Anne Bronte (1820 – 1849)
British novelist and poet, the youngest sibling of Charlotte and Emily Brontë.
"I've done you a piece of good service, Nancy," he began: then seeing me, he acknowledged my presence by a slight bow. I should have been invisible to Hatfield, or any other gentleman of those parts. "I've delivered your cat," he continued, "from the hands, or rather the gun, of Mr. Murray's gamekeeper."
"I settled everything with Mrs. Grey, while you were putting on your bonnet," replied he. "She said I might have her consent, if I could obtain yours; and I asked her, in case I should be so happy, to come and live with us — for I was sure you would like it better. But she refused, saying she could now afford to employ an assistant, and would continue the school till she could purchase an annuity sufficient to maintain her in comfortable lodgings; and, meantime, she would spend her vacations alternately with us and your sister, and should be quite contented if you were happy. And so now I have overruled your objections on her account. Have you any other?"
"No — none."
"You love me then?" said he, fervently pressing my hand.
"Yes."
"How shall I teach him hereafter to respect his father, and yet to avoid his example?"
"Now, Halford, I bid you adieu for the present. This is the first instalment of my debt. If the coin suits you, tell me so, and I'll send you the rest of my leisure: if you would rather remain my creditor than stuff your purse with such ungainly heavy pieces — tell me still, and I'll pardon your bad taste, and willingly keep the treasure to myself."
"Don't you know that every time we meet the thoughts of the final parting will become more painful? Don't you feel that every interview makes us dearer to each other than the last?"
"I shall expect my husband to have no pleasures but what he shares with me; and if his greatest pleasure of all is not the enjoyment of my company —- why — it will be the worse for him —- that's all."
"If such are your expectations of matrimony, Esther, you must, indeed, be careful whom you marry - or rather, you must avoid it altogether"
"Adoration isn’t love. I adore Annabella, but I don’t love her; and I love thee, Milicent, but I don’t adore thee."
Such humble talents as God had given me I will endeavour to put to their greatest use; if I am able to amuse, I will try to benefit too; and when I fell it my duty to speak unpalatable truth, with the help of God, I will speak it, through it be to the prejudice of my name and to the detriment of my reader's immediate pleasure as well as my own.
"Whatever my husband's faults may be, it can only aggravate the evil for me to hear them from a stranger's lips."
Revenge! No - what good would that do? - it would make him no better, and me no happier
"He cannot endure Rachel, because he knows she has a proper appreciation of him."
"The more you loved your God the more deep and pure and true would be your love to me."
"If you mean Mr. Weston to be one of your victims," said I, with affected indifference, "you will have to make such overtures yourself that you will find it difficult to draw back when he asks you to fulfil the expectations you have raised."
"I have heard that, with some persons, temperance – that is, moderation – is almost impossible; and if abstinence be an evil (which some have doubted), no one will deny that excess is a greater. Some parents have entirely prohibited their children from tasting intoxicating liquors; but a parent’s authority cannot last for ever; children are naturally prone to hanker after forbidden things; and a child, in such a case, would be likely to have a strong curiosity to taste, and try the effect of what has been so lauded and enjoyed by others, so strictly forbidden to himself – which curiosity would generally be gratified on the first convenient opportunity; and the restraint once broken, serious consequences might ensue."
"You might as well sell yourself to slavery at once, as marry man you dislike."
All true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasure may be hard to find, and when found, so trivial in quantity, that the dry, shrivelled kernel scarcely compensates for the trouble of cracking the nut. Whether this be the case with my history or not, I am hardly competent to judge. I sometimes think it might prove useful to some, and entertaining to others; but the world may judge for itself. Shielded by my own obscurity, and by the lapse of years, and a few fictitious names, I do not fear to venture; and will candidly lay before the public what I would not disclose to the most intimate friend.
"If you would really study my pleasure, mother, you must consider your own comfort and convenience a little more than you do."
"I cannot express my joy. I find it very difficult to conceal it from my aunt; but I don't wish to trouble her with my feelings till I know whether I ought to indulge them or not. If I find it my absolute duty to suppress them, they shall trouble no one but myself; and if I can really feel myself justified in indulging this attachment, I can dare anything, even the anger and grief of my best friend."
"It’s well to have such a comfortable assurance regarding the worth of those we love. I only wish you may not find your confidence misplaced."
'But what is this?' he murmured. 'Why, Esther, you're crying now!'
'Oh, it's nothing - it's only too much happiness - and the wish,' sobbed she, 'that our dear Helen were as happy as ourselves.'