Jane Austen

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

The old gentleman died: his will was read, and like almost every other will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure.

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.

Vanity was the beginning and the end of Sir Walter Elliot’s character; vanity of person and of situation.

No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an heroine.

But there certainly are not so many men of large fortune in the world as there are pretty women to deserve them.

I remember saying to myself, as I drove to the house, “I like this man, pray Heaven no harm come of it!”

Mary wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.

Certainly not; but if you observe, people always live forever when there is an annuity to be paid them; and she is very stout and healthy, and hardly forty.

There was a strange rumour in Highbury of all the little Perrys being seen with a slice of Mrs. Weston’s wedding-cake in their hands: but Mr. Woodhouse would never believe it.

How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!

Her father had no ward, and the squire of the parish no children.

Nobody meant to be unkind, but nobody put themselves out of their way to secure her comfort.

I have more than once repented that I did not marry him myself; and were he but one degree less contemptibly weak I certainly should: but I must own myself rather romantic in that respect, and that riches only will not satisfy me.

Compliments always take you by surprise, and me never.

Mama, the more I know of the world, the more am I convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much!

For Mrs. Weston there was nothing to be done; for Harriet everything.

It is a pity they are not knocked on the head at once, before they reach Admiral Baldwin’s age.

Nothing more alarming occurred than a fear, on Mrs. Allen’s side, of having once left her clogs behind her at an inn, and that fortunately proved to be groundless.

“If this man had not twelve thousand a year, he would be a very stupid fellow.”