Charlotte Brontë > Quotes

“Las personas reservadas a menudo necesitan hablar de sus sentimientos y pesares con menos tapujos que los extrovertidos. Incluso el estoico más severo es en el fondo un ser humano, y por lo tanto «irrumpir» con atrevimiento y buena voluntad en el «silencioso mar» de sus almas constituye para ellos un inmenso favor.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“But, in my opinion, if I am not formed for love, it follows that I am not formed for marriage.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“like the spirit of this great London which I feel around me. Who but a coward would pass his whole life in hamlets; and for ever abandon his faculties to the eating rust of obscurity?”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Tell me now, fairy as you are - can't you give me a charm, or a philter, or something of that sort, to make me a handsome man?'
'It would be past the power of magic, sir;' and, in thought, I added, 'A loving eye is all the charm needed; to such you are handsome enough; or rather your sternness has a power beyond beauty.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“No, my fairy: but I am only too thankful to hear and feel you.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Mr. Rochester is an amateur of the decided and eccentric: Grace is eccentric at least.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition

“By whomsoever majesty is beheld for the first time, there will always be experienced a vague surprise bordering on disappointment, that the same does not appear seated, en permanence, on a throne, bonneted with a crown, and furnished, as to the hand, with a sceptre. Looking out for a king and queen, and seeing only a middle-aged soldier and a rather young lady, I felt half cheated, half pleased.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“He stood between me and every thought of religion, as an eclipse intervenes between man and the broad sun”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“That bitter hour cannot be described: in truth, “the waters came into my soul; I sank in deep mire: I felt no standing; I came into deep waters; the floods overflowed me.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Se supone que las mujeres hemos de ser serenas por lo general, pero nosotras tenemos sentimientos igual que los hombres. Necesitamos ejercitar nuestras facultades necesitamos espacio para nuestros esfuerzos tanto como ellos. Sufrimos restricciones demasiado severas y un estancamiento demasiado total, exactamente igual que los hombres. Demuestra estrechez de miras por parte de nuestros más afortunados congéneres el decir que deberíamos limitarnos a preparar postres y tejer medias, tocar el piano y bordar bolsos. Es imprudente condenarnos, o reírse de nosotras, si pretenden elevarse por encima de lo que dictan las costumbres para su sexo.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Birds began singing in brake and copse: birds were faithful to their mates; birds were emblems of love. What was I? In the midst of my pain of heart and frantic effort of principle, I abhorred myself. I had no solace from self-approbation: none even from self-respect.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Their sisters have no earthly employment but household work and sewing, no earthly pleasure but an unprofitable visiting, and no hope, in all their life to come, of anything better. This stagnant state of things makes them decline in health. They are never well, and their minds and views shrink to wondrous narrowness. The great wish, the sole aim of every one of them is to be married, but the majority will never marry; they will die as they now live. They scheme, they plot, they dress to ensnare husbands. The gentlemen turn them into ridicule; they don’t want them; they hold them very cheap.”
― Charlotte Brontë, The Brontës Complete Works

“I was only going to say that heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke up sobbing for joy - pg 111”
― Charlotte Brontë

“El amor por el riesgo endulza el sabor de esa sensación, y el brillo del orgullo te anima a seguir, pero de repente te asalta la brisa del miedo.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“And you ought not to think yourself on an equality with the Misses Reed and Master Reed, because Missis kindly allows you to be brought up with them. They will have a great deal of money, and you will have none: it is your place to be humble, and to try to make yourself agreeable to them.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition

“[…] but the longer I considered the position, education, &c., of the parties, the less I felt justified in judging and blaming either him or Miss Ingram for acting in conformity to ideas and principles instilled into them, doubtless, from their childhood. All their class held these principles: I supposed, then, they had reasons for holding them, such as I could not fathom. It seemed to me that, were I a gentleman like him, I would take to my bosom only such a wife as I could love; but the very obviousness of the advantages to the husband’s own happiness offered by this plan convinced me that there must be arguments against its general adoption of which I was quite ignorant: otherwise I felt sure all the world would act as I wished to act.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Is there not love in my heart, and constancy in my resolves? It will expiate at God's tribunal. I know my Maker sanctions what I do. For the world's judgement—I wash my hands thereof. For man's opinion—I defy it.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I will tell anybody who asks me questions, this exact tale. People think you a good woman, but you are bad, hard-hearted. You are deceitful!”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“If I let a gust of wind or a sprinkling of rain turn me aside from the easy tasks, what preparation would such sloth be for the future I propose myself?”
― Charlotte Brontë

“How seem in the eyes of that God who made all firmaments, from whose nostrils issued whatever of life is here, or in the stars, shining yonder - how seem the differences of man? But as Time is not for God, nor Space, so neither is Measure, nor Comparison. We abase ourselves in our littleness, and we do right; yet it may be that the constancy of one heart, the truth and faith of one mind according to the light He has appointed, import as much to Him as the just motion of satellites about their planets, of planets about their suns, of suns around that mighty unseen centre incomprehensible, irrealizable, with strange mental effort only divined.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette

“Hold her arms, Miss Abbot: she’s like a mad cat.” “For shame! for shame!” cried the lady’s-maid. “What shocking conduct, Miss Eyre, to strike a young gentleman, your benefactress’s son! Your young master.” “Master! How is he my master? Am I a servant?” “No; you are less than a servant, for you do nothing for your keep. There, sit down, and think over your wickedness.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition

“Lo resistirías si no tuvieras otro remedio, si fuera tu obligación hacerlo. Es débil y estúpido decir que no puedes soportar lo que está escrito en tu destino.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Los pájaros muertos de frío no comprenden las ráfagas que los hacen temblar; la misma incapacidad tiene el alma sufriente para reconocer, en el momento de su mayor aflicción, el alba que la ha de liberar.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Shirley

“No man — no woman — is always strong, always able to bear up against the unjust opinion, the vilifying word. Calumny, even from the mouth of a fool, will sometimes cut into unguarded feelings. Shirley looked like a child that had been naughty and punished, but was now forgiven and at rest.”
― Charlotte Brontë, The Brontës Complete Works

“Veltīgi apgalvo, ka cilvēks ir apmierināts ar mierīgu dzīvi; cilvēkam vajadzīga darbība dzīve, un viņš pats sev tādu rod, ja to nedāvā liktenis.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“You have nothing to do with the master of Thornfield, further than to receive the salary he gives you for teaching his protégée, and to be grateful for such respectful and kind treatment as, if you do your duty, you have a right to expect at his hands. Be sure that is the only tie he seriously acknowledges between you and him; so don’t make him the object of your fine feelings, your raptures, agonies, and so forth. He is not of your order: keep to your caste, and be too self-respecting to lavish the love of the whole heart, soul, and strength, where such a gift is not wanted and would be despised.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition

“I don’t know the gentlemen here. I have scarcely interchanged a syllable with one of them; and as to thinking well of them, I consider some respectable, and stately, and middle-aged, and others young, dashing, handsome, and lively: but certainly they are all at liberty to be the recipients of whose smiles they please, without my feeling disposed to consider the transaction of any moment to me.” “You don’t know”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre: The Original 1847 Unabridged and Complete Edition

“I’m very far from jesting, Miss Catherine,’ I replied. ‘You love Mr. Edgar because he is handsome, and young, and cheerful, and rich, and loves you. The last, however, goes for nothing: you would love him without that, probably; and with it you wouldn’t, unless he possessed the four former attractions.”
― Charlotte Brontë, The Brontës: Complete Novels of Charlotte, Emily & Anne Brontë - All 8 Books in One Edition: Jane Eyre, Shirley, Villette, Wuthering Heights and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall…

“forging a fresh chain to fetter your heart?”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Discoveries made by stealth seem to me dishonourable discoveries.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Villette