Gender and Independence Quotes in Jane Eyre

I'll be preparing myself to go out as a missionary to preach liberty to them that are enslaved—your harem inmates amongst the rest.

I suppose your love will effervesce in six months, or less. I have observed in books written by men, that period assigned as the farthest to which a husband's ardour extends.

I thought of the life that lay before me—your life, sir—an existence more expansive and stirring than my own: as much more so as the depths of the sea to which the brook runs are than the shallows of its own strait channel.

Sir, your wife is living: that is a fact acknowledged this morning by yourself. If I lived with you as you desire, I should then be your mistress: to say otherwise is sophistical—is false.

At any rate, there is neither room nor claim for me, sir.

I was seized with shame: my tongue would not utter the request I had prepared. I dared not offer her the half-worn gloves, the creased handkerchief: besides, I felt it would be absurd.

The want of house or brass (by which I suppose you mean money) does not make a beggar in your sense of the word.

I thank you for the proposal, Mr. Rivers, and I accept it with all my heart.

I am not brutally selfish, blindly unjust, or fiendishly ungrateful. Besides, I am resolved I will have a home and connections.

Yes; just as if you were speaking Greek. I feel I have adequate cause to be happy, and I _will_ be happy. Goodbye!