Anne Brontë quote: "Therefore, have done with this nonsense: you have no ground for hope: dismiss, at once, these hurtful thoughts and foolish wishes from your mind, and turn to your own duty, and the dull blank life that lies before you. You might have known such happiness was not for you."

Reading is my favourite occupation, when I have leisure for it and books to read.
ANNE BRONTë

I possess the faculty of enjoying the company of those I - of my friends as well in silence as in co...
ANNE BRONTë

But he who dares not grasp the thorn
Should never crave the rose.
ANNE BRONTë

Smiles and tears are so alike with me, they are neither of them confined to any particular feelings:...
ANNE BRONTë

It is better to arm and strengthen your hero, than to disarm and enfeeble your foe.
ANNE BRONTë

All true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasure may be hard to find, and when ...
ANNE BRONTë

I will give my whole heart and soul to my Maker if I can,' I answered, 'and not one atom more of it ...
ANNE BRONTë

I wished to tell the truth, for truth always conveys its own moral to those who are able to receive ...
ANNE BRONTë

You may think it all very fine, Mr. Huntingdon, to amuse yourself with rousing my jealousy; but take...
ANNE BRONTë

A spirit of candor and frankness, when wholly unaccompanied with coarseness, he
admired in othe...
ANNE BRONTë

. . . because we cannot conceive that as we grow up our own minds will become so enlarged and elevat...
ANNE BRONTë

Already, I seemed to feel my intellect deteriorating, my heart petrifying, my soul contracting; and ...
ANNE BRONTë

How odd it is that we so often weep for each other’s distresses, when we shed not a tear for our o...
ANNE BRONTë

I love the silent hour of night,
For blissful dreams may then arise,
Revealing to my charm...
ANNE BRONTë

Preserve me from such cordiality! It is like handling briar-roses and may-blossoms - bright enough t...
ANNE BRONTë

God might awaken that heart, supine and stupefied with self-indulgence, and remove the film of sensu...
ANNE BRONTë

I cannot love a man who cannot protect me.
ANNE BRONTë

It is natural for our unamiable sex to dislike the creatures, for you ladies lavish so many caresses...
ANNE BRONTë

When I tell you not to marry without love, I do not advise you to marry for love alone: there are ma...
ANNE BRONTë

I imagine there must be only a very, very few men in the world, that I should like to marry; and of ...
ANNE BRONTë

Well, but you affirm that virtue is only elicited by temptation; - and you think that a woman cannot...
ANNE BRONTë

The best way to enjoy yourself is to do what is right and hate nobody.
ANNE BRONTë

. . . and I imagine that, though cold and haughty in her general demeanor, and even exacting in her ...
ANNE BRONTë

That wish - that prayer - both men and women would have scorned me for - "But, Father, Thou wilt not...
ANNE BRONTë

My prayers, my tears, my wishes, fears, and lamentations, were witnessed by myself and heaven alone....
ANNE BRONTë

She left me, offended at my want of sympathy, and thinking, no doubt, that I envied her. I did not -...
ANNE BRONTë

The next visit I paid to Nancy Brown was in the second week in March: for, though I had many spare m...
ANNE BRONTë

Well! what is there remarkable in all this? Why have I recorded it? Because, reader, it was importan...
ANNE BRONTë

All true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasure may be hard to find, and when ...
ANNE BRONTë

One glance he gave, one little smile at parting—it was but for a moment; but therein I read, or th...
ANNE BRONTë

And why should he interest himself at all in my moral and intellectual capacities: what is it to him...
ANNE BRONTë

You say you cannot love God; but it strikes me that if you rightly consider who and what He is, you ...
ANNE BRONTë

I began this book with the intention of concealing nothing, that those who liked might have the bene...
ANNE BRONTë

But our wishes are like tinder: the flint and steel of circumstances are continually striking out sp...
ANNE BRONTë

But, God knows best, I concluded.
ANNE BRONTë

One bright day in the last week of February, I was walking in the park, enjoying the threefold luxur...
ANNE BRONTë

I had been seasoned by adversity, and tutored by experience, and I longed to redeem my lost honour i...
ANNE BRONTë

You cannot expect stone to be as pliable as clay.
ANNE BRONTë

The human heart is like india-rubber; a little swells it, but a great deal will not burst it. If "li...
ANNE BRONTë

I still preserve those relics of past sufferings and experience, like pillars of witness set up in t...
ANNE BRONTë

