Anne Brontë - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848)

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A light wind swept over the corn; and all nature laughed in the sunshine.

Anne Brontë
All our talents increase in the using, and every faculty, both good and bad, strengthens by exercise.

Anne Brontë
If you would have your son to walk honourably through the world, you must not attempt to clear the stones from his path, but teach him to walk firmly over them — not insist upon leading him by the hand, but let him learn to go alone.

Anne Brontë
But no generous mind delights to oppress the weak, but rather to cherish and protect.

Anne Brontë
I would not send a poor girl into the world, ignorant of the snares that beset her path; nor would I watch and guard her, till, deprived of self-respect and self-reliance, she lost the power or the will to watch and guard herself.

Anne Brontë
She was trusted and valued by her father, loved and courted by all dogs, cats, children, and poor people, and slighted and neglected by everybody else.

Anne Brontë
When I spend my money I like to enjoy the full value of it.

Anne Brontë
'I have often wished in vain,' said she, 'for another's judgment to appeal to when I could scarcely trust the direction of my own eye and head, they having been so long occupied with the contemplation of a single object as to become almost incapable of forming a proper idea respecting it.'
'That,' replied I, 'is only one of many evils to which a solitary life exposes us.'

Anne Brontë
The bud, though plucked, would not be withered, only transplanted to a fitter soil to ripen and blow beneath a brighter sun; and though I might not cherish and watch my child's unfolding intellect, he would be snatched away from all the suffering and sins of earth; and my understanding tells me this would be no great evil; but my heart shrinks from the contemplation of such a possibility, and whispers I could not bear to see him die.

Anne Brontë
Mamma does all she can,' said she, 'to make me feel myself a burden and incumbrance to the family, and the most ungrateful, selfish, and undutiful daughter that ever was born;

Anne Brontë
I trust she may yet be happy; but, if she is, it will be entirely the reward of her own goodness of heart; for had she chosen to consider herself the victim of fate, or of her mother's worldly wisdom, she might have been thoroughly miserable; and if, for duty's sake, she had not made every effort to love her husband, she would, doubtless, have hated him to the end of her days.

Anne Brontë
You may have as many words as you please, – only I can't stay to hear them.

Anne Brontë
It is a woman's nature to be constant - to love one and one only, blindly, tenderly, and for ever.

Anne Brontë
I thought Mr. Millward never would cease telling us that he was no tea-drinker, and that it was highly injurious to keep loading the stomach with slops to the exclusion of more wholesome sustenance, and so give himself time to finish his fourth cup.

Anne Brontë
His heart was like a sensitive plant, that opens for a moment in the sunshine, but curls up and shrinks into itself at the slightest touch of the finger, or the lightest breath of wind.

Anne Brontë
Increase of love brings increase of happiness, when it is mutual, and pure as that will be.

Anne Brontë
If you would have a boy to despise his mother, let her keep him at home, and spend her life in petting him up, and slaving to indulge his follies and caprices.

Anne Brontë
I sometimes think she has no feeling at all; and then I go on till she cries - and that satisfies me.

Anne Brontë
What are their thoughts to you or me, so long as we are satisfied with ourselves - and each other.

Anne Brontë
God is Infinite Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness - and Love; but if this idea is too vast for your human faculties - if your mind loses itself in its overwhelming infinitude, fix it on Him who condescended to take our nature upon Him, who was raised to heaven even in His glorified human body, in whom the fullness of the Godhead shines.

Anne Brontë
Friends as we are, we would willingly keep your failings to ourselves - even from ourselves if we could, unless by knowing them we could deliver you from them.

Anne Brontë
I was not really angry: I felt for him all the time, and longed to be reconciled; but I determined he should make the first advances, or at least show some signs of an humble and contrite spirit, first; for, if I began, it would only minister to his self-conceit, increase his arrogance, and quite destroy the lesson I wanted to give him.

Anne Brontë
I do believe a young lady can't be too careful who she marries.

Anne Brontë
My heart is too thoroughly dried to be broken in a hurry, and I mean to live as long as I can.

Anne Brontë
When a lady does consent to listen to an argument against her own opinions, she is always predetermined to withstand it - to listen only with her bodily ears, keeping the mental organs resolutely closed against the strongest reasoning.

Anne Brontë
You've been weeping, I see - that's our grand resource, you know. But doesn't it make your eyes smart? and do you always find it to answer?

Anne Brontë
Though I hate him from my heart, and should rejoice at any calamity that could befall him, I'll leave him to God; and though I abhor my own life, I'll leave that, too, to Him that gave it.

Anne Brontë
If ever I am a mother I will zealously strive against this crime of over- indulgence. I can hardly give it a milder name when I think of the evils it brings.

Anne Brontë
Instead of combating my slight prejudice against you as uncharitable, I mean to cherish it, until I am convinced that I have no reason to distrust this kind, insinuating friendship you are so anxious to push upon me.

Anne Brontë
There's nothing like active employment to console the afflicted;

Anne Brontë