Quotes By Jane Austen

There is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions.

One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it, unless it has been all suffering, nothing but suffering.

I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle.

Vanity working on a weak head, produces every sort of mischief.

If things are going untowardly one month, they are sure to mend the next.

One cannot be always laughing at a man without now and then stumbling on something witty.

Good-humoured, unaffected girls, will not do for a man who has been used to sensible women. They are two distinct orders of being.

It is always incomprehensible to a man that a woman should ever refuse an offer of marriage.

Selfishness must always be forgiven you know, because there is no hope of a cure.

It is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are they the result of previous study?

We do not look in our great cities for our best morality.

Oh! do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch.

Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.

A person who can write a long letter with ease, cannot write ill.

To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love.

Next to being married, a girl likes to be crossed in love a little now and then.

In nine cases out of ten, a woman had better show more affection than she feels.

What wild imaginations one forms where dear self is concerned! How sure to be mistaken!

They are much to be pitied who have not been given a taste for nature early in life.

The more I know of the world, the more I am convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love.

It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation.

Where youth and diffidence are united, it requires uncommon steadiness of reason to resist the attraction of being called the most charming girl in the world.

Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised, or a little mistaken.

Dress is at all times a frivolous distinction, and excessive solicitude about it often destroys its own aim.

My sore throats are always worse than anyone's.

Husbands and wives generally understand when opposition will be vain.

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

If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.

An artist cannot do anything slovenly.

My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.