, it would yet find her more rational, more acquainted with herself, and leave her less to regret when it were gone.

I do not play this instrument so well as I should wish to, but I have always supposed that to be my own fault because I would not take the trouble of practicing.

The past, present, and future, were all equally in gloom.

Oh! Do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch.

I could not be happy with a man whose taste did not in every point coincide with my own. He must enter in all my feelings; the same books, the same music must charm us both.

Nobody could catch cold by the sea; nobody wanted appetite by the sea; nobody wanted spirits; nobody wanted strength. Sea air was healing, softening, relaxing -- fortifying and bracing -- seemingly just as was wanted -- sometimes one, sometimes the other. If the sea breeze failed, the seabath was the certain corrective; and where bathing disagreed, the sea air alone was evidently designed by nature for the cure.

There are people who, the more you do for them, the less they will do for themseselves.

If I understand you rightly, you had formed a surmise of such horror as I have hardly words to-- Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?"They had reached the end of the gallery, and with tears of shame she ran off to her own room.

She wished such words unsaid with all her heart,…she felt depressed beyond any thing she had ever known before.

In such moments of precious, invaluable misery, she rejoiced in tears of agony. . .

If, however, I am allowed to think that you and yours feel an interest in my fate and actions, it may be the means—it may put me on my guard—at least, it may be something to live for.

An interval of meditation, serious and grateful, was the best corrective of everything dangerous.

Trusting that you will some time or other do me greater justice than you can do now.

I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine.

Mr. ***** is blessed with such happy manners as may ensure his making friends -- whether he may be equally capable of retaining them, is less certain.

I am now convinced that I have never been much in love; for had I really experienced that pure and elevating passion, I should at present detest his very name, and wish him all manner of evil. But my feelings are not only cordial towards him; they are even impartial towards her. I cannot find out that I hate her at all, or that I am in the least unwilling to think her a very good sort of girl. There can be no love in all this.

His departure gave Catherine the first experimental conviction that a loss may be sometimes a gain.

A loss may be sometimes a gain.

All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one, you need not covet it) is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone.

Sophia shrieked and fainted on the ground – I screamed and instantly ran mad. We remained thus mutually deprived of our senses, some minutes, and on regaining them were deprived of them again. For an Hour and a Quarter did we continue in this unfortunate situation – Sophia fainting every moment and I running mad as often. At length a groan from the hapless Edward (who alone retained any share of life) restored us to ourselves.

Dear Eloisa (said I) there’s no occasion for your crying so much about such a trifle. (for I was willing to make light of it in order to comfort her) I beg you would not mind it – You see it does not vex me in the least; though perhaps I may suffer most from it after all; for I shall not only be obliged to eat up all the Victuals I have dressed already, but must if Henry should recover (which however is not very likely) dress as much for you again; or should he die (as I suppose he will) I shall still have to prepare a Dinner for you whenever you marry any one else. So you see that tho perhaps for the present it may afflict you to think of Henry’s sufferings, yet I dare say he’ll die soon and then his pain will be over and you will be easy, whereas my Trouble will last much longer for work as hard as I may, I am certain that the pantry cannot be cleared in less than a fortnight,Before the house-maid had lit the fire the next day, or the sun gained any power over the cold, gloomy morning in January, Marianne, only half dressed, was kneeling against one of the window-seats for the sake of all the little light she could command from it, and writing as fast as a continual flow of tears would permit her.

We must not be so ready to fancy ourselves intentionally injured. . . It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us.

There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature,They all went indoors with their new friends, and found rooms so small as none but those who invite from the heart could think capable of accommodating so many.

What are men to rocks and mountains?,Adieu to disappointment and spleen. What are men to rocks and mountains?,I assure you. I have no notion of treating men with such respect. That is the way to spoil them.

That would be the greatest misfortune of all! -- To find a man agreeable whom one is determined to hate! -- Do not wish me such an evil.

Poverty is a great evil, but to a woman of education and feeling it ought not, it cannot be the greatest. —I would rather be a teacher at a school (and I can think of nothing worse) than marry a man I did not like.

A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.

