Brontë Quotes About Life, Love, and Loss
The Brontë sisters—Charlotte, Emily, and Anne—are known and loved for their passionate heroines (usually striding across wild Yorkshire moors), subversive stories, and secret lives. Enjoy these stirring Brontë quotes about life, love, and loss.
“You know full well as I do the value of sisters’ affections: There is nothing like it in this world.” —Charlotte Brontë, The Professor
“She’s hard to guide any way but her own.” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“If she were more perfect, she would be less interesting.” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“I’m mortally sorry that you are not worth knocking down!” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“I would always rather be happy than dignified.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“He’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same…” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“It is foolish to wish for beauty. Sensible people never either desire it for themselves or care about it in others. If the mind be but well cultivated, and the heart well disposed, no one ever cares for the exterior.” —Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey
“It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility: they must have action; they will make it if they cannot find it.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“Because, my dear, beauty is that quality which, next to money, is generally the most attractive to the worst kinds of men.” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it.” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“Smiles and tears are so alike with me, they are neither of them confined to any particular feelings: I often cry when I am happy, and smile when I am sad.” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had the courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“The ties that bind us to life are tougher than you imagine, or than any one can who has not felt how roughly they may be pulled without breaking.” —Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey
“I wish I were a girl again, half savage and hardy, and free…Why am I so changed?” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“No one can be happy in eternal solitude.” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“I have not broken your heart—you have broken it; and in breaking it, you have broken mine.” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“It is a pity that doing one’s best does not always answer.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“Increase of love brings increase of happiness, when it is mutual, and pure as that will be.” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“Reading is my favorite occupation, when I have leisure for it and books to read.” —Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey
“I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!” —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“How odd it is that we so often weep for each other’s distresses, when we shed not a tear for our own!” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“You are human and fallible.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“My heart is too thoroughly dried to be broken in a hurry, and I mean to live as long as I can” —Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
“I am not an angel, and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself.” —Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Do you have favorite Brontë quotes that’s aren’t on the list? Share them in the comments! Is Anne your favorite? Check out Carolina Ciucci’s Reasons I Love Anne Brontë (And Why You Should Too). Or maybe Charlotte is the Brontë of your heart and Jane Eyre is your favorite novel ever? Here are 16 Beautiful Jane Eyre Book Covers and The 35 Best Lines from Jane Eyre.
