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4492d6e
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I am very happy, Jane; and when you hear that I am dead, you must be sure and not grieve: there is nothing to grieve about. We all must die one day, and the illness which is removing me is not painful; it is gentle and gradual: my mind is at rest. I leave no one to regret me much: I have only a father; and he is lately married, and will not miss me. By dying young, I shall escape great sufferings. I had not qualities or talents to make my w..
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Charlotte Brontë |
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37bd38d
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I will bestir myself,' was her resolution, 'and try to be wise if I cannot be good.
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intelligence
resolution
wisdom
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Charlotte Brontë |
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14f1e63
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Then my sole relief was to walk along the corridor of the third storey, backwards and forwards, safe in the silence and solitude of the spot, and allow my mind's eye to dwell on whatever bright visions rose before it - and, certainly, they were many and glowing; to let my heart be heaved by the exultant movement, which, while it swelled it in trouble, expanded it with life; and, best of all, to open my inward ear to a tale that was never en..
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imagination
restlessness
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Charlotte Brontë |
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c17103e
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Human beings never enjoy complete happiness in this world. I was not born for a different destiny to the rest of my species: to imagine such a lot befalling me is a fairy tale -- a daydream." "Which I can and will realise. I shall begin today."
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love
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Charlotte Brontë |
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abdfb83
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It agitates me that the skyline there is forever our limit, I long for the power of unlimited vision...If I could behold all I imagine.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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7e36625
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I mean that I value vision, and dread being struck stone blind.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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8413019
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I Believe she thought I had forgotten my station; and yours, sir.' 'Station! Station!-- your station is in my heart, and on the necks of those who would insult you, now or hereafter.
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love
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Charlotte Brontë |
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344a9d6
|
Jane: "St John dresses well. He is a handsome man: tall, fair, with blue eyes and a Grecian profile." Rochester:(Aside) "Damn him!" (To me) "Did you like him, Jane?"
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Charlotte Brontë |
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e04d5e8
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The vehemence of emotion, stirred by grief and love within me, was claiming mastery, and struggling for full sway; and asserting a right to predominate: to overcome, to live, rise, and reign at last; yes,--and to speak.
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voice
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Charlotte Brontë |
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cc78f36
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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!
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Charlotte Brontë |
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6239b82
|
Farewell!" was the cry of my heart as I left him. Despair added, "Farewell for ever!" --
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Charlotte Brontë |
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2a920f7
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I am strangely glad to get back again to you: and wherever you are is my home--my only home.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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e180041
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I will do my best: it is a pity that doing one's best does not always answer.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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aa00a80
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I am sure, sir, I should never mistake informality for insolence: one I rather like, the other nothing free-born would submit to, even for a salary
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Charlotte Brontë |
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e05be9d
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As to the thoughts, they are elfish. Those eyes in the Evening Star you must have seen in a dream.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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5112f23
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There was nothing to cool or banish love in these circumstances, though much to create despair. Much, too, you will think, reader, to engender jealousy: if a woman, in my position, could presume to be jealous of a woman in Miss Ingram's. But I was not jealous...Miss Ingram was a mark beneath jealousy: she was too inferior to excite the feeling. Pardon the seeming paradox; I mean what I say. She was very showy, but she was not genuine; she h..
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Charlotte Brontë |
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c4dc23b
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How can it be that Jane is with me, and says she loves me? Will she not depart as suddenly as she came? To-morrow, I fear I shall find her no more.
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jane-eyre
love
mr-rochester
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Charlotte Brontë Brontë |
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8314902
|
Speak," he urged. "What about, sir?" "Whatever you like. I leave both the choice of subject and the manner of treating it entirely to yourself." Accordingly I sat and said nothing. "If he expects me to talk, for the mere sake of talking and showing off, he will find he has addressed himself to the wrong person," I thought."
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Charlotte Brontë |
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d4b7cd2
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Your station is in my heart, and on the necks of those who would insult you.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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eb9dd4f
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I had wanted to compromise with Fate: to escape occasional great agonies by submitting to a whole life of privation and small pains.
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fate
pain
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Charlotte Brontë |
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43aca6b
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Besides, I seemed to hold two lives--the life of thought, and that of reality; and, provided the former was nourished with a sufficiency of the strange necromantic joys of fancy, the privileges of the latter might remain limited to daily bread, hourly work, and a roof of shelter.
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thought
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Charlotte Brontë |
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b0e534e
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Then her soul sat on her lips, and language flowed, from what source I cannot tell.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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e292297
|
Something real, cool, and solid, lies before you something unromantic as Monday morning, when all who have work wake with the consciousness that they must rise and betake themselves thereto.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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97e1f4d
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your grasp, even in fury, would have a charm for me...
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fury
love
madness
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Charlotte Brontë |
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504388f
|
Prodigious was the amount of life I lived that morning.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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c920ddd
|
Young ladies have a remarkable way of letting you know that they think you a "quiz" without actually saying the words. A certain superciliousness of look, coolness of manner, nonchalance of tone, express fully their sentiments on the point, without committing them by any positive rudeness in word or deed."
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Charlotte Brontë |
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d0a1a77
|
Propensities and principles must be reconciled by some means.
