Jane Austen quotes

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

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 14

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.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 6

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

Yes; I cannot speak well enough to be unintelligible.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 16

No man is offended by another man’s admiration of the woman he loves; it is the woman only who can make it a torment.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 19

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

Mr. Allen, who owned the chief of the property about Fullerton, the village in Wiltshire where the Morlands lived, was ordered to Bath for the benefit of a gouty constitution—and his lady, a good-humoured woman, fond of Miss Morland, and probably aware that if adventures will not befall a young lady in her own village, she must seek them abroad, invited her to go with them.

Where the heart is really attached, I know very well how little one can be pleased with the attention of anybody else.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 6

Where people are really attached, poverty itself is wealth; grandeur I detest: I would not settle in London for the universe.

— Isabella · Chapter 15

One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it, unless it has been all suffering, nothing but suffering, which was by no means the case at Lyme.

— Anne · Chapter XX

“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.”

— Spoken by a character · Chapter VIII

A man does not recover from such a devotion of the heart to such a woman. He ought not; he does not.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XX

Anne hoped she had outlived the age of blushing; but the age of emotion she certainly had not.

With the exception, perhaps, of Admiral and Mrs Croft, who seemed particularly attached and happy, (Anne could allow no other exceptions even among the married couples), there could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison, no countenances so beloved. Now they were as strangers; nay, worse than strangers, for they could never become acquainted. It was a perpetual estrangement.

You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XXIII

I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XXIII

How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!

His cold politeness, his ceremonious grace, were worse than anything.

Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience--or give it a more fascinating name, call it hope.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XIX

I never wish to offend, but I am so foolishly shy, that I often seem negligent, when I am only kept back by my natural awkwardness.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XVII

"This will probably be the case," he replied; "and yet there is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions."

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XI

I will be calm, I will be mistress of myself.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XLVIII

Mama, the more I know of the world, the more am I convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much!

— Spoken by a character · Chapter III

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XLVI

I wish as well as every body else to be perfectly happy; but, like every body else it must be in my own way. Greatness will not make me so.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XVII

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.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XII

Their taste was strikingly alike. The same books, the same passages were idolized by each; or if any difference appeared, any objection arose, it lasted no longer than till the force of her arguments and the brightness of her eyes could be displayed.

His own enjoyment, or his own ease, was, in every particular, his ruling principle.

— Elinor · Chapter XLVII

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

For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?

— Spoken by a character · Chapter LVII

What are men to rocks and mountains?

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XXVII

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter III

“That is very true,” replied Elizabeth, “and I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine.”

— Elizabeth · Chapter V

You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XXXIV

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.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter V

Till this moment, I never knew myself.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XXXVI

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter LVIII

“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.”

— Spoken by a character · Chapter LX

Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.

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

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter IX

Ah! that ball!—why did we wait for any thing?—why not seize the pleasure at once?—How often is happiness destroyed by preparation, foolish preparation!

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XII

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

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XVI

I cannot make speeches, Emma:” he soon resumed; and in a tone of such sincere, decided, intelligible tenderness as was tolerably convincing.—“If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XIII

I do not know whether it ought to be so, but certainly silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter VIII

I always deserve the best treatment, because I never put up with any other; and, therefore, you must give me a plain, direct answer.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XVIII

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; but where, as in this case, though the conduct is mistaken, the feelings are not, it may not be very material.—Mr.

You must be the best judge of your own happiness.

— Emma · Chapter VII