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For A Long Time The Fear Of Seeming Singular Scared Me Away; But By Degrees, As People Became Accustomed To Me And My Habits, And To Such Shadows Of Peculiarity As Were Engrained In My Nature - Shades, Certainly Not Striking Enough To Interest, And Perhaps Not Prominent Enough To Offend, But Born In And With Me, And No More To Be Parted With Than My Identity - But Slow Degrees I Became A Frequenter Of This Straight Narrow Path.

-Charlotte Bronte

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For A Long Time

Charlotte Bronte

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For A Long Time The Fear Of Seeming Singular Scared Me Away; But By Degrees, As People Became Accustomed To Me And My Habits, And To Such Shadows Of Peculiarity As Were Engrained In My Nature - Shades, Certainly Not Striking Enough To Interest, And Perhaps Not Prominent Enough To Offend, But Born In And With Me, And No More To Be Parted With Than My Identity - But Slow Degrees I Became A Frequenter Of This Straight Narrow Path.

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Something Of Vengeance I Had Tasted For The First Time; As Aromatic Wine It Seemed, On Swallowing, Warm And Racy: Its After-flavour, Metallic And Corroding, Gave Me A Sensation As If I Had Been Poisoned.

This Is A Terrible Hour, But It Is Often That Darkest Point Which Precedes The Rise Of Day; That Turn Of The Year When The Icy January Wind Carries Over The Waste At Once The Dirge Of Departing Winter, And The Prophecy Of Coming Spring.

I Think You Will Learn To Be Natural With Me, As I Find It Impossible To Be Conventional With You

Fortune Is Proverbially Called Changeful, Yet Her Caprice Often Takes The Form Of Repeating Again And Again A Similar Stroke Of Luck In The Same Quarter.

What The Deuce Is To Do Now?

Your Will Shall Decide Your Destiny.

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.

When We Are Struck At Without A Reason, We Should Strike Back Again Very Hard; I Am Sure We Should - So Hard As To Teach The Person Who Struck Us Never To Do It Again.

But What Is So Headstrong As Youth? What So Blind As Inexperience?

For A Long Time The Fear Of Seeming Singular Scared Me Away; But By Degrees, As People Became Accustomed To Me And My Habits, And To Such Shadows Of Peculiarity As Were Engrained In My Nature - Shades, Certainly Not Striking Enough To Interest, And Perhaps Not Prominent Enough To Offend, But Born In And With Me, And No More To Be Parted With Than My Identity - But Slow Degrees I Became A Frequenter Of This Straight Narrow Path.

The Shadows Are As Important As The Light.

It Is In Vain To Say Human Beings Ought To Be Satisfied With Tranquility: They Must Have Action; And They Will Make It If They Cannot Find It.

Jane, I Never Meant To Wound You Thus...will You Ever Forgive Me?" Reader, I Forgave Him At The Moment And On The Spot.

If We Would Build On A Sure Foundation In Friendship We Must Love Friends For Their Sake Rather Than For Our Own.

Prodigious Was The Amount Of Life I Lived That Morning.

Beauty Is In The Eye Of The Gazer.

I Sat Down And Tried To Rest. I Could Not; Though I Had Been On Foot All Day, I Could Not Now Repose An Instant; I Was Too Much Excited. A Phase Of My Life Was Closing Tonight, A New One Opening Tomorrow: Impossible To Slumber In The Interval; I Must Watch Feverishly While The Change Was Being Accomplished.

Mademoiselle Is A Fairy," He Said, Whispering Mysteriously.

Little Jane's Love Would Have Been My Best Reward, Without It, My Heart Is Broken.

And It Is You, Spirit--with Will And Energy, And Virtue And Purity--that I Want, Not Alone With Your Brittle Frame.

As To The Mouth, It Delights At Times In Laughter; It Is Disposed To Impart All That The Brain Conceives; Though I Daresay It Would Be Silent On Much The Heart Experiences. Mobile And Flexible, It Was Never Intended To Be Compressed In The Eternal Silence Of Solitude: It Is A Mouth Which Should Speak Much And Smile Often, And Have Human Affection For Its Interlocutor.

'my Bride Is Here,' Rochester Said , Again Drawing Me To Him, 'because My Equal Is Here, And My Likeness. Jane, Will You Marry Me?'

Will You Marry Me

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

Crying Does Not Indicate That You Are Weak. Since Birth, It Has Always Been A Sign That You Are Alive.

You, Jane, I Must Have You For My Own--entirely My Own.

