Jane Eyre — Vocabulary
Charlotte Bronte
(Edited)

At a later day, I knew the language and the book; therefore, I will here quote the line: though, when I first heard it, it was only like a stroke on sounding brass to me — conveying no meaning:p.382.9alternate pages13 more

To England, then, I conveyed her; a fearful voyage I had with such a monster in the vessel. Glad was I when I at last got her to Thornfield, and saw her safely lodged in that third-storey room, of whose secret inner cabinet she has now for ten years made a wild beast's den -- a goblin's cell.p.356.7alternate pages13 more

"I am not an angel," I asserted; "and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself: 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."p.300.3alternate pages7 more

  "You examine me, Miss Eyre," said he: "do you think me handsome?"
  I should, if I had deliberated, have replied to this question by something conventionally vague and polite; but the answer somehow slipped from my tongue before I was aware — "No, sir."p.154.1alternate pages7 more

There was no harassing restraint, no repressing of glee and vivacity with him; for with him I was at perfect ease, because I knew I suited him; all I said or did seemed either to console or revive him.p.504.2alternate pages13 more

The confidence he had thought fit to repose in me seemed a tribute to my discretion: I regarded and accepted it as such.p.171.3alternate pages4 more

My task was a very hard one; but, as I was absolutely resolved — as my cousins saw at length that my mind was really and immutably fixed on making a just division of the property ... they yielded at length so far as to consent to put the affair to arbitration.p.448.5alternate pages33 more

I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my centre and spring of life, wraps my existence about you,p.363.2alternate pages5 more

Some of the best people that ever lived have been as destitute as I am; and if you are a Christian, you ought not to consider poverty a crime.p.393.7alternate pages6 more

Not a hint, however, did she drop about sending me to school: still I felt an instinctive certainty that she would not long endure me under the same roof with her; for her glance, now more than ever, when turned on me, expressed an insuperable and rooted aversion.p.33.6alternate pages4 more

but as his wife — at his side always, and always restrained, and always checked — forced to keep the fire of my nature continually low, to compel it to burn inwardly and never utter a cry, though the imprisoned flame consumed vital after vital — this would be unendurable.p.470.4alternate pages4 more

Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be.p.365.5alternate pages2 more

Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless?p.292.7alternate pages14 more

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.p.365.4alternate pages7 more

"Because," he said, "I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you — especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame."p.291.5alternate pages5 more

I had had no communication by letter or message with the outer world: school-rules, school-duties, school-habits and notions, and voices, and faces, and phrases, and costumes, and preferences, and antipathies — such was what I knew of existence.p.101.9alternate pages7 more

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, too 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.p.130.1alternate pages3 more

I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. 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.p.233.2alternate pages

It is far better to endure patiently a smart which nobody feels but yourself, than to commit a hasty action whose evil consequences will extend to all connected with you;p.66.8alternate pages24 more

I know that had I been a sanguine, brilliant, careless, exacting, handsome, romping child — though equally dependent and friendless — Mrs. Reed would have endured my presence more complacently; her children would have entertained for me more of the cordiality of fellow-feeling; the servants would have been less prone to make me the scapegoat of the nursery.p.19.7alternate pages30 more