If any one faculty of our nature may be called more wonderful than the rest, I do think it is memory. There seems something more speakingly incomprehensible in the powers, the failures, the inequalities of memory, than in any other of our intelligences. The memory is sometimes so retentive, so serviceable, so obedient - at others, so bewildered and so weak - and at others again, so tyrannic, so beyond control! - We are to be sure a miracle every way - but our powers of recollecting and of forgetting, do seem peculiarly past finding out.

Everybody pretends to feel and tries to describe with the taste and elegance of him who first defined what picturesque beauty was. I detest jargon of every kind, and sometimes I have kept my feelings to myself, because I could find no language to describe them in but what was worn and hackneyed out of all sense and meaning.

But above all, above respect and esteem, there was a motive within her of good will which could not be overlooked. It was gratitude. -- Gratitude, not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough, to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister.

Where people are really attached, poverty itself is wealth.

If this man had not twelve thousand a year, he would be a very stupid fellow.

You are very fond of bending little minds; but where little minds belong to rich people in authority, I think they have a knack of swelling out, till they are quite as unmanageable as great ones.

Elinor had some difficulty here to refrain from observing, that she thought Fanny might have borne with composure, an acquisition of wealth to her brother, by which neither she nor her child could be possibly impoverished.

Marianne could never love by halves; and her whole heart became, in time, as much devoted to her husband, as it had once been to Willoughby.

You must learn some of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.

In books too, as well as in music, she courted the misery which a contrast between the past and present was certain of giving.

But think no more of the letter. The feelings of the person who wrote, and the person who received it, are now so widely different from what they were then, that every unpleasant circumstance attending it ought to be forgotten. You must learn some of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.

Nobody can tell what I suffer! But it is always so. Those who do not complain are never pitied.

We do not suffer by accident.

He had suffered, and he had learnt to think, two advantages that he had never known before…,It would be most right, and most wise, and, therefore must involve least suffering.

If I could not be persuaded into doing what I thought wrong, I will never be tricked into it.

I have changed my mind, and changed the trimmings of my cap this morning; they are now such as you suggested.

Obstinate, headstrong girl!,Those who do not complain are never pitied.

I leave it to be settled, by whomsoever it may concern, whether the tendency of this work be altogether to recommend parental tyranny, or reward filial disobedience.

[Mrs. Allen was] never satisfied with the day unless she spent the chief of it by the side of Mrs. Thorpe, in what they called conversation, but in which there was scarcely ever any exchange of opinion, and not often any resemblance of subject, for Mrs. Thorpe talked chiefly of her children, and Mrs. Allen of her gowns.

To exemplify, -a beautiful glossy nut, which, blessed with original strength, has outlived all the storms of autumn. Not a puncture, not a weak spot any where. -This nut. . . while so many of its brethren have fallen and been trodden under foot, is still in possession of all the happiness that a hazel-nut can be supposed capable of.

I am no indiscriminate novel reader. The mere trash of the common circulating library I hold in the highest contempt.

Walter Scott has no business to write novels, especially good ones. — It is not fair. — He has fame and profit enough as a poet, and should not be taking the bread out of other people’s mouths. — I do not like him, and do not mean to like Waverley if I can help it — but fear I must.

Well, evil to some is always good to others.

You may well warn me against such an evil. Human nature is so prone to fall into it!,She will never submit to any thing requiring industry and patience, and a subjection of the fancy to the understanding.

It was impossible to quarrel with words, whose tremulous inequality showed indisposition so plainly.

. . . and yet, though desirous to be gone, she could not quit the mansion-house, or look an adieu to the cottage, with its black, dripping and comfortless veranda, or even notice through the misty glasses the last humble tenements of the village, without a saddened heart. Scenes had passed in Uppercross which made it precious. It stood the record of many sensations of pain, once severe, but now softened; and of some instances of relenting feeling, some breathings of friendship and reconciliation, which could never be looked for again, and which could never cease to be dear. She left it all behind her, all but the recollection that such things had been.

Her feelings were very acute, and too little understood to be properly attended to. Nobody meant to be unkind, but nobody put themselves out of their way to secure her comfort.

Alas! with all her reasoning, she found, that to retentive feelings eight years may be little more than nothing.

Your feelings may be the strongest,’ replied Anne, ‘but the same spirit of analogy will authorise me to assert that ours are the most tender. Man is more robust than woman, but he is not longer lived; which exactly explains my view of the nature of their attachments. Nay, it would be too hard upon you, if it were otherwise.