It Is Strange,' Pursued He, 'that While I Love Rosomond Oliver So Wildly-with All The Intensity, Indeed, Of A First Passion, The Object Of Which Is Exquisitely Beautiful, Graceful, And Fascinating--i Experience At The Same Time A Calm, Unwarped Consciousness, That She Would Not Make Me A Good Wife; That She Is Not The Partner Suited To Me; That I Should Discover This Within A Year After Marriage; And That To Twelve Months' Rapture Would Succeed A Lifetime Of Regret. This I Know.

Sir,' I Interrupted Him, 'you Are Inexorable For That Unfortunate Lady; You Speak Of Her With Hate --- With Vindictive Antipathy. It Is Cruel --- She Cannot Help Being Mad.

Life Appears To Me Too Short To Be Spent In Nursing Animosity, Or Registering Wrongs.

I Would Always Rather Be Happy Than Dignified.

Rochester: "i Am No Better Than The Old Lightning-struck Chestnut-tree In Thornfield Orchard…and What Right Would That Ruin Have To Bid A Budding Woodbine Cover Its Decay With Freshness?" Jane: "you Are No Ruin Sir - No Lighting-struck Tree: You Are Green And Vigorous. Plants Will Grow About Your Roots, Whether You Ask Them Or Not, Because They Take Delight In Your Bountiful Shadow; And As They Grow They Will Lean Towards You, And Wind Round You, Because Your Strength Offers Them So Safe A Prop.

On The Contrary, I'm A Universal Patriot, If You Could Understand Me Rightly: My Country Is The World.

Dread Remorse When You Are Tempted To Err, Miss Eyre; Remorse Is The Poison Of Life.

He Made Me Love Him Without Looking At Me.

I Am Anchored On A Resolve You Cannot Shake. My Heart, My Conscience Shall Dispose Of My Hand - They Only. Know This At Last.

It Did Not Seem As If A Prop Were Withdrawn, But Rather As If A Motive Were Gone: It Was Not The Power To Be Tranquil Which Had Failed Me, But The Reason For Tranquility Was No More.

Poverty, For Me, Is Synonymous With Degradation.

A Beauty Neither Of Fine Colour Nor Long Eyelash, Nor Pencilled Brow, But Of Meaning, Of Movement, Of Radiance.

I Could Not Unlove Him Now, Merely Because I Found That He Had Ceased To Notice Me.

Such Is The Imperfect Nature Of Man! Such Spots Are There On The Disc Of The Clearest Planet; And Eyes Like Miss Scatcherd's Can Only See Those Minute Defects, And Are Blind To The Full Brightness Of The Orb.

I Remembered That The Real World Was Wide, And That A Varied Field Of Hopes And Fears, Of Sensations And Excitments, Awaited Those Who Had The Courage To Go Forth Into It's Expanse, To Seek Real Knowledge Of Life Amidst It's Perils.

The Idea Of Seeing The Sea - Of Being Near It - Watching Its Changes By Sunrise, Sunset, Moonlight, And Noonday - In Calm, Perhaps In Storm - Fills And Satisfies My Mind.

We Should Acknowledge God Merciful, But Not Always For Us Comprehensible.

Religious Faith

I Stood Lonely Enough, But To That Feeling Of Isolation I Was Accustomed: It Did Not Oppress Me Much.

I Wished Critics Would Judge Me As An Author, Not As A Woman.

I Hold Another Creed, Which No One Ever Taught Me, And Which I Seldom Mention, But In Which I Delight, And To Which I Cling, For It Extends Hope To All; It Makes Eternity A Rest - A Mighty Home, Not A Terror And An Abyss. Besides, With This Creed, I Can So Clearly Distinguish Between The Criminal And His Crime; I Can So Sincerely Forgive The First While I Abhor The Last; With This Creed, Revenge Never Worries My Heart, Degradation Never Too Deeply Disgusts Me, Injustice Never Crushes Me Too Low. I Live In Calm, Looking To The End.

Happiness Quite Unshared Can Scarcely Be Called Happiness; It Has No Taste.

Life And Happiness

If There Are Words And Wrongs Like Knives, Whose Deep Inflicted Lacerations Never Heal - Cutting Injuries And Insults Of Serrated And Poison-dripping Edge - So, Too, There Are Consolations Of Tone Too Fine For The Ear Not Fondly And For Ever To Retain Their Echo: Caressing Kindnesses - Loved, Lingered Over Through A Whole Life, Recalled With Unfaded Tenderness, And Answering The Call With Undimmed Shine, Out Of That Raven Cloud Foreshadowing Death Himself.

The Word Book Acted As A Transient Stimulus

To Prolong Doubt Was To Prolong Hope.

Look Twice Before You Leap.

If He Were Insane, However, His Was A Very Cool And Collected Insanity.

Fair As A Lily, And Not Only The Pride Of Life, But The Desire Of His Eyes

You Are Afraid Of Me, Because I Talk Like A Sphinx.

I Could Not Help It: The Restlessness Was In My Nature; It Agitated Me To Pain Sometimes.

To Talk To Each Other Is But A More Animated And An Audible Thinking.

To The Dear Eye And Eloquent Tongue, To The Soul Made Of Fire, And The Character That Bends But Does Not Break... I Am Ever Tender And True.

What You Want To Ignite In Others Must First Burn Inside Yourself.

Consistency, Madam, Is The First Of Christian Duties.

Presentiments Are Strange Things: And So Are Sympathies; And So Are Signs; And The Three Combined Make One Mystery To Which Humanity Has Not Yet Found The Key.

Good-night, My-" He Stopped, Bit His Lip, And Abruptly Left Me.

To You I Am Neither Man Nor Woman. I Come Before You As An Author Only. It Is The Sole Standard By Which You Have A Right To Judge Me--the Sole Ground On Which I Accept Your Judgment.

I Mentally Shake Hands With You For Your Answer, Despite Its Inaccuracy." Mr. Rochester

It Is Far Better To Endure Patiently A Smart Which Nobody Feels But Yourself, Than To Commit A Hasty Action Whose Evil Consequences Will Extend To All Connected With You.

No Mockery In This World Ever Sounds To Me So Hollow As That Of Being Told To Cultivate Happiness. What Does Such Advice Mean? Happiness Is Not A Potato, To Be Planted In Mould, And Tilled With Manure.

Prejudices, It Is Well Known, Are Most Difficult To Eradicate From The Heart Whose Soil Has Never Been Loosened Or Fertilized By Education; They Grow Firm There, Firm As Weeds Among Stones.

It Is One Of My Faults, That Though My Tongue Is Sometimes Prompt Enough At An Answer, There Are Times When It Sadly Fails Me In Framing An Excuse; And Always The Lapse Occurs At Some Crisis, When A Facile Word Or Plausible Pretext Is Specially Wanted To Get Me Out Of Painful Embarrassment.

Jane Eyre "i Desired More...than Was Within My Reach. Who Blames Me? Many Call Me Discontented. I Couldn't Help It: The Restlessness Is In My Nature; It Agitated Me To Pain Sometimes.

I Would Not Be You For A Kingdom.' The Remark Was Too Naïve To Rouse Anger; I Merely Said - 'very Good.' 'and What Would You Give To Be Me?' She Inquired. 'not A Bad Sixpence - Strange As It May Sound', I Replied. 'you Are But A Poor Creature.' 'you Don't Think So In Your Heart.' 'no; For In My Heart You Have Not The Outline Of A Place: I Only Occasionally Turn You Over In My Brain.

Memory In Youth Is Active And Easily Impressible; In Old Age It Is Comparatively Callous To New Impressions, But Still Retains Vividly Those Of Earlier Years.

But This I Know; The Writer Who Possesses The Creative Gift Owns Something Of Which He Is Not Always Master--something That At Times Strangely Wills And Works For Itself. He May Lay Down Rules And Devise Principles, And To Rules And Principles It Will Perhaps For Years Lie In Subjection; And Then, Haply Without Any Warning Of Revolt, There Comes A Time When It Will No Longer Consent.

I Had A Theoretical Reverence And Homage For Beauty, Elegance, Gallantry, Fascination But Had I Met Those Qualities Incarnate In Masculine Shape, I Should Have Known Instinctively That They Had Nor Could Have Sympathy With Anything In Me.

It Is A Happy Thing That Time Quells The Longings Of Vengeance And Hushes The Promptings Of Rage And Aversion. I Had Left This Woman In Bitterness And Hate, And I Came Back To Her Now With No Other Emotion Than A Sort Of Ruth For Her Great Sufferings, And Strong Yearning To Forget And Forgive All Injuries - To Be Reconciled And Clasp Hands In Amity.

I Have For The First Time Found What I Can Truly Love- I Have Found You. You Are My Sympathy-my Better Self-my Good Angel-i Am Bound To You With A Strong Attachment.

The Eagerness Of A Listener Quickens The Tongue Of A Narrator.

Jane, My Little Darling (so I Will Call You, For So You Are), You Don't Know What You Are Talking About; You Misjudge Me Again: It Is Not Because She Is Mad I Hate Her. If You Were Mad, Do You Think I Should Hate You?

