Charlotte Bronte’s “Jane Eyre” Quotes (179 Quotes)

The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator.

Which is better? - To have surrendered to temptation; listened to passion; made no painful effort - no struggled; - but to have sunk down in the silken snare; fallen asleep on the flower covering it; wakened in a southern clime, amongst the luxuries of a pleasure villa: to have been now living in France, Mr. Rochester's mistress; delirious with his love half my time - for he would - oh, yes, he would have love me well for a while.

And as I had lifted no petition to Heaven to avert it - as I had neither joined my hands, nor bent my knees, nor moved my lips - it came: in full heavy swing the torrent poured over me. The whole consciousness of my life lorn, my love lost, my hope quenched, my faith death-struck, swayed full and mighty above me in one sullen mass.

But you know very well you are thinking of another they, and that he is not thinking of you

He made me love him without looking at me

I believe it was an inspiration rather than a temptation

I hold myself supremely blest -- blest beyond what language can express; because I am my husband's life as fully as he is mine. No woman was ever nearer to her mate than I am: ever more absolutely bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh.

I think I must admit so fair a guest when it asks entrance to my heart.

It drew aside the window-curtain and looked out; perhaps it saw dawn approaching, for, taking the candle, it retreated to the door. Just at my bedside, the figure stopped: the fiery eyes glared upon me-she thrust up her candle close to my face, and extinguished it under my eyes. I was aware her lurid visage flamed over mine, and I lost consciousness: for the second time in my life-only the second time-I became insensible from terror.

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.

Propensities and principles must be reconciled by some means.

The vehemence of emotion, stirred by grief and love within me, was claiming mastery, and struggling for full sway; and asserting a right to predominate: to overcome, to live, rise, and reign at last; yes,--and to speak.

With what judgment ye judge ye shall be judged!

And I am a hard woman, -impossible to put off.

Como é imperfeita a natureza do homem!

He was the first to recognise me, and to love what he saw.

I both wished and feared to see Mr. Rochester on the day which followed this sleepless night. I wanted to hear his voice again, yet feared to meet his eye.

I honour endurance, perseverance, industry, talent; because these are the means by which men achieve great ends and mount to lofty eminence. -St.John Rivers

I think that good reads is a good website to check out what book you want to read. Jane Eyre is a very sad book and poignant. It's really sad because she's an orphan and nobody wants her. A woman finds out that she is an orphan and adopts her. Jane treats her as if that were here mother and they get along very beautifully at the end.

It had formerly been my endeavor to study all sides of his character: to take the bad with the good; and from the just weighing of both, to form an equitable judgment. Now I saw no bad. The sarcasm that had repelled, the harshness that had startled me once, were only like keen condiments in a choice dish: their presence was pungent, but their absence would be felt as comparatively insipid.

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.

Reader, do you know, as I do, what terror those cold people can put into the ice of their questions? How much of the fall of the avalanche is in their anger? of the breaking up of the frozen sea in their displeasure?

The word book acted as a transient stimulus

Yet, when this cherished volume was now placed in my hand-when I turned over its leaves, and sought in its marvellous pictures the charm I had, till now, never failed to find-all was eerie and dreary; the giants were gaunt goblins, the pigmies malevolent and fearful imps, Gulliver a most desolate wanderer in most dread and dangerous regions. I closed the book, which I dared no longer peruse, and put it on the table, beside the untasted tart.

And if I let a gust of wind or a sprinkling of rain turn me aside from these easy tasks, what preparation would such sloth be for the future I propose to myself?

Dread remorse when you are tempted to err, Miss Eyre; remorse is the poison of life.

His chest heaved once, as if his large heart, weary of despotic constriction, had expanded, despite the will, and made a vigorous bound for the attainment of liberty.

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 knew he would soon strike, and while dreading the blow, I mused on the disgusting and ugly appearance of him who would presently deal it.

I think you will learn to be natural with me, as I find it impossible to be conventional with you

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.

My habitual mood of humiliation, self-doubt, forlorn depression, fell damp on the embers of my decaying ire.

Religion called - Angels beckoned - God commanded - life rolled together like a scroll - death's gates opening showed eternity beyond.

Then her soul sat on her lips, and language flowed, from what source I cannot tell.

You are afraid of me, because I talk like a sphinx.

And it is you, spirit--with will and energy, and virtue and purity--that I want, not alone with your brittle frame.

En osaa käyttää minkäänlaista keskitietä. Ollessani tekemisissä omalle luonteelleni täysin vastakkaisten, määräävien ja kovien luonteitten kanssa olen aina joko alistunut nöyrästi tai kapinoinut vimmatusti. Joskus olen nöyrtynyt melkein katkeamispisteeseen saakka, joskus purkautunut kiihkeästi kuin tulivuori.

His idea was still with me, because it was not a vapor sunshine could disperse, nor a sand-traced effigy storms could wash away; it was a name graven on a tablet, fated to last as long as the marble it inscribed. The craving to know what had become of him followed me everywhere.

I could not answer the ceaseless inward question-why I thus suffered; now, at the distance of-I will not say how many years, I see it clearly.

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.

I thought of him now-in his room-watching the sunrise; hoping I should soon come to say I would stay with him and be his. I longed to be his; I panted to return; it was not too late.

It is a pity that doing one's best does not always answer.

My help had been needed and claimed; I had given it: I was pleased to have done something: trivial, transitory though the deed was, it was yet an active thing, and I was weary of an existence all passive.

Remorse is the poison of life.

There is something in that, I know there is, because it does not sound too sweet; it is not like such words as Liberty, Excitement, Enjoyment; delightful sounds truly; but no more than sounds for me; and so hollow and fleeting that it is mere waste of time to listen to them.

You have introduced a topic on which our natures are at variance -- a topic we should never discuss: the very name of love is an apple of discord between us. If the reality were required, what should we do? How should we feel? My dear cousin, abandon your scheme of marriage -- forget it.

And with that answer, he left me. I would much rather he had knocked me down.

Even for me life had its gleams of sunshine.

Hopeless of the future, I wished but this- that my Maker had that night thought good to require my soul of me while I slept; and that this weary frame, absolved by death from further conflict with fate, had now but to decay quietly, and mingle in peace with the soil of this wilderness.

I could not help it: the restlessness was in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes.