Jane Austen Week - Monday: Random Jane Austen Quotes

It's Monday of Jane Austen Week! Today's event is random quotes from Jane Austen's novels and water color illustrations by C.E. Brock. Interested in more of the illustrations? I found them at this site! If you scroll down, there will be a section for "Novel Illustration Archive".

Sense and Sensibility

Sense and Sensibility: "Indulging the
recollection of past enjoyment and crying
over the present reverse."

  Elinor, this eldest daughter, whose advice was so effectual, possessed a strength of understanding, and coolness of judgment, which qualified her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her mother, and enabled her frequently to counteract, to the advantage of them all, that eagerness of mind in Mrs. Dashwood which must generally have led to imprudence. She had an excellent heart; her disposition was affectionate, and her feelings were strong; but she knew how to govern them: it was a knowledge which her mother had yet to learn; and which one of her sisters had resolved never to be taught.

  Marianne's abilities were, in many respects, quite equal to Elinor's. She was sensible and clever; but eager in everything: her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation. She was generous, amiable, interesting: she was everything but prudent. The resemblance between her and her mother was strikingly great. ~ Chapter 1

"And how does dear, dear Norland look?" cried Marianne.

"Dear, dear Norland," said Elinor, "probably looks much as it always does at this time of the year—the woods and walks thickly covered with dead leaves."

"Oh," cried Marianne, "with what transporting sensation have I formerly seen them fall! How have I delighted, as I walked, to see them driven in showers about me by the wind! What feelings have they, the season, the air altogether inspired! Now there is no one to regard them. They are seen only as a nuisance, swept hastily off, and driven as much as possible from the sight."

"It is not every one," said Elinor, "who has your passion for dead leaves." ~ Chapter 17

Elinor agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition. ~ Chapter 36

"I am not wishing him too much good," said Marianne at last with a sigh, "when I wish his secret reflections may be no more unpleasant than my own. He will suffer enough in them."

"Do you compare your conduct with his?"

"No. I compare it with what it ought to have been; I compare it with yours." ~ Chapter 47

How soon he had walked himself into the proper resolution, however, how soon an opportunity of exercising it occurred, in what manner he expressed himself, and how he was received, need not be particularly told. This only need be said;—that when they all sat down to table at four o'clock, about three hours after his arrival, he had secured his lady, engaged her mother's consent, and was not only in the rapturous profession of the lover, but, in the reality of reason and truth, one of the happiest of men. ~ Chapter 49

Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice: "Oh, papa, what
news -- what news?"

 It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. ~ Chapter 1

"...A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment." ~ Mr. Darcy, Chapter 6

"I do assure you, sir, that I have no pretensions whatever to that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man. I would rather be paid the compliment of being believed sincere. I thank you again and again for the honour you have done me in your proposals, but to accept them is absolutely impossible. My feelings in every respect forbid it. Can I speak plainer? Do not consider me now as an elegant female, intending to plague you, but as a rational creature, speaking the truth from her heart."  ~ Elizabeth Bennet, Chapter 19

"You judge very properly," said Mr. Bennet, "and it is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are the result of previous study?" ~Chapter 14

  "I remember, when we first knew her in Hertfordshire, how amazed we all were to find that she was a reputed beauty; and I particularly recollect your saying one night, after they had been dining at Netherfield, 'She a beauty!—I should as soon call her mother a wit.' But afterwards she seemed to improve on you, and I believe you thought her rather pretty at one time."

  "Yes," replied Darcy, who could contain himself no longer, "but that was only when I first saw her, for it is many months since I have considered her as one of the handsomest women of my acquaintance."

  He then went away, and Miss Bingley was left to all the satisfaction of having forced him to say what gave no one any pain but herself. ~ Chapter 45

Mansfield Park

Mansfield Park: "While Fanny cut
the roses."

"I shall soon be rested," said Fanny; "to sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure, is the most perfect refreshment."  ~ Chapter 9

"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." ~Chapter 11

"I speak what appears to me the general opinion; and where an opinion is general, it is usually correct." ~Chapter 11


"A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of." ~ Chapter 21


"Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery." ~ Chapter 48

Emma: "There was no longer a want
of subject."