My ideas flow so rapidly that I have not time to express them──by which means my letters sometimes convey no ideas at all to my correspondents.

She hated herself more than she could express.

Every body has their taste in noises as well as other matters; and sounds are quite innoxious, or most distressing, by their sort rather than their quantity.

But remember that the pain of parting from friends will be felt by every body at times, whatever be their education or state.

Do not consider me now as an elegant female intending to plague you, but as a rational creature speaking the truth from her heart.

Much was said, and much was ate, and all went well.

…each found her greatest safety in silence…,If a woman conceals her affection with the same skill from the object of it, she may lose the opportunity of fixing him; and it will then be but poor consolation to believe the world equally in the dark. There is so much of gratitude or vanity in almost any attachment, that it is not safe to leave any to itself. We can all begin ‘freely’- as light preference is natural enough; but there are very few of us who have a heart enough to be really in love without encouragement.

She was of course only too good for him; but as nobody minds having what is too good for them, he was very steadily earnest in the pursuit of the blessing, and it was not possible that encouragement from her should be long wanting.

For though a very few hours spent in the hard labour of incessant talking will dispatch more subjects than can really be in common between any two rational creatures, yet with lovers it is different. Between them no subject is finished, no communication is ever made, till it has been made at least twenty times over.

Eleanor went to her room "where she was free to think and be wretched.

…Elinor was then at liberty to think and be wretched.

But I will not repine. It cannot last long. He will be forgot, and we shall all be as we were before.

I have faults enough, but they are not, I hope, of understanding. My temper I dare not vouch for. It is, I believe, too little yielding— certainly too little for the convenience of the world. I cannot forget the follies and vices of other so soon as I ought, nor their offenses against myself. My feelings are not puffed about with every attempt to move them. My temper would perhaps be called resentful. My good opinion once lost, is lost forever.

The politeness which she had been brought up to practice as a duty made it impossible for her to escape; while the want of that higher species of self-command, that just consideration of others, that knowledge of her own heart, that principle of right which had not formed any essential part of her education, made her miserable under it.

He had just compunction enough for having done nothing for his sisters himself, to be exceedingly anxious that everybody else should do a great deal.

She had always wanted to do every thing, and had made more progress in both drawing and music than many might have done with so little labour as she ever would submit to. . . She was not much deceived as to her own skill either as an artist or a musician, but she was not unwilling to have others deceived, or sorry to know her reputation for accomplishment often higher than it deserved.

Depend upon it you see but half. You see the evil, but you do not see the consolation. There will be little rubs and disappointments everywhere, and we are all apt to expect too much; but then if one scheme of happiness fails, human nature turns to another; if the first calculation is wrong, we make a second better; we find comfort somewhere- and those evil-minded observers, dearest Mary, who make much of a little, are more taken in and deceived than the parties themselves.

We must consider what Miss. Fairfax quits, before we condemn her taste for what she goes to.

Pride,’ observed Mary, who piqued herself upon the solidity of her reflections, ‘is a very common failing, I believe. By all that I have ever read, I am convinced that it is very common indeed; that human nature is particularly prone to it, and that there are very few of us who do not cherish a feeling of self-complacency on the score of some quality or other, real or imaginary.

Oh! what a silly Thing is Woman! How vain, how unreasonable!,With a book, he was regardless of time.

The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in reading a good novel, must be incredibly stupid,Nothing is more deceitful," said Darcy, "than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast.

By you, I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You shewed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased.

Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion and somethings an indirect boast.

the rent here may be low but i believe we have it on very hard terms --sense & sensibility,I should wish to see them very good friends, and would, on no account, authorize in my girls the smallest degree of arrogance towards their relations; but still they cannot be equals. ” (10),You are infinitely my superior in merit; all that I know - You have qualities which I had not supposed to exist in such a degree in any human creature. You have some touches of the angel in you, beyond what - not merely beyond what one sees, because one never sees any thing like it - but beyond what one fancies might be. But still I am not frightened. It is not by equality of merit that you can be won. That is out of the question. It is he who sees and worships your merit the strongest, who loves you most devotedly, that has the best right to a return. ” (326),. . . the pleasantness of an employment does not always evince its propriety.

It was gratitude; gratitude, not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection.

It was gratitude; gratitude, not merelyfor having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him.

