Charlotte Brontë > Quotes

“Suddenly he was sobered: a vacant space appeared near Miss de Bassompierre; the circle surrounding her seemed about to dissolve. This movement was instantly caught by Graham’s eye—ever-vigilant, even while laughing; he rose, took his courage in both hands, crossed the room, and made the advantage his own. Dr. John, throughout his whole life, was a man of luck—a man of success. And why? Because he had the eye to see his opportunity, the heart to prompt to well-timed action, the nerve to consummate a perfect work. And no tyrant-passion dragged him back; no enthusiasms, no foibles encumbered his way. How well he looked at this very moment! When Paulina looked up as he reached her side, her glance mingled at once with an encountering glance, animated, yet modest; his colour, as he spoke to her, became half a blush, half a glow. He stood in her presence brave and bashful: subdued and unobtrusive, yet decided in his purpose and devoted in his ardour. I gathered all this by one view. I did not prolong my observation—time failed me, had inclination served: the night wore late; Ginevra and I ought already to have been in the Rue Fossette. I rose, and bade good-night to my godmother and M. de Bassompierre.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Lo único que eso significa es que tenemos ciertos gustos y sentimientos comunes. Debo, pues, repetirme hasta la saciedad que nunca estaremos juntos... Y reconocer que, mientras sea capaz de pensar y de respirar, no dejaré de amarle.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“All John Reed’s violent tyrannies, all his sisters’ proud indifference, all his mother’s aversion, all the servants’ partiality, turned up in my disturbed mind like a dark deposit
in a turbid well.

Why was I always suffering, always browbeaten, always accused, for ever condemned? Why could I never please? Why was it useless to try to win any one’s favour?”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jan Eyre

“Much enjoyment I do not expect in the life opening before me: yet it will, doubtless, if I regulate my mind, and exert my powers as I ought, yield me enough to live on from day to day.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“That night I never thought to sleep; but a slumber fell on me as soon as I lay down in bed. I was transported in thought to the scenes of childhood: I dreamt I lay in the red-room at Gateshead; that the night was dark, and my mind impressed with strange fears.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“A nőket általában nyugodtnak, csendesnek tartják, pedig a nők éppen úgy szeretik a képességeiket, tehetségüket próbára tenni, mint fivéreik. Ők is éppen úgy szenvednek, ha túlságosan megkötik őket, ha tétlenségre vannak kárhoztatva, mint a férfiak, és kicsinyesség azt kívánni az asszonyoktól, hogy elégedjenek meg a főzéssel és a harisnyakötéssel, a kalimpálással és hímezgetéssel. Meggondolatlanság elítélni vagy kinevetni az asszonyokat, ha többet akarnak tenni vagy tanulni, mint amennyit a szokások a női nemnek kiszabtak.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“that then I longed for a power of vision which might overpass that limit; which might reach the busy world, towns, regions full of life I had heard of but never seen; that I desired more of practical experience than I possessed; more of intercourse with my kind, of acquaintance with variety of character, than was here within my reach.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“The little creature, thus left unharassed, did for herself what none other could do—contended with an intolerable feeling; and, ere long, in some degree, repressed it. That day she would accept solace from none; nor the next day: she grew more passive afterwards.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Indisputably, a great, good, handsome man is the first of created things.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Shirley

“The first woman’s breast that heaved with life on this world yielded the daring which could contend with Omnipotence, the strength which could bear a thousand years of bondage, the vitality which could feed that vulture death through uncounted ages, the unexhausted life and uncorrupted excellence, sisters to immortality, which, after millenniums of crimes, struggles, and woes, could conceive and bring forth a Messiah.”
― Charlotte Brontë, The Complete Novels of the Brontë Sisters

“Next day new steps were to be taken; my plans could no longer be confined to my own breast; I must impart them in order to achieve their success.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“few weeks after that, when my mother had supplied herself with an assistant, I became the wife of Edward Weston, and never have found cause to repent it, and am certain that I never shall. We have had trials, and we know that we must have them again; but we bear them well together, and endeavour to fortify ourselves and each other against the final separation—that greatest of all afflictions to the survivor; but, if we keep in mind the glorious heaven beyond, where both may meet again, and sin and sorrow are unknown, surely that too may be borne; and meantime, we endeavour to live to the glory of Him who has scattered so many blessings in our path.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë: Masterpieces: Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Agnes Grey,The Professor... (Bauer Classics)

