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You, Jane, I must have you for my own--entirely my own.
Charlotte Bronte -
Novelists should never allow themselves to weary of the study of real life.
Charlotte Bronte
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Shake me off, then, sir--push me away; for I'll not leave you of my own accord.
Charlotte Bronte -
A depressing and difficult passage has prefaced every page I have turned in life.
Charlotte Bronte -
There is, in lovers, a certain infatuation of egotism; they will have a witness of their happiness, cost that witness what it may.
Charlotte Bronte -
Good fortune opens the hand as well as the heart wonderfully; and to give somewhat when we have largely received, but to afford a vent to the unusual ebullition of the sensations.
Charlotte Bronte -
A reader kindly pointed out to me recently that most of the quotes I include are by men. And it's true. Personally, I don't even consider whether the author is male or female, nor even care much who the author is - what's significant is the message. Of course, women are equally capable of great insights, however in our culture it's not so long ago that women could not even be published...
Charlotte Bronte -
My fine visions are all very well, but I must not forget they are absolutely unreal. I have a rosy sky and a green flowery Eden in my brain; but without, I am perfectly aware, lies at my feet a rough tract to travel, and around me gather black tempests to encounter.
Charlotte Bronte
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The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator.
Charlotte Bronte -
They will both be happy, and I do not grudge them their bliss; but I groan under my own misery: some of my suffering is very acute. Truly, I ought not to have been born: they should have smothered me at first cry.
Charlotte Bronte -
I like to see flowers growing, but when they are gathered, they cease to please. I look on them as things rootless and perishable; their likeness to life makes me sad. I never offer flowers to those I love; I never wish to receive them from hands dear to me.
Charlotte Bronte -
I like the spirit of this great London which I feel around me. Who but a coward would pass his whole life in hamlets; and for ever abandon his faculties to the eating rust of obscurity?
Charlotte Bronte -
If he does go, the change will be doleful. Suppose he should be absent spring, summer, and autumn: how joyless sunshine and fine days will seem!
Charlotte Bronte -
Human beings must love something, and, in the dearth of worthier objects of affection, I contrived to find a pleasure in loving and cherishing a faded graven image, shabby as a miniature scarecrow. It puzzles me now to remember with what absurd sincerity I doated on this little toy, half fancying it alive and capable of sensation. I could not sleep unless it was folded in my night-gown; and when it lay there safe and warm, I was comparatively happy, believing it to be happy likewise.
Charlotte Bronte
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The hiss of the quenched element, the breakage of the pitcher which I had flung from my hand when I had emptied it, and, above all, the splash of the shower-bath I had liberally bestowed, roused Mr Rochester at last though it was dark, I knew he was awake; because I heard him fulminating strange anathemas at finding himself lying in a pool of water. 'Is there a flood?' he cried...
Charlotte Bronte -
Jane! will you hear reason?' (he stooped and approached his lips to my ear) 'because, if you won't, I'll try violence.
Charlotte Bronte -
We wove a web in childhood, A web of sunny air; We dug a spring in infancy Of water pure and fair; We sowed in youth a mustard seed, We cut an almond rod; We are now grown up to riper age Are they withered in the sod?
Charlotte Bronte -
Feeling without judgement is a washy draught indeed; but judgement untempered by feeling is too bitter and husky a morsel for human deglutition.
Charlotte Bronte -
Old maids like the houseless and unemployed poor, should not ask for a place and an occupation in the world: the demand disturbs the happy and the rich.
Charlotte Bronte -
'I wish I had only offered you a sovereign instead of ten pounds. Give me back nine pounds, Jane; I’ve a use for it.' 'And so have I, sir,' I returned, putting my hands and my purse behind me. 'I could not spare the money on any account.' 'Little niggard!' said he, 'refusing me a pecuniary request! Give me five pounds, Jane.' 'Not five shillings, sir; nor five pence.' 'Just let me look at the cash.' 'No, sir; you are not to be trusted.'
Charlotte Bronte
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I think I must admit so fair a guest when it asks entrance to my heart.
Charlotte Bronte -
I could not help it: the restlessness was in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes.
Charlotte Bronte -
I seem to have gathered up a stray lamb in my arms: you wandered out of the fold to seek your shepherd, did you, Jane?
Charlotte Bronte -
I smiled: I thought to myself Mr. Rochester is peculiar — he seems to forget that he pays me £30 per annum for receiving his orders. "The smile is very well," said he, catching instantly the passing expression; "but speak too." "I was thinking, sir, that very few masters would trouble themselves to inquire whether or not their paid subordinates were piqued and hurt by their orders.
Charlotte Bronte