“Dullness it is that perverts and corrups the spirit but it is always possible to look past the dullness, and see the bright, shining heart of things”

“I am no faint-heart when it comes to the unpleasant truth. Indeed I have always taken a bracing sort of pleasure in facing it.”

“To marry is to narrow one's possibilities horribly.”

“She sincerely wishes success, for her new life, and intends that no failure of effort, temper, or spirits on her part will jeopardise it.”

“Probably no purer incitement to hatred existed, Lydia had found, than being told of anyone or anything: you will love him, her or it. The spirit immediately rose up like a fanged cobra.”

“Love is always unexpected”

“It is not always easy, for a woman alone.”