Charlotte Brontë > Quotes

“I am only bound to invoke Memory where I know her responses will possess some degree of interest; therefore I now pass a space of eight years almost in silence: a few lines only are necessary to keep up the links of connection.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“he gathered me near his heart. I was full of faults; he took them and me all home.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Meantime, Mr. Rochester had again summoned the ladies round him, and was selecting certain of their number to be of his party. “Miss Ingram is mine, of course,” said he: afterwards he named the two Misses Eshton, and Mrs. Dent. He looked at me: I happened to be near him, as I had been fastening the clasp of Mrs. Dent’s bracelet, which had got loose.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“They were not bound to regard with affection a thing that could not sympathise with one amongst them; a heterogeneous thing, opposed to them in temperament, in capacity, in propensities; a useless thing, incapable of serving their interest, or adding to their pleasure; a noxious thing, cherishing the germs of indignation at their treatment, of contempt of their judgment.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I wanted to be weak that I might avoid the awful passage of further suffering I saw laid out for me”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Se si fosse sempre buoni e obbedienti verso quelli che sono crudeli e ingiusti, i cattivi avrebbero il sopravvento: non avrebbero mai paura e così non cambierebbero mai e diventerebbero sempre peggiori. Quando ci colpiscono senza ragione, dovremmo reagire colpendo ancora più forte; sono certa che dovremmo: tanto forte da insegnare a chi ci ha colpito a non colpirci più.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“He turned away; he threw himself on his face on the sofa.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited?  Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs. ”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Sententious sage! so it is: but I swear by my household gods not”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Mr. Rochester had sometimes read my unspoken thoughts with an acumen to me incomprehensible: in the present instance he took no notice of my abrupt vocal response; but he smiled at me with a certain smile he had of his own, and which he used but on rare occasions.  He seemed to think it too good for common purposes: it was the real sunshine of feeling—he shed it over me now. “Pass, Janet,” said he, making room for me to cross the stile: “go up home, and stay your weary little wandering feet at a friend’s threshold.” All”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“All looked colder and darker in that visionary hollow than in reality:”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Iubirea nascuta din frumusetea adevarata nu era pentru mine - n-aveam nimic in comun cu asa ceva. [...] insa o astfel de iubire, trezita cu sfiala la viata dupa o atat de indelungata cunoastere, calita in flacara suferintei, pecetluita de consecventa, consolidata de focul pur si dainuitor al afectiunii, supusa de ratiune la toate incercarile intelectului si, in cele din urma, forjata prin insasi viata ei la aceasta desavarsire fara pata, aceasta iubire care dispretuieste pasiunea, frenezia si delirul ei si stingerea ei atat de grabnica, in iubirea aceasta crezusem cu toata fiinta mea.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“L'inquietudine era nella mia natura; e qualche volta mi agitava fino alla sofferenza. Allora il mio unico sollievo era di camminare su e giù per il corridoio del terzo piano, rifugiarmi nella sua solitudine, abbandonare il mio spirito alle splendide visioni che mi sovrastavano, lasciare il mio cuore vibrare di un'esaltazione che lo turbava sì, ma lo dilatava; e soprattutto aprire l'orecchio a una voce inesistente, una voce creata dalla mia immaginazione e che non mi dava pace, alimentata dalla vita, dal fuoco e dalle sensazioni a cui aspiriamo, e che nella mia esistenza allora non avevo. Inutile dire agli uomini di essere contenti della tranquillità. Quel che essi desiderano è l'azione, e se non la troveranno, la creeranno. Milioni di esseri sono condannati a un destino più pacifico del mio, e milioni si ribellano contro la loro sorte. Nessuno sa quanti ribelli, oltre i ribelli politici, popolano la terra. In genere si crede che le donne siano molto quiete. Le donne invece provano gli stessi sentimenti degli uomini. Hanno bisogno di esercitare le loro facoltà, e di provare le loro capacità come i loro fratelli; soffrono come gli uomini dei freni e dell'inattività, e fa parte della mentalità ristretta dei loro compagni più fortunati il dire che si devono limitare a cucinare e a far la calza, a suonare il piano e a far ricami. E' stupido condannarle o schernirle, se cercano di fare di più o imparare di più di quello che è solito al loro sesso.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited? Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs. We are, and must be, one and all, burdened with faults in this world: but the time will soon come when, I trust, we shall put them off in putting off our corruptible bodies;6 when debasement and sin will fall from us with this cumbrous frame of flesh, and only the spark of the spirit will remain”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“With self-denial and economy now, and steady self-exertion by-and-by, an object in life need not fail you. Venture not to complain that such an object is too selfish, too limited, and lacks interest; be content to labout for independence until you have proved, by winning that prize, your right to look higher. But afterwards, is there nothing more for me in life - no true home - nothing to be dearer to me than myself, and by its paramount preciousness, to draw from me better things than I care to culture for myself only?”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Every joy that life gives must be earned ere it be secured; and how hardly earned, those only know who have wrestled for great prizes. The heart’s blood must gem with red beads the brow of the combatant, before the wreath of victory rustles over it.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Shirley

