To look almost pretty is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain for the first fifteen years of her life than a beauty from her cradle can ever receive.
No man is offended by another man's admiration of the woman he loves; it is the woman only who can make it a torment.
A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony in a moment.
In nine cases out of ten, a woman had better show more affection than she feels.
I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.
An engaged woman is always more agreeable than a disengaged. She is satisfied with herself. Her cares are over, and she feels that she may exert all her powers of pleasing without suspicion. All is safe with a lady engaged; no harm can be done.
There is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions.
A single woman with a very narrow income must be a ridiculous, disagreeable old maid - the proper sport of boys and girls; but a single woman of good fortune is always respectable, and may be as sensible and pleasant as anybody else.
Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast.
How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!
We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be.
It is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are they the result of previous study?
Where youth and diffidence are united, it requires uncommon steadiness of reason to resist the attraction of being called the most charming girl in the world.
There is safety in reserve, but no attraction. One cannot love a reserved person.
Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.
It is very difficult for the prosperous to be humble.
General benevolence, but not general friendship, made a man what he ought to be.
Walter Scott has no business to write novels, especially good ones. It is not fair. He has fame and profit enough as a poet, and should not be taking the bread out of the mouths of other people.
We do not look in our great cities for our best morality.
It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation.