Best Quotes from Persuasion

After the catastrophe that was Netflix's new adaptation of Persuasion (read more here), I revisted the novel and found some dog-eared pages with quotes that I adored (I mean if I could I'd probably just dog-ear the whole book- or all of Jane Austen's books).

page 96-97: "Anne could not immediately fall into quotation again. The sweet scenes of autumn were for a while put by - unless some tender sonnet, fraught with the apt anaology of the declining year, with declining happiness, and the images of youth and hope, and spring, all gone together, blessed her memory."

page 115: "He was shy, and disposed to abstraction; but the engaging mildness of her countenance, and the gentleness of her manners, soon had their effect; and Anne was well repaid the first trouble of exertion. He was evidently a young man of considereable taste in reading, though principally in poetry; and besides the persausion of havinggiven him at least an evening's indulgence in the discussion of subjects, which his usual companions had probably no concern in, she had the hope of being of real use to him in some suggestions as to the duty and benefit of their conversation. For, though shy, he did not seem reserved; it has rather the apperance of feelings glad to burst their usual restraints..."

page 210: Wentworth: "'...and the more I saw, the more I found to admire.'"

page 210: Anne: "'One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it, unless it has been all suffering, nothing but suffering - which was by no means the case at Lyme. We were only in anxiety and distress during the last two hours; and, previously, there had been a great deal of enjoyment. So much novelty and beauty! I have travelled so little, that every fresh place would be interesting to me - but there is real beauty at Lyme: and in short' (with a faint blush at some recollections) 'altogether my impressions of the place were very agreeable.'"

page 221: Mrs Smith: "'Your contenance perfectly informs me that you were in company last night with the person, whom you think the most agreeable in the world, the person who interests you at this present time, more than all the rest of the world put together.'"

page 253: "She tried to be calm, and leave things to take their course; and tried to dwell much on this argument of rational dependance - 'Surley, if there be constant attachment on each side, our hearts must understand each other ere long..."

page 270: Wentworth's letter to Anne: "'I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half in agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own, than when you almost broke it eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone I think and plan. - Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? - I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice, when they would be lost on others. - Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice indeed. You do believe that there is true attachement and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating in F.W.'"

(Any citations and page numbers come from the Vintage Classics edition of Persuasion with an Introduction by Lynne Truss)