Am I A Liar In Your Eyes?" He Asked Passionately. "little Skeptic, You Shall Be Convinced. What Love Have I For Miss Ingram? None: And That You Know. What Love Has She For Me? None: As I Have Taken Pains To Prove; I Caused A Rumor To Reach Her That My Fortune Was Not A Third Of What Was Supposed, And After That I Presented Myself To See The Result; It Was Coldness Both From Her And Her Mother. I Would Not-i Could Not-marry Miss Ingram. You-you Strange-you Almost Unearthly Thing!-i Love As My Own Flesh. You-poor And Obscure, And Small And Plain As You Are-i Entreat To Accept Me As A Husband.

You — You Strange — You Almost Unearthly Thing! — I Love As My Own Flesh. You — Poor And Obscure, And Small And Plain As You Are — I Entreat To Accept Me As A Husband.

I Know I Must Conceal My Sentiments: I Must Smother Hope; I Must Remember That He Cannot Care Much For Me. For When I Say That I Am Of His Kind, I Do Not Mean That I Have His Force To Influence, And His Spell To Attract: I Mean Only That I Have Certain Tastes And Feelings In Common With Him.i Must, Then, Repeat Continually That We Are Forever Sundered: - And Yet, While I Breathe And Think, I Must Love Him.

It Would Not Be Wicked To Love Me." "it Would To Obey You.

You May Fume And Fidget As You Please: But This Is The Best Plan To Pursue With You, I Am Certain. I Like You More Than I Can Say; But I’ll Not Sink Into A Bathos Of Sentiment: And With This Needle Of Repartee I’ll Keep You From The Edge Of The Gulf Too; And, Moreover, Maintain By Its Pungent Aid That Distance Between You And Myself Most Conducive To Our Real Mutual Advantage.

Jane! Will You Hear Reason?' (he Stooped And Approached His Lips To My Ear) 'because, If You Won't, I'll Try Violence.

That To Begin With; Let Respect Be The Foundation, Affection The First Floor, Love The Superstructure.

Peril, Loneliness, An Uncertain Future, Are Not Oppressive Evils, So Long As The Frame Is Healthy And The Faculties Are Employed; So Long, Especially, As Liberty Lends Us Her Wings, And Hope Guides Us By Her Star.

Now For The Hitch In Jane's Character,' He Said At Last, Speaking More Calmly Than From His Look I Had Expected Him To Speak. 'the Reel Of Silk Has Run Smoothly Enough So Far; But I Always Knew There Would Come A Knot And A Puzzle: Here It Is. Now For Vexation, And Exasperation, And Endless Trouble!

If There Is One Notion I Hate More Than Another, It Is That Of Marriage - I Mean Marriage In The Vulgar, Weak Sense, As A Mere Matter Of Sentiment.

We Know That God Is Everywhere; But Certainly We Feel His Presence Most When His Works Are On The Grandest Scale Spread Before Us; And It Is In The Unclouded Night-sky, Where His Worlds Wheel Their Silent Course, That We Read Clearest His Infinitude, His Omnipotence, His Omnipresence.

I Have Little Left In Myself -- I Must Have You. The World May Laugh -- May Call Me Absurd, Selfish -- But It Does Not Signify. My Very Soul Demands You: It Will Be Satisfied, Or It Will Take Deadly Vengeance On Its Frame.

It Is Not Violence That Best Overcomes Hate -- Nor Vengeance That Most Certainly Heals Injury.

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.

The Writer Who Possesses The Creative Gift Owns Something Of Which He Is Not Always Master - Something That, At Times, Strangely Wills And Works For Itself.

What Delusion Has Come Over Me? What Sweet Madness Has Seized Me?

Monsieur, Sit Down; Listen To Me. I Am Not A Heathen, I Am Not Hard-hearted, I Am Not Unchristian, I Am Not Dangerous, As They Tell You; I Would Not Trouble Your Faith; You Believe In God And Christ And The Bible, And So Do I.

There Is A Perverse Mood Of The Mind Which Is Rather Soothed Than Irritated By Misconstruction; And In Quarters Where We Can Never Be Rightly Known, We Take Pleasure, I Think, In Being Consummately Ignored. What Honest Man On Being Casually Taken For A Housebreaker Does Not Feel Rather Tickled Than Vexed At The Mistake?

There Is Nothing I Fear So Much As Idleness, The Want Of Occupation, Inactivity, The Lethargy Of The Faculties; When The Body Is Idle, The Spirit Suffers Painfully.

Everyone Else Is Just Cocktails.

Die Without Me If You Will. Live For Me If You Dare.

