Quotes from Jane Austen

She began now to comprehend that he was exactly the man who, in disposition and talents, would most suit her. His understanding and temper, though unlike her own, would have answered all her wishes. It was an union that must have been to the advantage of both: by her ease and liveliness, his mind might have been softened, his manners improved; and from his judgement, information, and knowledge of the world, she must have received benefit of greater importance.

She felt that she could so much more depend upon the sincerity of those who sometimes looked or said a careless or a hasty thing, than of those whose presence of mind never varied, whose tongue never slipped.

Every savage can dance.

I love you. Most ardently.

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.

Is not general incivility the very essence of love?

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

You deserve a longer letter than this; but it is my unhappy fate seldom to treat people so well as they deserve.

The last few hours were certainly very painful, replied Anne: but when pain is over, the remembrance of it often becomes a pleasure. One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it, unless it has been all suffering, nothing but suffering-

for he is such a disagreeable man, that it would be quite a misfortune to be liked by him.

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.

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.

This sweetest and best of all creatures, faultless in spite of all her faults.

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 gentleman before the gentleman is first known to have dreamt of her.

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

They parted at last with mutual civility, and possibly a mutual desire of never meeting again.

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. -Edward Ferrars

Elizabeth had never been more at a loss to make her feelings appear what they were not. It was necessary to laugh, when she would rather have cried.

What a shame, for I dearly love to laugh.

I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly.

What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps me in a continual state of inelegance.

I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like

We certainly do not forget you, so soon as you forget us. It is, perhaps, our fate rather than our merit. We cannot help ourselves.

She had a lively, playful disposition that delighted in anything ridiculous.