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Jane Austen

b: Steventon, England, Dec 16, 1775

d: Winchester, England, Jul 18, 1817

English. Author. Her books about family life in rural England and comedies have withstood time in the changing outside world: Pride and Prejudice, 1813, Sense and Sensibilities, 18111.

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"It was not very wonderful that Catherine .. should prefer cricket, base ball . . . to books."

An engaged woman is always more agreeable than a disengaged. She is satisfied with herself. Her cares are over, and she feels that she may exert all her powers of pleasing without suspicion. All is safe with a lady engaged; no harm can be done.

But when a young lady is to be a heroine, the perverseness of forty surrounding families cannot prevent her. Something must and will happen to throw a hero in her way.

Every man is surrounded by a neighborhood of voluntary spies.

Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance.

Human nature is so well disposed towards those who are in interesting situations, that a young person, who either marries or dies, is sure of being kindly spoken of.

I cannot think well of a man who sports with any woman's feelings; and there may often be a great deal more suffered than a stander-by can judge of.

I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.

I pay very little regard...to what any young person says on the subject of marriage. If they profess a disinclination for it, I only set it down that they have not yet seen the right person.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man is in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

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

Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings.

Nothing amuses me more than the easy manner with which everybody settles the abundance of those who have a great deal less than themselves.

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.

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

One cannot fix one's eyes on the commonest natural production without finding food for a rambling fancy.

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

Single women have a dreadful propensity for being poor. Which is one very strong argument in favor of matrimony.

The enthusiasm of a woman's love is even beyond the biographer's.

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

To look almost pretty is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain for the first fifteen years of her life than a beauty from her cradle can ever receive.

To sit in the shade on a fine day and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment.

Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.

We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be.

What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps me in a continual state of inelegance.

Where any one body of educated men, of whatever denomination, are condemned indiscriminately, there must be a deficiency of information, or...of something else.

You mistake me, my dear. I have a high respect for your nerves. They are my old friends. I have heard you mention them with consideration these twenty years at least.