Human Beings Must Have Action; And They Will Make It If They Cannot Find It.

Novelists Should Never Allow Themselves To Weary Of The Study Of Real Life.

You Ask Rather Too Many Questions. I Have Given You Answers Enough For The Present: Now I Want To Read.

I Can Live Alone, If Self-respect, And Circumstances Require Me So To Do. I Need Not Sell My Soul To Buy Bliss. I Have An Inward Treasure Born With Me, Which Can Keep Me Alive If All Extraneous Delights Should Be Withheld, Or Offered Only At A Price I Cannot Afford To Give.

I Shall Be Thirty-one Next Birthday. My Youth Is Gone Like A Dream; And Very Little Use Have I Ever Made Of It. What Have I Done These Last Thirty Years? Precious Little.

One Does Not Jump, And Spring, And Shout Hurrah! At Hearing One Has Got A Fortune, One Begins To Consider Responsibilities, And To Ponder Business; On A Base Of Steady Satisfaction Rise Certain Grave Cares, And We Contain Ourselves, And Brood Over Our Bliss With A Solemn Brow.

My Future Husband Was Becoming To Me My Whole World; And More Than The World: Almost My Hope Of Heaven. He Stood Between Me And Every Thought Of Religion, As An Eclipse Intervenes Between Man And The Broad Sun. I Could Not, In Those Days, See God For His Creature: Of Whom I Had Made An Idol.

Give Him Enough Rope And He Will Hang Himself.

The Ease Of His Manner Freed Me From Painful Restraint; The Friendly Frankness, As Correct As Cordial, With Which He Treated Me, Drew Me To Him

Adversity Is A Good School.

Arraigned At My Own Bar, Memory Having Given Her Evidence Of The Hopes, Wishes, Sentiments I Had Been Cherishing Since Last Night-- Of The General State Of Mind Which I Have Indulged For Nearly A Fortnight Past; Reason Having Come Forward And Told In Her Own Quiet Way , A Plain, Unvarnished Tale, Showing How I Had Rejected The Real, And Rabidly Devoured The Ideal;-- I Pronounced Judgment To This Effect:-- That A Greater Fool Than Jane Eyre Had Never Breathed The Breath Of Life: That A More Fantastic Idiot Had Never Surfeited Herself On Sweet Lies, And Swallowed The Poison As If It Were Nectar.

My God, Whose Son, As On This Night, Took On Him The Form Of Man, And For Man Vouchsafed To Suffer And Bleed, Controls Thy Hand, And Without His Behest, Thou Canst Not Strike A Stroke. My God Is Sinless, Eternal, All-wise, And In Him Is My Trust, And Though Stripped And Crushed By Thee, -though Naked, Desolate, Void Of Resource- I Do Not Despair:where The Lance Of Guthrum Now Wet With My Blood, I Should Not Despair. I Watch, I Toil, I Hope, I Pray: Jehovah, In His Own Time, Will Aid.

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.

Is Not The Real Experience Of Each Individual Very Limited? And, If A Writer Dwells Upon That Solely Or Principally, Is He Not In Danger Of Repeating Himself, And Also Of Becoming An Egotist? Then, Too, Imagination Is A Strong, Restless Faculty, Which Claims To Be Heard And Exercised: Are We To Be Quite Deaf To Her Cry, And Insensate To Her Struggles? When She Shows Us Bright Pictures, Are We Never To Look At Them, And Try To Reproduce Them? And When She Is Eloquent, And Speaks Rapidly And Urgently In Our Ear, Are We Not To Write To Her Dictation?

Men, In General, Are A Sort Of Scum, Very Different To Anything Of Which You Have An Idea.

My Sister Emily Loved The Moors. Flowers Brighter Than The Rose Bloomed In The Blackest Of The Heath For Her; Out Of A Sullen Hollow In A Livid Hillside Her Mind Could Make An Eden. She Found In The Bleak Solitude Many And Dear Delights; And Not The Least And Best-loved Was – Liberty.

He Is Not To Them What He Is To Me," I Thought: "he Is Not Of Their Kind. I Believe He Is Of Mine- I Am Sure He Is- I Feel Akin To Him- I Understand The Language Of His Countenance And Movements: Though Rank And Wealth Sever Us Widely, I Have Something In My Brain And Heart, In My Blood And Nerves, That Assimilates Me Mentally To Him.

If You Don't Love Another Living Soul, Then You'll Never Be Disappointed.

I Had Not Intended To Love Him; The Reader Knows I Had Wrought Hard To Extirpate From My Soul The Germs Of Love There Detected; And Now, At The First Renewed View Of Him, They Spontaneously Revived, Great And Strong! He Made Me Love Him Without Looking At Me.

You Transfix Me Quite.

He Turned Away; He Threw Himself On His Face On The Sofa. 'oh, Jane! My Hope - My Love - My Life!' Broke In Anguish From His Lips.

Love Of My Life

As Much Good-will May Be Conveyed In One Hearty Word As In Many.

It Is Good To Be Attracted Out Of Ourselves, To Be Forced To Take A Near View Of The Sufferings, The Privations, The Efforts, The Difficulties Of Others.

I Recalled The Voice I Had Heard; Again I Questioned Whence It Came, As Vainly As Before: It Seemed In Me Not In The External World. I Asked, Was It A Mere Nervous Impression A Delusion? I Could Not Conceive Or Believe: It Was More Like An Inspiration.

I Like This Day; I Like That Sky Of Steel; I Like The Sternness And Stillness Of The World Under This Frost.

When You Are Inquisitive, Jane, You Always Make Me Smile. You Open Your Eyes Like An Eager Bird, And Make Every Now And Then A Restless Movement, As If Answers In Speech Did Not Flow Fast Enough For You, And You Wanted To Read The Tablet Of One's Heart.

Silence Is Of Different Kinds, And Breathes Different Meanings.

There Is No Happiness Like That Of Being Loved By Your Fellow Creatures, And Feeling That Your Presence Is An Addition To Their Comfort.

Thank You, Mr. Rochester, For Your Great Kindness. I Am Strangely Glad To Get Back Again To You: And Wherever You Are Is My Home—my Only Home.

But I Tell You - And Mark My Words - You Will Come Some Day To A Craggy Pass In The Channel, Where The Whole Of Life's Stream Will Be Broken Up Into Whirl And Tumult, Foam And Noise: Either You Will Be Dashed To Atoms On Crag Points, Or Lifted Up And Borne On By Some Master-wave Into A Calmer Current.

Strange That Grief Should Now Almost Choke Me, Because Another Human Being's Eye Has Failed To Greet Mine.

His Mind Was Indeed My Library, And Whenever It Was Opened To Me, I Entered Bliss.

Great Pains Were Taken To Hide Chains With Flowers

A Ruffled Mind Makes A Restless Pillow.

I Have No Wish To Talk Nonsense." "if You Did, It Would Be In Such A Grave, Quiet Manner, I Should Mistake It For Sense.

I Ask You To Pass Through Life At My Side—to Be My Second Self, And Best Earthly Companion.

Tact, If It Be Genuine, Never Sleeps.

God Did Not Give Me My Life To Throw It Away.

I Can But Die... And I Believe In God. Let Me Try And Wait His Will In Silence.

Reserved People Often Really Need The Frank Discussion Of Their Sentiments And Griefs More Than The Expansive.

Would You Not Be Happier If You Tried To Forget Her Severity, Together With The Passionate Emotions It Excited? Life Appears To Me Too Short To Be Spent In Nursing Animosity, Or Registering Wrongs.

I'm Just Going To Write Because I Cannot Help It.

No Mockery In This World Ever Sounds To Me So Hollow As That Of Being Told To Cultivate Happiness. What Does Such Advice Mean? Happiness Is Not A Potato, To Be Planted In Mould, And Tilled With Manure. Happiness Is A Glory Shining Far Down Upon Us Out Of Heaven. She Is A Divine Dew Which The Soul, On Certain Of Its Summer Mornings, Feels Dropping Upon It From The Amaranth Bloom And Golden Fruitage Of Paradise.

I Had Not Seen "pride And Prejudice," Till I Read That Sentence Of Yours, And Then I Got The Book. And What Did I Find? An Accurate Daguerreotyped Portrait Of A Common-place Face; A Carefully Fenced, Highly Cultivated Garden, With Neat Borders And Delicate Flowers; But No Glance Of A Bright, Vivid Physiognomy, No Open Country, No Fresh Air, No Blue Hill, No Bonny Beck. I Should Hardly Like To Live With Her Ladies And Gentlemen, In Their Elegant But Confined Houses.

I Try To Avoid Looking Forward Or Backward, And Try To Keep Looking Upward.

Men Judge Us By The Success Of Our Efforts. God Looks At The Efforts Themselves.

Congratulations

What Tale Do You Like Best To Hear?' 'oh, I Have Not Much Choice! They Generally Run On The Same Theme - Courtship; And Promise To End In The Same Catastrophe - Marriage.

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.

Better To Be Without Logic Than Without Feeling.

