Edward Rochester

I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you. It is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs... And if that boisterous Channel, and two hundred miles or so of land come broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapt; and then I’ve a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly. As for you,—you’d forget me.

You looked very much puzzled, Miss Eyre; and though you are not pretty any more than I am handsome, yet a puzzled air becomes you; besides, it is convenient, for it keeps those searching eyes of yours away from my physiognomy, and busies them with the worsted flowers of the rug; so puzzle on.

— 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".

— ... I have no wish to talk nonsense.
— If you did, it would be in such a grave, quiet manner, I should mistake it for sense.

At this moment, I am paving hell with energy.

There are grains of truth in the wildest fable.

Little girl, a memory without blot or contamination must be an exquisite treasure—an inexhaustible source of pure refreshment: is it not?

Is it better to drive a fellow-creature to despair than to transgress a mere human law, no man being injured by the breach?

A woman who could betray me for such a rival was not worth contending for; she deserved only scorn; less, however, than I, who had been her dupe.

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Charlotte Brontë

Jane Eyre

Of yourself you could come with soft flight and nestle against my heart, if you would: seized against your will, you will elude the grasp like an essence—you will vanish ere I inhale your fragrance.

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Charlotte Brontë

Jane Eyre

You will come some day to a craggy pass in the channel, where the whole of life’s stream will be broken up into whirl and tumult, foam and noise: either you will be dashed to atoms on crag points, or lifted up and borne on by some master-wave into a calmer current—as I am now.

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Charlotte Brontë

Jane Eyre