Jane Austen Quotes

582 Sourced Quotes

Follies and nonsense, whims and inconsistencies do divert me, I own, and I laugh at them whenever I can.

Jane Austen

If there is anything disagreeable going on men are always sure to get out of it.

Jane Austen

You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased.

Jane Austen

Misery such as mine has no pride. I care not who knows that I am wretched.

Jane Austen

Well, my comfort is, I am sure Jane will die of a broken heart, and then he will be sorry for what he has done.

Jane Austen

The evergreen! How beautiful, how welcome, how wonderful the evergreen! When one thinks of it, how astonishing a variety of nature! In some countries we know that the tree that sheds its leaf is the variety, but that does not make it less amazing, that the same soil and the same sun should nurture plants differing in the first rule and law of their existence.

Jane Austen

There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.

Jane Austen

But there are some situations of the human mind in which good sense has very little power...

Jane Austen

She would have liked to know how he felt as to a meeting. Perhaps indifferent, if indifference could exist under such circumstances. He must be either indifferent or unwilling. Has he wished ever to see her again, he need not have waited till this time; he would have done what she could not but believe that in his place she should have done long ago, when events had been early giving him the indepencence which alone had been wanting.

Jane Austen

It is very difficult for the prosperous to be humble...

Jane Austen

We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man; but this would be nothing if you really liked him.

Jane Austen

A person who can write a long letter with ease, cannot write ill.

Jane Austen

The stream is as good as at first; the little rubbish it collects in the turnings is easily moved away.

Jane Austen

I give you joy of having left Winchester. Now you may own how miserable you were there; now it will gradually all come out, your crimes and your miseries — how often you went up by the Mail to London and threw away fifty guineas at a tavern, and how often you were on the point of hanging yourself, restrained only, as some ill-natured aspersion upon poor old Winton has it, by the want of a tree within some miles of the city.

Jane Austen

You ought certainly to forgive them as a Christian, but never to admit them in your sight, or allow their names to be mentioned in your hearing.

Jane Austen

A woman, especially if she has the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.

Jane Austen

Had Elizabeth been able to encounter his eye, she might have seen how well the expression of heartfelt delight, diffused over his face, became him; but, though she could not look, she could listen, and he told her of feelings, which, in proving of what importance she was to him, made his affection every moment more valuable.

Jane Austen

And sometimes I have kept my feelings to myself, because I could find no language to describe them in.

Jane Austen

Whom are you going to dance with?' asked Mr. Knightley. She hesitated a moment and then replied, 'With you, if you will ask me.' Will you?' said he, offering his hand. Indeed I will. You have shown that you can dance, and you know we are not really so much brother and sister as to make it at all improper.' Brother and sister! no, indeed.

Jane Austen

It is this delightful habit of journalizing which largely contributes to form the easy style of writing for which ladies are so generally celebrated. Every body allows that the talent of writing is particularly female. Nature might have done something, but I am sure it must be essentially assisted by the practice of keeping a journal.

Jane Austen

To flatter and follow others, without being flattered and followed in turn, is but a state of half enjoyment.

Jane Austen

You... may perhaps be brought to acknowledge that it is very well worthwhile to be tormented for two or three years of one's life, for the sake of being able to read all the rest of it.

Jane Austen

I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of any thing than of a book! — When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.

Jane Austen

And to all this she must yet add something more substantial, in the improvement of her mind by extensive reading.

Jane Austen

If the heroine of one novel be not patronized by the heroine of another, from whom can she expect protection and regard?

Jane Austen

I assure you. I have no notion of treating men with such respect. That is the way to spoil them.

Jane Austen

I have been used to consider poetry as "the food of love" said Darcy. "Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away.

Jane Austen

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

What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps one in a continual state of inelegance.

Jane Austen

It may be possible to do without dancing entirely. Instances have been known of young people passing many, many months successively without being at any ball of any description, and no material injury accrue either to body or mind.

Jane Austen