Jane Austen Children Quotations

I am determined that only the deepest love will induce me into matrimony. So... I shall end an old maid, and teach your ten children to embroider cushions and play their instruments very ill.

Where shall we see a better daughter, or a kinder sister, or a truer friend?

[Mrs. Allen was] never satisfied with the day unless she spent the chief of it by the side of Mrs. Thorpe, in what they called conversation, but in which there was scarcely ever any exchange of opinion, and not often any resemblance of subject, for Mrs. Thorpe talked chiefly of her children, and Mrs. Allen of her gowns.

Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their power, which no subsequent connections can supply...

You think me foolish to call instruction a torment, but if you had been as much used as myself to hear poor little children first learning their letters and then learning to spell, if you had ever seen how stupid they can be for a whole morning together, and how tired my poor mother is at the end of it, as I am in the habit of seeing almost every day of my life at home, you would allow that to torment and to instruct might sometimes be used as synonymous words.

Fortunately for those who pay their court through such foibles, a fond mother, though, in pursuit of praise for her children, themost rapacious of human beings, is likewise the most credulous; her demands are exorbitant; but she will swallow any thing.

A sick child is always the mother's property; her own feelings generally make it so.

Mr. Bennet, how can you abuse your own children in such a way? You take delight in vexing me. You have no compassion for my poor nerves." "You mistake me, my dear. I have a high respect for your nerves. They are my old friends. I have heard you mention them with consideration these last twenty years at least.

That will do extremely well, child. You have delighted us long enough. Let the other young ladies have time to exhibit.

On every formal visit a child ought to be of the party, by way of provisions for discourse.

A family of ten children will be always called a fine family, where there are heads and arms and legs enough for the number.