The end of Religion is not to teach us how to die, but how to live....
ANNE BRONTë

I always lacked common sense when taken by surprise.
ANNE BRONTë

A little girl loves her bird--Why? Because it lives and feels; because it is helpless and harmless? ...
ANNE BRONTë

What a fool you must be," said my head to my heart, or my sterner to my softer self.
ANNE BRONTë

No, thank you, I don't mind the rain,' I said. I always lacked common sense when taken by surprise.
ANNE BRONTë

He had not breathed a word of love, or dropped one hint of tenderness or affection, and yet I had be...
ANNE BRONTë

The ties that bind us to life are tougher than you imagine, or than any one can who has not felt how...
ANNE BRONTë

I was sorry for her; I was amazed, disgusted at her heartless vanity; I wondered why so much beauty ...
ANNE BRONTë

What business had I to think of one that never thought of me?
ANNE BRONTë

I tried to cheer her up, and apparently succeeded in some degree, before the walk was over; but in t...
ANNE BRONTë

if I hate the sins, I love the sinner, and would do much for his salvation
ANNE BRONTë

He is very fond of me, almost too fond. I could do with less caressing and more rationality. I shoul...
ANNE BRONTë

I was not really angry: I felt for him all the time, and longed to be reconciled; but I determined h...
ANNE BRONTë

Is it that they think it a duty to be continually talking,' pursued she: 'and so never pause to thin...
ANNE BRONTë

Although I maintain that if she were more perfect, she would be less interesting.
ANNE BRONTë

There is such a thing as looking through a person's eyes into the heart, and learning more of the he...
ANNE BRONTë

He never could have loved me, or he would not have resigned me so willingly
ANNE BRONTë

Keep a guard over your eyes and ears as the inlets of your heart, and over your lips as the outlet, ...
ANNE BRONTë

If you would have your son to walk honorably through the world, you must not attempt to clear the st...
ANNE BRONTë

I would rather have your friendship than the love of any other woman in the world.
ANNE BRONTë

When I tell you not to marry without love, I do not advise you to marry for love alone: there are ma...
ANNE BRONTë

[B]eauty is that quality which, next to money, is generally the most attractive to the worst kinds o...
ANNE BRONTë

My heart is too thoroughly dried to be broken in a hurry, and I mean to live as long as I can.
ANNE BRONTë

His heart was like a sensitive plant, that opens for a moment in the sunshine, but curls up and shri...
ANNE BRONTë

Adieu! but let me cherish, still, The hope with which I cannot part. Contempt may wound, and coldnes...
ANNE BRONTë

When I tell you not to marry without love, I do not advise you to marry for love alone - there are m...
ANNE BRONTë

I cannot get him to write or speak in real, solid earnest. I don't much mind it now, but if it be al...
ANNE BRONTë

No one can be happy in eternal solitude.
ANNE BRONTë

If we can only speak to slander our betters, let us hold our tongues.
ANNE BRONTë

When a lady condescends to apologise, there is no keeping one’s anger.
ANNE BRONTë

What is it that constitutes virtue, Mrs. Graham? Is it the circumstance of being able and willing to...
ANNE BRONTë

I see that a man cannot give himself up to drinking without being miserable one-half his days and ma...
ANNE BRONTë

To regret the exchange of earthly pleasures for the joys of Heaven, is as if the grovelling caterpil...
ANNE BRONTë

Well, to tell you the truth, I've thought of it often and often before, but he's such devilish good ...
ANNE BRONTë

I may be permitted, like the doctors, to cure a greater evil by a less, for I shall not fall serious...
ANNE BRONTë

If you would really study my pleasure, mother, you must consider your own comfort and convenience a ...
ANNE BRONTë

I thought Mr. Millward never would cease telling us that he was no tea-drinker, and that it was high...
ANNE BRONTë

To represent a bad thing in its least offensive light is, doubtless, the most agreeable course for a...
ANNE BRONTë

It is a troublesome thing, Halford, this susceptibility to affronts where none are intended.
ANNE BRONTë

May she wake in torment!’ [...] ‘Why, she’s a liar to
the end! Where is she? Not there - ...
EMILY BRONTë

Every leaf speaks bliss to me, fluttering from the autumn tree.
EMILY BRONTë

Oh, I'm burning! I wish I were out of doors! I wish I were a girl again, half savage and hardy, and ...
EMILY BRONTë

Oh, Cathy! Oh, my life! how can I bear it?" was the first sentence he uttered, in a tone that did no...
EMILY BRONTë

Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton's is as different as a moonbea...
EMILY BRONTë

You know that I could as soon forget you as my existence!
EMILY BRONTë

It is hard to forgive, and to look at those eyes, and feel those wasted hands,' he answered. 'Kiss m...
EMILY BRONTë

It was not the thorn bending to the honeysuckles, but the honeysuckles embracing the thorn.
EMILY BRONTë

She burned too bright for this world.
EMILY BRONTë

Terror made me cruel . . .
EMILY BRONTë

Heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the ...
EMILY BRONTë

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the mor...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I do not think, sir, you have any right to command me, merely because you are older than I, or becau...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

He's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.
EMILY BRONTë

I had not intended to love him; the reader knows I had wrought hard to extirpate from my soul the ge...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

No sight so sad as that of a naughty child," he began, "especially a naughty little girl. Do you kno...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I know what it is to live entirely for and with what I love best on earth. I hold myself supremely b...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

The trouble is not that I am single and likely to stay single, but that I am lonely and likely to st...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Love is like the wild rose-briar; Friendship like the holly-tree. The holly is dark when the rose-br...
EMILY BRONTë

I can be on guard against my enemies, but God deliver me from my friends!
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

A person who has not done one half his day's work by ten o'clock, runs a chance of leaving the other...
EMILY BRONTë

Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think w...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I am not an angel," I asserted; "and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Gentle reader, may you never feel what I then felt! May your eyes never shed such stormy, scalding, ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I am not an angel,' I asserted; 'and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself. Mr. Rochester, ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

You teach me now how cruel you've been - cruel and false. Why did you despise me? Why did you betray...
EMILY BRONTë

Monsieur, if a wife's nature loathes that of the man she is wedded to, marriage must be slavery. Aga...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I doubt if I have made the best use of all my calamities. Soft, amiable natures they would have refi...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Jane, be still; don't struggle so like a wild, frantic bird, that is rending its own plumage in its ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Flirting is a woman’s trade, one must keep in practice.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

The soul, fortunately, has an interpreter - often an unconscious but still a faithful interpreter - ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I have not broken your heart - you have broken it; and in breaking it, you have broken mine.
EMILY BRONTë

Friends always forget those whom fortune forsakes.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

If we would build on a sure foundation in friendship, we must love our friends for their sakes rathe...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Because misery, and degradation, and death, and nothing that God or Satan could inflict would have p...
EMILY BRONTë

Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot...
EMILY BRONTë

If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and ...
EMILY BRONTë

I would always rather be happy than dignified.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

If men could see us as we really are, they would be a little amazed; but the cleverest, the acutest ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Good-night, my-" He stopped, bit his lip, and abruptly left me.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

There is no happiness like that of being loved by your fellow creatures, and feeling that your prese...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

It does good to no woman to be flattered [by a man] who does not intend to marry her; and it is madn...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Even for me life had its gleams of sunshine.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

We know that God is everywhere; but certainly we feel His presence most when His works are on the gr...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; an...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I ask you to pass through life at my side—to be my second self, and best earthly companion.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

It is a long way to Ireland, Janet, and I am sorry to send my little friend on such weary travels: b...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I have little left in myself -- I must have you. The world may laugh -- may call me absurd, selfish ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

All my heart is yours, sir: it belongs to you; and with you it would remain, were fate to exile the ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never be...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Every atom of your flesh is as dear to me as my own: in pain and sickness it would still be dear.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Reader, I married him.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

If all the world hated you and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved of you and ab...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I have for the first time found what I can truly love–I have found you. You are my sympathy–my b...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs.
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Do you think I am an automaton? — a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of br...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to a...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

No: I shall not marry Samuel Fawthrop Wynne."

"I ask why? I must have a reason. In all re...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

I am anchored on a resolve you cannot shake. My heart, my conscience shall dispose of my hand -- ...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë

Therefore, have done with this nonsense: you have no ground for hope: dismiss, at once, these hurtful thoughts and foolish wishes from your mind, and turn to your own duty, and the dull blank life that lies before you. You might have known such happiness was not for you.

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Anne Brontë

Therefore, have done with this nonsense: you have no ground for hope: dismiss, at once, these hurtful thoughts and foolish wishes from your mind, and turn to your own duty, and the dull blank life that lies before you. You might have known such happiness was not for you.

Anne Brontë

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