Nothing was so likely to do her good as a little quiet cheerfulness at home.

Young people do not like to be always thwarted.

Respect for right conduct is felt by every body.

He paid her only the compliment of attention; and she felt a respect for him on the occasion, which the others had reasonably forfeited by their shameless want of taste.

Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.

But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she hardly had a good feature in her face, than he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes. To this discovery succeeded some others equally mortifying. Though he had detected with a critical eye more than one failure of perfect symmetry in her form, he was forced to acknowledge her figure to be light and pleasing; and in spite of his asserting that her manners were not those of the fashionable world, he was caught by their easy playfulness. (6. 12),Pride has often been his best friend. It has connected him nearer with virtue than any other feeling.

Completely and perfectly and incandescently happy. . .

Pride is a very common failing, I believe. By all that I have ever read, I am convinced that it is very common indeed; that human nature is particularly prone to it, and that there are very few of us who do not cherish a feeling of self-complacency on the score of some quality or other, real or imaginary.

A distinction to which they had been born gave no pride.

When the evening was over, Anne could not but be amused at the idea of her coming to Lyme, to preach patience and resignation to a young man whom she had never seen before; nor could she help fearing, on more serious reflection, that, like many other great moralists and preachers, she had been eloquent on a point in which her own conduct would ill bear examination.

Anne did think on the question with perfect decision, and said as much in replay as her own feelings could accomplish, or as his seemed able to bear, for he was too much affected to renew the subject - and when he spoke again, it was something totally different.

Whenever you are transplanted, like me, you will understand how very delightful it is to meet with anything at all like what one has left behind.

I do not wish to avoid the walk. The distance is nothing when one has a motive.

You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. . . I have loved none but you.

The I examined my own heart. And there you were. Never, I fear, to be removed.

Upon my word, Emma, to hear you abusing the reason you have, is almost enough to make me think so too. Better be without sense than misapply it as you do.

…she had no resources for solitude…,Mr. Collins was to attend them, at the request of Mr. Bennet, who was most anxious to get rid of him, and have his library to himself,Shall I ask you how the church is to be filled, if a man is neither to take orders with a living, nor without?,Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure,If I am wrong, I am doing what I believe to the right.

. . . his second. . . must give him the pleasantest proof of its being a great deal better to choose than to be chosen, to excite gratitude than to feel it.

With this answer Elizabeth was forced to be content; but her own opinion continued the same, and she left disappointed and sorry. It was not in her nature, however, to increase her vexations by dwelling on them. She was confident of having performed her duty, and to fret over unavoidable evils, or augment them by anxiety, was no part of her disposition.

To avoid a comparative poverty, which her affection and her society would have deprived of all its horrors, I have, by raising myself to affluence, lost everything that could make it a blessing.

When once we are buried you think we are gone. But behold me immortal!,What a revolution in her ideas!,The older a person grows, Harriet, the more important it is that their manners should not be bad; the more glaring and disgusting any loudness, or coarseness, or awkwardness becomes. What is passable in youth is detestable in later age.

I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.

Mr. Bennet, how can you abuse your own children in such a way? Youtake delight in vexing me. You have no compassion for my poor nerves. ""You mistake me, my dear. I have a high respect for your nerves. Theyare my old friends. I have heard you mention them with considerationthese last twenty years at least.

It was a very proper wedding. The bride was elegantly dressed---the two bridemaids were duly inferior---her father gave her away---her mother stood with salts in her hand expecting to be agitated---her aunt tried to cry--- and the service was impressively read by Dr. Grant.

After having so nobly disentangled themselves from the shackles of Parental Authority, by a Clandestine Marriage, they were determined never to forfeit the good opinion they had gained in the World, in so doing, by accepting any proposals of reconciliation that might be offered them by their Fathers – to their farther trial of their noble independence however they never were exposed.

for though a very few hours spent in the hard labor of incessant talking will dispatch more subjects that can really be in common between two rational creatures, yet for the lovers is different. Between them no subject is finished; no communication is ever made, till it has been made at least twenty times over.

Provided that nothing like useful knowledge could be gained from them, provided they were all story and no reflection, she had never any objection to books at all.

She is probably by this time as tired of me, as I am of her; but as she is too Polite and I am too civil to say so, our letters are still as frequent and affectionate as ever, and our Attachment as firm and sincere as when it first commenced.

Our time was most delightfully spent, in mutual Protestations of Freindship, and in vows of unalterable Love, in which we were secure from being interrupted, by intruding and disagreeable Visistors, as Augustus and Sophia had on their first Entrance in the Neighbourhood, taken due care to inform the surrounding Families, that as their happiness centered wholly in themselves, they wished for no other society.

Poor woman! She probably thought change of air might agree with many of her children.

That will do extremely well, child. You have delighted us long enough. Let the other young ladies have time to exhibit.

But it was a matter of great consolation to her, that what brought evil to herself would bring good to her sister; and Elinor, on the other hand, suspecting that it would not be in her power to avoid Edward entirely, comforted herself by thinking, that though their longer stay would therefore militate against her own happiness, it would be better for Marianne than an immediate return into Devonshire.

They were rather handsome, had been educated in one of the first private seminaries in town,There is so much of gratitude or vanity in almost every attachment, that it is not safe to leave any to itself. We can all BEGIN freely--a slight preference is natural enough; but there are very few of us who have heart enough to be really in love without encouragement. In nine cases out of ten a women had better show MORE affection than she feels. Bingley likes your sister undoubtedly; but he may never do more than like her, if she does not help him on.

Goldsmith tells us, that when lovely woman stoops to folly, she has nothing to do but to die; and when she stoops to be disagreeable, it is equally to be recommended as a clearer of ill-fame.

Run mad as often as you choose but do not faint,Sometime the worst type of weapon in the world is love.

There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well. The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of merit sense,Marianne would have thought herself very inexcusable had she been able to sleep at all the first night after parting from Willoughby. She would have been ashamed to look her family in the face next morning, had she not risen from her bed in more need of repose than when she lay down in it.

I am fond of history and am very well contented to take the false with the true. In the principal facts they have sources of intelligence in former histories and records, which may be as much depended on, I conclude, as anything that does not actually pass under ones own observation; and as for the little embellishments you speak of, they are embellishments, and I like them as such.

. . . for to be sunk, though but for an hour in your esteem is a humiliation to which I know not how to submit. -Susan,Reflection must be reserved for solitary hours; whenever she was alone, she gave way to it as the greatest relief; and not a day went by without a solitary walk, in which she might indulge in all the delight of unpleasant recollections.

One must not expect every thing.

Catherine had never wanted comfort more, and [Henry] looked as if he was aware of it.

When shall I cease to regret you! – When learn to feel a home elsewhere! – Oh! Happy house, could you know what I suffer in now viewing you from this spot, from whence perhaps I may view you no more! – And you, ye well-known trees! – but you will continue the same. – No leaf will decay because we are removed, nor any branch become motionless although we can observe you no longer! – No; you will continue the same; unconscious of the pleasure or the regret you occasion, and insensible of any change in those who walk under your shade! – But who will remain to enjoy you?,--As I must therefore conclude that you are not serious in your rejection of me, I shall choose to attribute it to your wish of increasing my love by suspense, according to the usual practice of elegant females. " --"I do assure you, sir, that I have no pretensions whatever to that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man. I would rather be paid the compliment of being believed sincere.

But history, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in. Can you?""Yes, I am fond of history. ""I wish I were too. I read it a little as a duty, but it tells me nothing that does not either vex or weary me. The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars or pestilences, in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all -- it is very tiresome.

How I hate the sight of an umbrella!,Where the waters do agree, it is quite wonderful the relief they give.

I dearly love a laugh.

I do not know where the error lies. I do not pretend to set people right, but I do see that they are often wrong.

He may have as strong a sense of what would be right, as you can have, without being so equal under particular circumstances to act up to it. ""Then, it would not be so strong a sense. If it failed to produce equal exertion, it could not be an equal conviction.

A very narrow income has a tendency to contract the mind, and sour the temper. Those who can barely live, and who live perforce in a very small, and generally very inferior, society, may well be illiberal and cross.

There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well. The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and everyday confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and of the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of either merit or sense.

I suspect that in this comprehensive and (may I say) commonplace censure, you are not judging from yourself, but from prejudiced persons, whose opinions you have been in the habit of hearing. It is impossible that your own observation can have given you much knowledge of the clergy. You can have been personally acquainted with very few of a set of men you condemn so conclusively.

Sometimes one is guided by what they say of themselves, and very frequently by what other people say of them, without giving oneself time to deliberate and judge.

I cannot comprehend the neglect of a family library in such days as these. "- Mr. Darcy,Marianne, who had the knack of finding her way in every house to the library, however it might be avoided by the family in general, soon procured herself a book.

Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing! but I have never been in love; it is not my way, or my nature; and I do not think I ever shall. And, without love, I am sure I should be a fool to change such a situation as mine.

She had nothing to wish otherwise, but that the days did not pass so swiftly. It was a delightful visit;—perfect, in being much too short.

Where other powers of entertainment are wanting, the true philosopher will derive benefit from such as are given.

From a night of more sleep than she had expected, Marianne awoke the next morning to the same consciousness of misery in which she had closed her eyes.

Occupied in observing Mr. Bingley’s attentions to her sister, Elizabeth was far from suspecting that she was herself becoming an object of some interest in the eyes of his friend. Mr. Darcy had at first scarcely allowed her to be pretty: he had looked at her without admiration at the ball; and when they next met, he looked at her only to criticise. But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she had hardly a good feature in her face, than he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes. To this discovery succeeded some others equally mortifying. Though he had detected with a critical eye more than one failure of perfect symmetry in her form, he was forced to acknowledge her figure to be light and pleasing; and in spite of his asserting that her manners were not those of the fashionable world, he was caught by their easy playfulness. Of this she was perfectly unaware: to her he was only the man who made himself agreeable nowhere, and who had not thought her handsome enough to dance with.

It is a most repulsive quality, indeed,’ said he. ‘Oftentimes very convenient, no doubt, but never pleasing. There is safety in reserve, but no attraction. One cannot love a reserved person. ’‘Not till the reserve ceases towards oneself; and then the attraction may be the greater.

There had been moments when she felt he had almost forgiven her. She would always remember those moments.

And this," cried Darcy, as he walked with quick steps across the room, "is your opinion of me! This is the estimation in which you hold me! I thank you for explaining it so fully.

Till it does come, you know, we women never mean to have anybody. It is a thing of course among us, that every man is refused, till he offers.

There is, I believe, in every disposition a tendency to some particular evil - a natural defect, which not even the best education can overcome.

sometimes I have kept my feelings to myself, because I could find no language to describe them in but what was worn and hackneyed out of all sense and meaning,Sometimes one is guided by what they say of themselves, and very frequently by what other people say of them, without giving oneself time to deliberate and judge,Shyness is only the effect of a sense of inferiority in some way or other. If I could persuade myself that my manners were perfectly easy and graceful, I should not be shy,Marianne was silent; it was impossible for her to say what she did not feel, however trivial the occasion…,What praise is more valuable than the praise of an intelligent servant?,There is a monsterous deal of stupid quizzing, & common-place nonsense talked, but scarcely any wit.

This was a lucky recollection -- it saved her from something like regret.

. . . it is indeed a street of so impertinent a nature, so unfortunately connected with the great London and Oxford roads, and the principal inn of the city, that a day never passes in which parties of ladies, however important their business, whether in quest of pastry, millinery, or even (as in the present case) of young men, are not detained on one side or other by carriages, horsemen, or carts. This evil had been felt and lamented, at least three times a day, by Isabella since her residence in Bath. . .

He listened to her with perfect indifference while she chose to entertain herself in this manner; and as his composure convinced her that all was safe, her wit flowed long.

It was rather too late in the day to set about being simple-minded and ignorant.

Well, well," said he, "do not make yourself unhappy. If you are a good girl for the next ten years, I will take you to a review at the end of them.

You judge very properly, and it is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are the result of previous study?,You will find her manners beyond anything I can describe; and your wit and vivacity, I think, must be acceptable to her, especially when tempered with the silence and respect which her rank will inevitably excite.

How unlucky that you should have a reasonable answer to give, and that I should be so reasonable as to admit it!,Her eye fell everywhere on lawns and plantations of the freshest green; and the trees, though not fully clothed, were in that delightful state when farther beauty is known to be at hand, and when, while much is actually given to the sight, more yet remains for the imagination.