“Never," said he, as he ground his teeth,
"never was anything at once so frail and so
indomitable. A mere reed she feels in my
hand!" (And he shook me with the force of his
hold.) "I could bend her with my finger and
thumb: and what good would it do if I bent, if I
uptore, if I crushed her? Consider that eye:
consider the resolute, wild, free thing looking
out of it, defying me, with more than courage-
with a stern triumph. Whatever I do with it's
cage, I cannot get at it-the savage, beautiful
creature! If I tear, if I rend the slight prison, my
outrage will only let the captive loose.
Conquered I might be of the house; but the
inmate would escape to heaven before I could
call myself possessor of its clay-dwelling
place. And it is you, spirit, with will and
energy, and virtue and purity-that I want: not
alone your brittle frame. Of yourself you could
come with soft flight and nestle against my
heart, if you would: seized against your will,
you will elide the grasp like an essence-you
will vanish ere I inhale your fragrance.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Edition With Illustrations

“I saw them smile, laugh - it was nothing: the light of the candles had as much soul in it as their smile; the tinkle of the bell as much significance as their laugh.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“They were not bound to regard with affection a thing that could not sympathise with one amongst them; a heterogenous 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 judging.
I know that had I been sanguine, brilliant, careless, exacting, handsome, romping child - though equally dependent and friendless - Mrs Reed would have endured my presence more complacently; her children would have entertained for me more of the cordiality of fellow-feeling; the servants would have been less prone to make me the scapegoat of the nursery.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had the courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will; which I now exert to leave you.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns. These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they are as distinct as is vice from virtue. Men too often confound them: they should not be confounded: appearance should not be mistaken for truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate and magnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-redeeming creed of Christ. There is—I repeat it—a difference; and it is a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly the line of separation between them. The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has been accustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make external show pass for sterling worth—to let white-washed walls vouch for clean shrines. It may hate him who dares to scrutinise and expose—to rase the gilding, and show base metal under it—to penetrate the sepulchre, and reveal charnel relics: but hate as it will, it is indebted to him.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“Vivere è come stare sul cratere di un vulcano che può sputare fuoco e lava a ogni momento.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I had a vague dread that wild cattle might be near.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“that my father had been a poor clergyman; that my mother had married him against the wishes of her friends, who considered the match beneath her; that my grandfather Reed was so irritated at her disobedience, he cut her off without a shilling; that after my mother and father had been married a year, the latter caught the typhus fever while visiting among the poor of a large manufacturing town where his curacy was situated, and where that disease was then prevalent: that my mother took the infection from him, and both died within a month of each other.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I have recorded in detail the events of my insignificant existence: to the first ten years of my life I have given almost as many chapters. But this is not to be a regular autobiography. I am only bound to invoke Memory where I know her responses will possess some degree of interest;”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“În cursul vieții dumitale va trebui să fii de nenumărate ori duhovnic fără voie al multor taine. Mulți vor simți instinctiv, ca și mine, că cel mai mare dar pe care-l ai nu e să vorbești despre dumneata, ci să-i asculți și pe alții vorbind despre ei, vor înțelege că nu le primești spovedania cu răutate disprețuitoare, ci cu un fel de simpatie înnăscută, ce alină și îmbărbătează, deși nu se manifestă prea zgomotos.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Clouds there are none, and clear stars beam mild, God, in His mercy, protection is showing. Comfort and hope to the poor orphan child. Ev'n should I fall o'er the broken bridge passing, Or stray in the marshes, by false lights beguiled.”
― Charlotte Brontë, The Brontës: Three Great Novels: Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“I am no bird and no net ensnares me. I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“As you hope ever to be forgiven, Mr. Rivers, the high crime and misdemeanour of spoiling a sanded kitchen, tell me what I wish to know.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Es una tontería y un síntoma de debilidad decir que no puedes soportar algo que el destino te manda para que lo soportes.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Jane, you understand what I want of you? Just this promise--'I will be yours, Mr. Rochester.'"

"Mr. Rochester, I will not be yours.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre