If people were always kind and obedient to those who are cruel and unjust, the wicked people would have it all their own way; they would never feel afraid, and so they would never alter, but would grow worse and worse. 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.”, “Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilised by education: they grow there, firm as weeds among stones.”, “Every atom of your flesh is as dear to me as my own: in pain and sickness it would still be dear.”, “I had not intended to love him; the reader knows I had wrought hard to extirpate from my soul the germs of love there detected; and now, at the first renewed view of him, they spontaneously revived, great and strong! The world may laugh -- may call me absurd, selfish -- but it does not signify. “Shirley and The Professor”, p.895, Everyman's Library, Charlotte Bronte (2010). how far more potent is it than force! The human heart has hidden treasures, In secret kept, in silence sealed; The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures, Whose charms were broken if revealed. “Jane Eyre”, p.75, Simon and Schuster, Charlotte Bronte (2004). that gentleness! “Jane Eyre”, p.320, Simon and Schuster. If you are cast in a different mould to the majority, it is no merit of yours: Nature did it. Mr. Rochester, you must neither expect nor exact anything celestial of me - for you will not get it, any more than I shall get it of you: which I do not at all anticipate.”, “Happiness quite unshared can scarcely be called happiness; it has no taste.”, “Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain and little, I am soulless and heartless? “Jane Eyre”, p.76, Simon and Schuster, Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte, Anne Bronte (2009). Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot. There is only one difference between a madman and me. God did not give me my life to throw it away. If all the world hated you, and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved you, and absolved you from guilt, you would not be without friends. I believe while I tremble; I trust while I weep. Life is so constructed, that the event does not, cannot, will not, match the expectation. “Villette”, p.350, Xist Publishing, Charlotte Bronte (2011). Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts, as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, to absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will. Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account.