Emma

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. ~Volume I, Chapter 1

Human nature is so well disposed towards those who are in interesting situations, that a young person, who either marries or dies, is sure of being kindly spoken of. ~Volume I, Chapter 4

There are people, who the more you do for them, the less they will do for themselves. ~Volume I, Chapter 11

"Business, you know, may bring money, but friendship hardly ever does" ~ Volume II, Chapter 16

If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. ~ Volume III, Chapter 13

Northanger Abbey
Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.  ~Chapter 4

"Not very good, I am afraid. But now really, do not you think Udolpho the nicest book in the world?"
"The nicest—by which I suppose you mean the neatest. That must depend upon the binding."
"Henry," said Miss Tilney, "you are very impertinent. Miss Morland, he is treating you exactly as he does his sister. He is forever finding fault with me, for some incorrectness of language, and now he is taking the same liberty with you. The word 'nicest,' as you used it, did not suit him; and you had better change it as soon as you can, or we shall be overpowered with Johnson and Blair all the rest of the way."

Northanger Abbey: The luxury of a...
frightened imagination over the pages
of Udolpho.

"I am sure," cried Catherine, "I did not mean to say anything wrong; but it is a nice book, and why should not I call it so?"
"Very true," said Henry, "and this is a very nice day, and we are taking a very nice walk, and you are two very nice young ladies. Oh! It is a very nice word indeed! It does for everything. Originally perhaps it was applied only to express neatness, propriety, delicacy, or refinement—people were nice in their dress, in their sentiments, or their choice. But now every commendation on every subject is comprised in that one word."
~ Chapter 14

"...and from politics, it was an easy step to silence." ~ Chapter 14

"Me? Yes; I cannot speak well enough to be unintelligible." ~ Chapter 16

"If I understand you rightly, you had formed a surmise of such horror as I have hardly words to—Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?" ~ Chapter 24

Persuasion: "In spire of the formidable
father & sister in the background."

Persuasion

How quick come the reasons for approving what we like! ~Chapter 2

The navy, I think, who have done so much for us, have at least an equal claim with any other set of men, for all the comforts and all the privileges which any home can give. Sailors work hard enough for their comforts, we must all allow. ~ Chapter 3

One man's ways may be as good as another's, but we all like our own best. ~ Chapter 13

The following morning Anne was out with her friend, and for the first hour, in an incessant and fearful sort of watch for him in vain; but at last, in returning down Pulteney Street, she distinguished him on the right hand pavement at such a distance as to have him in view the greater part of the street. There were many other men about him, many groups walking the same way, but there was no mistaking him. She looked instinctively at Lady Russell; but not from any mad idea of her recognising him so soon as she did herself. No, it was not to be supposed that Lady Russell would perceive him till they were nearly opposite. She looked at her however, from time to time, anxiously; and when the moment approached which must point him out, though not daring to look again (for her own countenance she knew was unfit to be seen), she was yet perfectly conscious of Lady Russell's eyes being turned exactly in the direction for him--of her being, in short, intently observing him. She could thoroughly comprehend the sort of fascination he must possess over Lady Russell's mind, the difficulty it must be for her to withdraw her eyes, the astonishment she must be feeling that eight or nine years should have passed over him, and in foreign climes and in active service too, without robbing him of one personal grace!

At last, Lady Russell drew back her head. "Now, how would she speak of him?"

"You will wonder," said she, "what has been fixing my eye so long; but I was looking after some window-curtains, which Lady Alicia and Mrs Frankland were telling me of last night. They described the drawing-room window-curtains of one of the houses on this side of the way, and this part of the street, as being the handsomest and best hung of any in Bath, but could not recollect the exact number, and I have been trying to find out which it could be; but I confess I can see no curtains hereabouts that answer their description." ~ Chapter 19

"...If I had such a memory as Benwick, I could bring you fifty quotations in a moment on my side the argument, and I do not think I ever opened a book in my life which had not something to say upon woman's inconstancy. Songs and proverbs, all talk of woman's fickleness. But perhaps you will say, these were all written by men."

"Perhaps I shall. Yes, yes, if you please, no reference to examples in books. Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything." ~ Chapter 23

There are the quotes that I've selected. What do you think? Do you have any quotes that you would like to have included? What is your favorite Jane Austen quote?

On Saturday, I would like to include the first ten memorable quote that you all have suggested as a part of the conclusion of Jane Austen Week. I will give you credit with suggesting it. In the comments for this post, just put the quote, the book it came from, and the chapter (both the volume/chapter and chapter format will work).

God Bless,