Top 100 Jane Austen Quotes
#1. THIS little work was finished in the year 1803, and intended for immediate publication.
Jane Austen
#2. A man would always wish to give a woman a better home than the one he takes her from; and he who can do it, where there is no doubt of her regard, must, I think, be the happiest of mortals.
Jane Austen
#4. Where there is a wish to please, one ought to overlook, and one does overlook a great deal.
Jane Austen
#5. ... she had nothing to do but to forgive herself and be happier than ever ...
Jane Austen
#6. No one else could be benefited by such a belief as this; for were I persuaded that Charlotte had any regard for him, I should only think worse of her understanding than I now
Jane Austen
#7. I beg your pardon; one knows exactly what to think.
Jane Austen
#8. For when people are determined on a mode of conduct which they know to be wrong, they feel injured by the expectation of any thing better from them.
Jane Austen
#9. We may sometimes take greater liberties in November than in May.
Jane Austen
#10. Charles Adams was an amiable, accomplished & bewitching young Man; of so dazzling a Beauty that none but Eagles could look him in the Face.
Jane Austen
#11. It was for the sake of what had been, rather than what was.
Jane Austen
#12. I am not afraid; for though I am the youngest, I'm the tallest.
Jane Austen
#13. 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.
Jane Austen
#14. While I can have my mornings to myself," said she, "it is enough - I think it is no sacrifice to join occasionally in evening engagements. Society has claims on us all; and I profess myself one of those who consider intervals of recreation and amusement as desirable for everybody.
Jane Austen
#15. Mine is a misery which nothing can do away.
Jane Austen
#16. Do you not want to know who has taken it? cried his wife impatiently.
Jane Austen
#17. 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.
Jane Austen
#18. My beloved Laura" (said she to me a few Hours before she died) "take warning from my unhappy End ... Beware of fainting-fits ... Beware of swoons, Run mad as often as you chuse; but do not faint - ".
Jane Austen
#19. To walk three miles, or four miles, or five miles, or whatever it is, above her ankles in dirt, and alone, quite alone! What could she mean by it? It seems to me to show an abominable sort of conceited independence, a most country-town indifference to decorum.
Jane Austen
#21. If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.
Jane Austen
#22. No one can be really esteemed accomplished who does not greatly surpass what is usually met with.
Jane Austen
#23. Elizabeth was excessively disappointed ... but it was her business to be satisfied - and certainly her temper to be happy; and all was soon right again.
Jane Austen
#24. wether I ought not to punish him by dismissing him at once after this reconciliation, or by marrying and teazing him for ever.
Jane Austen
#25. And is that all you can say for him?" cried Marianne, indignantly. "But what are his manners on more intimate acquaintance? What his pursuits, his talents, and genius?" Sir John was rather puzzled.
Jane Austen
#26. 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.
Jane Austen
#27. The manner in which they spoke of the Meryton assembly was sufficiently characteristic. Bingley had never met
Jane Austen
#28. Luck which so often defies anticipation in matrimonial affairs, giving attraction to what is moderate rather than to what is superior.
Jane Austen
#29. It was the desire of appearing superior to other people. The motive was too common to be wondered at.
Jane Austen
#30. What! do not you know who Miss Williams is? I am sure you must have heard of her before. She is a relation of the Colonel's, my dear; a very near relation. We will not say how near, for fear of shocking the young ladies.
Jane Austen
#31. 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.
Jane Austen
#32. For everybody must now 'move in a circle', - to the prevalence of which rotatory motion, is perhaps to be attributed the giddiness and false steps of many.
Jane Austen
#33. She was sensible and clever, but eager in everything; her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation.
Jane Austen
#34. I think him every thing that is worthy and amiable.
Jane Austen
#35. If I could but know his heart, everything would become easy.
Jane Austen
#36. Before them an indifferent house, standing low, and hemmed in by the barns and buildings of a farm-yard.
Jane Austen
#37. We women love longest even when all hope is gone.
Jane Austen
#38. It is possible to read too many novels. Henry Tileny, Northanger Abbey
Jane Austen
#39. I am only resolved to act in that manner, which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without reference to you, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me.
Jane Austen
#40. Instead of receiving any such letter of excuse from his friend, as Elizabeth half expected Mr. Bingley to do, he was able to bring Darcy with him to Longbourn before many days had passed after Lady Catherine's visit.
Jane Austen
#42. I am tired of submitting my will to the caprices of others - of resigning my own judgement in deference to those to whom I owe no duty, and for whom I feel no respect.
Jane Austen
#43. Had he been even old, ugly, and vulgar, the gratitude and kindness of Mrs. Dashwood would have been secured by any act of attention to her child; but the influence of youth, beauty, and elegance, gave an interest to the action which came home to her feelings.
Jane Austen
#44. Catherine [ ... ] enjoyed her usual happiness with Henry Tilney, listening with sparkling eyes to everything he said; and, in finding him irresistible, becoming so herself.
Jane Austen
#45. He was gone off to London, merely to have his hair cut ... there was an air of foppery and nonsense in it which she could not approve
Jane Austen
#46. 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.
Jane Austen
#47. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have
others think of us.
Jane Austen
#48. I do not like the studied air and artificial inflexions of voice which your very popular and most admired preachers generally have. A simple delivery is much better calculated to inspire devotion, and shows a much better taste.
Jane Austen
#49. You have another long walk before you.
Jane Austen
#50. I am always in love with every handsome man in the world.
Jane Austen
#51. Wherever you are you should always be contented, but especially at home, because there you must spend the most of your time.
Jane Austen
#52. That would be the greatest misfortune of all! To find a man agreeable whom one is determined to hate!
Jane Austen
#53. You need not hurry when the object is only to prevent my saying a bon mot, for there is not the least wit in my nature. I am a very matter-of-fact, plain-spoken being, and may blunder on the borders of a repartee for half an hour together without striking it out.
Jane Austen
#54. You must really begin to harden yourself to the idea of being worth looking at.
Jane Austen
#55. What praise is more valuable than the praise of an intelligent servant?
Jane Austen
#56. Better be without sense than misapply it as you do.
Jane Austen
#57. So long divided and so differently situated, the ties of blood were little more than nothing.
Jane Austen
#59. It is a shocking trick for a young person to be always lolling upon a sofa.
Jane Austen
#60. If there is any thing disagreeable going on, men are always sure to get out of it.
Jane Austen
#61. 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.
Jane Austen
#62. I am determined that only the deepest love will induce me into matrimony. So, I shall end an old maid, and teach your ten children to embroider cushions and play their instruments very ill.
Jane Austen
#63. Good heaven! My dear Isabella, what do you mean? Can you
can you really be in love with James?
Jane Austen
#64. If you will thank me, let it be for yourself alone. That the wish of giving happiness to you, might add force to the other inducements which led me on, I shall not attempt to deny. But your family owe me nothing. Much as I respect them, I believe, I thought only of you.
Jane Austen
#65. She considered that there were misfortunes of a much greater magnitude than the loss of a ball experienced every day by some part of mortality, and that the time might come when she would herself look back with wonder and perhaps envy on her having known no greater vexation.
Jane Austen
#66. 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.
Jane Austen
#67. There is one thing ... which a man can always do, if he chuses[sic], and that is, his duty.
Jane Austen
#68. Every emendation of Anne's had been on the side of honesty against importance. She wanted more vigorous measures, a more complete reformation, a quicker release from debt, a much higher tone of indifference for everything but justice and equity.
Jane Austen
#69. Sometimes the last person on earth you want to be with is the one person you can't be without.
Jane Austen
#70. One word from you shall silence me forever.
Jane Austen
#71. But a mind of usefulness and ingenuity seemed to furnish him with constant employment within.
Jane Austen
#72. A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.
Jane Austen
#73. To yield readily
easily
to the persuasion of a friend is no merit ... To yield without conviction is no compliment to the understanding of either.
Jane Austen
#74. 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.
Jane Austen
#75. I should hardly call her a lively girl - she is very earnest, very eager in all she does - sometimes talks a great deal and always with animation - but she is not often really merry.
Jane Austen
#76. If her case was pitiable, his was hopeless. His imprudence had made her miserable for a while; but it seemed to have deprived himself of all chance of ever being otherwise.
Jane Austen
#77. They went to the sands, to watch the flowing of the tide, which a fine south-easterly breeze was bringing in all the grandeur which so flat a shore admitted. They praised the morning; gloried in the sea; sympathized in the delight of the fresh-feeling breeze- and were silent ...
Jane Austen
#79. Mr. Wickham was the happy man towards whom almost every female eye was turned, and Elizabeth was the happy woman by whom he finally seated himself
Jane Austen
#80. I certainly must,' said she. 'This sensation of listlessness, weariness, stupidity, this disinclination to sit down and employ myself, this feeling of everything's being dull and insipid about the house! I must be in love; I should be the oddest creature in the world if I were not.
Jane Austen
#81. And though she sighed as she rejoiced, her sigh had none of the ill-will of envy in it. She would certainly have risen to their blessings if she could, but she did not want to lessen theirs.
Jane Austen
#82. Where the heart is really attached, I know very well how little one can be pleased with the attention of any body else.
Jane Austen
#83. Happiness must preclude false indulgence and physic.
Jane Austen
#84. Grant us peace, Almighty Father, so to pray as to deserve to be heard.
Jane Austen
#85. If I endeavor to undeceive people as to the rest of his conduct, who will believe me? The general prejudice against Mr. Darcy is so violent that it would be the death of half the good people in Meryton, to attempt to place him in an amiable light.
-Chapter 7
Jane Austen
#88. We must not be so ready to fancy ourselves intentionally injured ... It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us.
Jane Austen
#89. At first sight, his address is certainly not striking; and his person can hardly be called handsome, till the expression of his eyes, which are uncommonly good, and the general sweetness of his countenance, is perceived.
Jane Austen
#90. He was in love, very much in love; and it was a love which, operating on an active, sanguine spirit, of more warmth than delicacy, made her affection appear of greater consequence, because it was witheld, and determined him to have the glory, as well as the felicity of forcing her to love him.
Jane Austen
#91. ... dearest, loveliest Elizabeth [ ... ] By you, I was properly humbled.
Jane Austen
#92. Though she liked him for his attentions, and thought them all, whether in friendship, admiration, or playfulness, extremely judicious, they were not winning back her heart.
Jane Austen
#93. You do not make allowance enough for difference of situation and temper.
Jane Austen
#94. That's true," she cried - "very true. Little Emma, grow up a better woman than your aunt. Be infinitely cleverer and not half so conceited.
Jane Austen
#95. Eagerly succeeded at the instrument by her sister Mary, who
Jane Austen
#96. But Mr. Bennet was not of a disposition to seek comfort for the disappointment which his own imprudence had brought on in any of those pleasures which too often console the unfortunate for their folly or their vice.
Jane Austen
#97. I have had to contend against the unkindness of his sister, and the insolence of his mother; and have suffered the punishment of an attachment, without enjoying its advantages.
Jane Austen
#98. Every neighbourhood should have a great Lady.
Jane Austen
#99. I will not allow books to prove any thing."
"But how shall we prove any thing?"
"We never shall.
Jane Austen
#100. The far and the near must be relative, and depend on many varying circumstances.
Jane Austen
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