Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is… - Jane Austen

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?

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.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of someone or other of their daughters.