It Seems To Me, Monsieur, That There Is Nothing More Galling In Great Physical Misfortunes Than To Be Compelled To Make All Those About Us Share In Our Sufferings. The Ills Of The Soul One Can Hide, But Those Which Attack The Body And Destroy The Faculties Cannot Be Concealed.

It Is Hard Work To Control The Workings Of Inclination And Turn The Bent Of Nature; But That It May Be Done, I Know From Experience. God Has Given Us, In A Measure, The Power To Make Our Own Fate.

The Trouble Is Not That I Am Single And Likely To Stay Single, But That I Am Lonely And Likely To Stay Lonely.

I Care For Myself. The More Solitary, The More Friendless, The More Unsustained I Am, The More I Will Respect Myself.

Nervous Alarms Should Always Be Communicated, That They May Be Dissipated.

Enjoy The Blessings Heaven Bestows, Assist His Friends, Forgive His Foes; Trust God, And Keep His Statutes Still, Upright And Firm, Through Good And Ill; Thankful For All That God Has Given, Fixing His Firmest Hopes On Heaven; Knowing That Earthly Joys Decay, But Hoping Through The Darkest Day.

But Life Is A Battle: May We All Be Enabled To Fight It Well!

All My Heart Is Yours, Sir: It Belongs To You; And With You It Would Remain, Were Fate To Exile The Rest Of Me From Your Presence Forever.

You Had No Right To Be Born; For You Make No Use Of Life. Instead Of Living For, In, And With Yourself, As A Reasonable Being Ought, You Seek Only To Fasten Your Feebleness On Some Other Person's Strength.

Make My Happiness--i Will Make Yours.

Unlawful Pleasure, Trenching On Another's Rights, Is Delusive And Envenomed Pleasureits Hollowness Disappoints At The Time, Its Poison Cruelly Tortures Afterwards, Its Effects Deprave Forever.

I Am Not An Angel," I Asserted; "and I Will Not Be One Till I Die: I Will Be Myself.

I Feel Monotony And Death To Be Almost The Same.

If Life Be A War, It Seemed My Destiny To Conduct It Single-handed.

I Like Rudeness A Great Deal Better Than Flattery.

Take My Love. One Day Share My Life. Be My Dearest, First On Earth.

The City Seems So Much More In Earnest: Its Business, Its Rush, Its Roar Are Such Serious Things, Sights And Sounds. The City Is Getting Its Living - The West-end But Enjoying Its Pleasure.

The Human And Fallible Should Not Arrogate A Power With Which The Divine And Perfect Alone Can Be Safely Intrusted.

I Looked, And Had An Acute Pleasure In Looking,--a Precious Yet Poignant Pleasure; Pure Gold, With A Steely Point Of Agony: A Pleasure Like What The Thirst-perishing Man Might Feel Who Knows The Well To Which He Has Crept Is Poisoned, Yet Stoops And Drinks Divine Draughts Nevertheless.

Neither Birth Nor Sex Forms A Limit To Genius.

I Was Glad Of It: I Never Liked Long Walks, Especially On Chilly Afternoons: Dreadful To Me Was The Coming Home In The Raw Twilight, With Nipped Fingers And Toes, And A Heart Saddened By The Chidings Of Bessie, The Nurse, And Humbled By The Consciousness Of My Physical Inferiority To Eliza, John, And Georgiana Reed.

I Am Not Talking To You Now Through The Medium Of Custom, Conventionalities, Nor Even Of Mortal Flesh: It Is My Spirit That Addresses Your Spirit; Just As If Both Had Passed Through The Grave, And We Stood At God's Feet, Equal--as We Are!

Say Whatever Your Memory Suggests Is True; But Add Nothing And Exaggerate Nothing.

I See At Intervals The Glance Of A Curious Sort Of Bird Through The Close Set Bars Of A Cage: A Vivid, Restless, Resolute Captive Is There; Were It But Free, It Would Soar Cloud-high.

I Mean That I Value Vision, And Dread Being Struck Stone Blind.

Talented People Almost Always Know Full Well The Excellence That Is In Them.

I Am No Bird; And No Net Ensnares Me; I Am A Free Human Being With An Independent Will.

Mr. Rochester, If Ever I Did A Good Deed In My Life — If Ever I Thought A Good Thought—if Ever I Prayed A Sincere And Blameless Prayer — If Ever I Wished A Righteous Wish — I Am Rewarded Now. To Be Your Wife Is, For Me, To Be As Happy As I Can Be On Earth.

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?

Writers Cannot Choose Their Own Mood: With Them It Is Not Always Hide-tide, Nor --thank Heaven!--always Storm.