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reconciliation
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Charlotte Brontë |
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c959ccd
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I know that a pretty doll, a fair fool, might do well enough for the honeymoon; but when passion cooled, how dreadful to find a lump of wax and wood laid in my bosom, a half-idiot clasped in my arms, and to remember that I had made of this my equal- nay, my idol- to know that I must pass the rest of my dreary life with a creature incapable of understanding what I said, of appreciating what I thought, or of sympathising with what I felt!
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love
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Charlotte Brontë |
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c0a1793
|
Presentiments are strange things: and so are sympathies; and so are signs; and the three combined make one mystery to which humanity had not yet found the key.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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e58006c
|
Beauty is given to dolls, majesty to haughty vixens, but mind, feeling, passion and the crowning grace of fortitude are the attributes of an angel.
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beauty
majesty
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Charlotte Brontë |
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1e4b62e
|
I was tossed on a buoyant but unquiet sea, where billows of trouble rolled under surges of joy. I thought sometimes I saw beyond its wild waters a shore, sweet as the hills of Beulah; and now and then a freshening gale, wakened my hope, bore my spirit, triumphantly towards the bourne: but I could not reach it, even in fancy,--a counteracting breeze blew off land, and continually drove me back. Sense would resist delirium; judgment would war..
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Charlotte Brontë |
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70d4307
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To speak truth, sir, I don't understand you at all: I cannot keep up the conversation, because it has got out of my depth. Only one thing I know: you said you were not as good as you should like to be, and that you regretted your own imperfection--one thing I can comprehend: you intimated that to have a sullied memory was a perpetual bane. It seems to me, that if you tried hard, you would in time find it possible to become what you yourself..
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Charlotte Brontë |
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7441cbb
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I knew," he continued, "you would do me good in some way, at some time;--I saw it in your eyes when I first beheld you: their expression and smile did not"--(again he stopped)--"did not" (he proceeded hastily) "strike delight to my very inmost heart so for nothing. People talk of natural sympathies; I have heard of good genii: there are grains of truth in the wildest fable. My cherished preserver, goodnight!"
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Charlotte Brontë |
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a3937c0
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Who told you I was called Carl David?" "A little bird, Monsieur." "Does it fly from me to you? Then one can tie a message under its wing when needful."
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villette
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Charlotte Brontë |
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7a18fb6
|
Provided with a case of pencils, and some sheets of paper, I used to take a seat apart from them, near the window, and busy myself in sketching fancy vignettes representing any scene that happened momentarily to shape itself in the ever-shifting kaleidoscope of imagination: a glimpse of sea between two rock; the rising moon, and a ship crossing its disc; a group of reeds and water-flags, and a naiad's head, crowned with lotus-flowers, risin..
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drawing
flowers
jane-eyre
sketching
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Charlotte Brontë |
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212c16e
|
Que me voulez-vous?' said he in a growl of which the music was wholly confined to his chest and throat, for he kept his teeth clenched, and seemed registering to himself an inward vow that nothing earthly should wring from him a smile. My answer commenced uncompromisingly: - 'Monsieur,' I said, je veux l'impossible, des choses inouies;
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Charlotte Brontë |
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0cec511
|
there is no happiness like that of being loved by your fellow-creatures, and feeling that your presence is an addition to their comfort.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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41dc1eb
|
I know no medium: I never in my life have known any medium in my dealings with positive, hard characters, antagonistic to my own, between absolute submission and determined revolt. I have always faithfully observed the one, up to the very moment of bursting, sometimes with volcanic vehemence, into the other.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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7b0afb1
|
A strong, vague persuasion that it was better to go forward than backward, and that I could go forward-- that a way, however narrow and difficult, would in time open-- predominated over other feelings: its influence hushed them so far, that at last I became sufficiently tranquil to be able to say my prayers and seek my couch. I had just extinguished my candle and lain down, when a deep, low, mighty tone swung through the night. At first I k..
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faith
forward
st-paul-s
|
Charlotte Brontë |
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73f4627
|
Reserved people often really need the frank discussion of their sentiments and griefs more than the expansive. The sternest-seeming stoic is human after all, and to burst with boldness and good-will into the silent sea of their souls is often to confer on them the first of obligations.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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1ed06fa
|
Her eyes were the eyes of one who can remember; one whose childhood does not fade like a dream, nor whose youth vanish like a sunbeam. She would not take life loosely and incoherently, in parts, and let one season slip as she entered on another: she would retain and add; often review from the commencement, and so grow in harmony and consistency as she grew in years.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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5e4cd0e
|
To be together is for us to be at once free as in solitude, as gay as in company. We talk, I believe, all day long: to talk to each other is but more animated and an audible thinking. All my confidence is bestowed on him, all his confidence is devoted to me; we are precisely suited in character - perfect concord is the result.
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jane
jane-eyre
quotes-i-love
|
Charlotte Brontë |
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c5e867f
|
I had feelings: passive as I lived, little as I spoke, cold as I looked, when I thought of past days, I could feel. About the present, it was better to be stoical; about the future - such a future as mine - to be dead. And in catalepsy and a dead trance, I studiously held the quick of my nature.
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Charlotte Brontë |
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b48af2e
|
I could bend you with my finger and my thumb. A mere reed you feel in my hands. But whatever I do with this cage, I cannot get at you, and it is your soul that I want.
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Charlotte Brontë |