Upon my word, you five your opinion very decidedly for so young a person.

and if a rainy morning deprived them of other enjoyments, they were still resolute in meeting in defiance of wet and dirt, and shut themselves up, to read novels together. Yes, novels; for I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with novel–writers, of degrading by their contemptuous censure the very performances, to the number of which they are themselves adding — joining with their greatest enemies in bestowing the harshest epithets on such works, and scarcely ever permitting them to be read by their own heroine, who, if she accidentally take up a novel, is sure to turn over its insipid pages with disgust. Alas! If the heroine of one novel be not patronized by the heroine of another, from whom can she expect protection and regard? I cannot approve of it. Let us leave it to the reviewers to abuse such effusions of fancy at their leisure, and over every new novel to talk in threadbare strains of the trash with which the press now groans. Let us not desert one another; we are an injured body. Although our productions have afforded more extensive and unaffected pleasure than those of any other literary corporation in the world, no species of composition has been so much decried. From pride, ignorance, or fashion, our foes are almost as many as our readers. And while the abilities of the nine–hundredth abridger of the History of England, or of the man who collects and publishes in a volume some dozen lines of Milton, Pope, and Prior, with a paper from the Spectator, and a chapter from Sterne, are eulogized by a thousand pens — there seems almost a general wish of decrying the capacity and undervaluing the labour of the novelist, and of slighting the performances which have only genius, wit, and taste to recommend them. “I am no novel–reader — I seldom look into novels — Do not imagine that I often read novels — It is really very well for a novel. ” Such is the common cant. “And what are you reading, Miss — ?” “Oh! It is only a novel!” replies the young lady, while she lays down her book with affected indifference, or momentary shame. “It is only Cecilia, or Camilla, or Belinda”; or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best–chosen language. Now, had the same young lady been engaged with a volume of the Spectator, instead of such a work, how proudly would she have produced the book, and told its name; though the chances must be against her being occupied by any part of that voluminous publication, of which either the matter or manner would not disgust a young person of taste: the substance of its papers so often consisting in the statement of improbable circumstances, unnatural characters, and topics of conversation which no longer concern anyone living; and their language, too, frequently so coarse as to give no very favourable idea of the age that could endure it.

The anxiety, which in this state of their attachment must be the portion of Henry and Catherine, and of all who loved either, as to its final event, can hardly extend, I fear, to the bosom of my readers, who will see in the tell-tale compression of the pages before them, that we are all hastening together to perfect felicity.

And she did what nobody thought of doing. . . she consulted Anne.

Where an opinion is general it is usually correct.

There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort.

Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.

There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort.

Why not seize the pleasure at once? How often is happiness destroyed by preparation foolish preparation?,That sanguine expectation of happiness which is happiness itself.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

A person who can write a long letter with ease cannot write ill.

Grant us grace Almighty Father so to pray as to deserve to be heard.

I have been a selfish being all my life in practice though not in principle.

The less said the better.

Why not seize the pleasure at once? How often is happiness destroyed by preparation foolish preparation!,Let him have all the perfections in the world, I think it ought not to be set down as certain that a man must be acceptable to every woman he may happen to like himself.

We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be.

Walter Scott has no business to write novels, especially good ones. It is not fair. He has fame and profit enough as a poet, and should not be taking the bread out of the mouths of other people.

Business, you know, may bring you money, but friendship hardly ever does.

Selfishness must always be forgiven you know, because there is no hope of a cure.

Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.

To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love.

To sit in the shade on a fine day and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment.

They are much to be pitied who have not been given a taste for nature early in life.

Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance.

Single women have a dreadful propensity for being poor. Which is one very strong argument in favor of matrimony.

Good-humoured, unaffected girls, will not do for a man who has been used to sensible women. They are two distinct orders of being.

My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.

Nobody minds having what is too good for them.

Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised, or a little mistaken.

It is always incomprehensible to a man that a woman should ever refuse an offer of marriage.

To look almost pretty is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain for the first fifteen years of her life than a beauty from her cradle can ever receive.

From politics, it was an easy step to silence.

General benevolence, but not general friendship, made a man what he ought to be.

Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.

Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree the pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything.

There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort.

Woman is fine for her own satisfaction alone. No man will admire her the more, no woman will like her the better for it. Neatness and fashion are enough for the former, and a something of shabbiness or impropriety will be most endearing to the latter. .