A Waft Of Wind Came Sweeping Down The Laurel-walk, And Trembled Through The Boughs Of The Chestnut: It Wandered Away-away-to An Indefinite Distance-it Died. The Nightingale's Song Was Then The Only Voice Of The Hour: In Listening To It, I Again Wept.

Because When She Failed, I Saw How She Might Have Succeeded. Arrows That Continually Glanced Off From Mr. Rochester's Breast And Fell Harmless At His Feet, Might, I Knew, If Shot By A Surer Hand, Have Quivered Keen In His Proud Heart - Have Called Love Into His Stern Eye, And Softness Into His Sardonic Face, Or Better Still, Without Weapons A Silent Conquest Might Have Been Won.

Reader, I Married Him.

In Sunshine, In Prosperity, The Flowers Are Very Well; But How Many Wet Days Are There In Life—november Seasons Of Disaster, When A Man's Hearth And Home Would Be Cold Indeed, Without The Clear, Cheering Gleam Of Intellect.

I Am Not An Angel,' I Asserted; 'and I Will Not Be One Till I Die: I Will Be Myself. Mr. Rochester, You Must Neither Expect Nor Exact Anything Celestial Of Me - For You Will Not Get It, Any More Than I Shall Get It Of You: Which I Do Not At All Anticipate.

I Doubt If I Have Made The Best Use Of All My Calamities. Soft, Amiable Natures They Would Have Refined To Saintliness; Of Strong, Evil Spirits They Would Have Made Demons; As For Me, I Have Only Been A Woe-struck And Selfish Woman.

Gentle Reader, May You Never Feel What I Then Felt! May Your Eyes Never Shed Such Stormy, Scalding, Heart-wrung Tears As Poured From Mine. May You Never Appeal To Heaven In Prayers So Hopeless And So Agised As In That Hour Left My Lips: For Never May You, Like Me, Dread To Be The Instrument Of Evil To What You Wholly Love.

I Believe That Creature Is A Changeling: She Is A Perfect Cabinet Of Oddities.

You Can Write Nothing Of Value Unless You Give Yourself Wholly To The The Theme -- And When You So Give Yourself -- You Lose Appetite Ans Sleep -- It Cannot Be Helped --

When His First-born Was Put Into His Arms, He Could See That The Boy Had Inherited His Own Eyes, As They Once Were - Large, Brilliant, And Black.

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.

Flattery Would Be Worse Than Vain; There Is No Consolation In Flattery.

A Christmas Frost Had Come At Midsummer; A White December Storm Had Whirled Over June; Ice Glazed The Ripe Apples, Drifts Crushed The Blowing Roses; On Hayfield And Cornfield Lay A Frozen Shroud: Lanes Which Last Night Blushed Full Of Flowers, To-day Were Pathless With Untrodden Snow; And The Woods, Which Twelve Hours Since Waved Leafy And Flagrant As Groves Between The Tropics, Now Spread, Waste, Wild, And White As Pine-forests In Wintry Norway.

I Am No Bird And No Net Ensnares Me

...it Strikes Me With Terror And Anguish To Feel I Absolutely Must Be Torn From You For Ever. I See The Necessity Of Departure; And It Is Like Looking On The Necessity Of Death.

I Don't Call You Handsome, Sir, Though I Love You Most Dearly: Far Too Dearly To Flatter You. Don't Flatter Me.

Some Of The Best People That Ever Lived Have Been As Destitute As I Am; And If You Are A Christian, You Ought Not To Consider Poverty A Crime.

What Necessity Is There To Dwell On The Past, When The Present Is So Much Surer-the Future So Much Brighter?

Dwell On The Past

There Is, I Am Convinced, No Picture That Conveys In All Its Dreadfulness, A Vision Of Sorrow, Despairing, Remediless, Supreme. If I Could Paint Such A Picture, The Canvas Would Show Only A Woman Looking Down At Her Empty Arms.

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.

If You Are Cast In A Different Mould To The Majority, It Is No Merit Of Yours: Nature Did It.

The Negation Of Severe Suffering Was The Nearest Approach To Happiness I Expected To Know. Besides, I Seemed To Hold Two Lives - The Life Of Thought, And That Of Reality.

A New Chapter In A Novel Is Something Like A New Scene In A Play.

You Have Rather The Look Of Another World. I Marvelled Where You Had Got That Sort Of Face.

Yet It Would Be Your Duty To Bear It, If You Could Not Avoid It: It Is Weak And Silly To Say You Cannot Bear What It Is Your Fate To Be Required To Bear.

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