“He and I went up to London.  He had the advice of an eminent oculist; and he eventually recovered the sight of that one eye.  He cannot now see very distinctly: he cannot read or write much; but he can find his way without being led by the hand: the sky is no longer a blank to him—the earth no longer a void.  When his first-born was put into his arms, he could see that the boy had inherited his own eyes, as they once were—large, brilliant, and black.  On that occasion, he again, with a full heart, acknowledged that God had tempered judgment with mercy.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“But I had fastened the door—I had the key in my pocket: I should have been a careless shepherd if I had left a lamb—my pet lamb—so near a wolf’s den, unguarded: you were safe.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“¿Cree que puedo quedarme sino significo nada para usted? ¿Cree qué soy un autómata?, ¿una máquina sin sentimientos? ¿Cree que puedo soportar que me quiten el pedazo de pan de la boca y la gota de agua vital del vaso? ¿Cree que porque soy pobre, fea, anodina y pequeña, carezco de alma y corazón? ¡Se equivoca! Tengo la misma alma que usted, y el mismo corazón. Y, si Dios me hubiera dotado de algo de belleza y una gran fortuna, le habría puesto tan difícil dejarme como lo es para mí dejarlo a usted. No le hablo con la voz de la costumbre o de las convenciones, ni siquiera con voz humana; ¡ es mi espíritu el que se dirige al suyo, como si ambos hubiéramos muerto y estuviéramos a los pies de Dios, iguales, como lo somos!”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“But then it seems disgraceful to be flogged, and to be sent to stand in the middle of a room full of people; and you are such a great girl: I am far younger than you, and I could not bear it."

"Yet it would be your duty to bear it if you could not avoid it: it is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what is your fate to be required to bear.”
― Charlotte bronte, Jane Eyre

“Humph! Promptly spoken. But I won’t allow that, seeing that it would never suit my case, as I have made an indifferent, not to say a bad, use of both advantages. Leaving superiority out of the question, then, you must still agree to receive my orders now and then, without being piqued or hurt by the tone of command. Will you?”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I'd rather be a thing than an angel”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“There are human tempers, bland, glowing, and genial, within whose influence it is as good for the poor in spirit to live, as it is for the feeble in frame to bask in the glow of noon.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Religion called--Angels beckoned--God commanded--life rolled together like a scroll--death's gates opening, showed eternity beyond: it seemed, that for safety and bliss there, all here might be sacrificed in a second. The dim room was full of visions.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Young ladies have a remarkable way of letting you know that they think you a 'quiz' without actually saying the words. A certain superciliousness of look, coolness of manner, nonchalance of tone, express fully their sentiments on the point, without committing them by any positive rudeness in word or deed.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! — I have as much soul as you — and full as much heart!”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Already it has done me good: my heart was a sort of charnel; it will now be a shrine.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Jane Eyre, who had been an ardent, expectant woman - almost a bride - was a cold, solitary girl again: her life was pale; her prospects were desolate. A Christmas frost had come at midsummer; a white December storm had whirled over June; ice glazed the ripe apples, drifts crushed the blowing roses; on hayfield and cornfield lay a frozen shroud: lanes which last night blushed full of flowers, to-day were pathless with untrodden snow; and the woods, which twelve hours since waved leafy and fragrant as groves between the tropics, now spread, waste, wild, and white as pine-forests in wintry Norway. My hopes were all dead—struck with a subtle doom, such as, in one night, fell on all the first-born in the land of Egypt. I looked on my cherished wishes, yesterday so blooming and glowing; they lay stark, chill, livid corpses that could never revive.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I had learnt to love Mr. Rochester: I could not unlove him now, merely because I found that he had ceased to notice me—because”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“No; I know I should think well of myself; but that is not enough: if others don't love me, I would rather die than live.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre