"A few years before, Anne Elliot had been a very pretty girl, but her bloom had vanished early; and as even in its hei…"

"Vanity was the beginning and the end of Sir Walter Elliot's character; vanity of person and of situation. He had been…"

"Elizabeth had succeeded at sixteen to all that was possible of her mother's rights and consequence; and being very ha…"

"Here Anne spoke: "The navy, I think, who have done so much for us, have at least an equal claim with any other set of…"

"She had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequence of an unn…"

"My sore throats, you know, are always worse than anybody's."

"Anne hoped she had outlived the age of blushing; but the age of emotion she certainly had not."

"He had, in fact, though now his sisters were doing all they could for him, by calling him "poor Richard," been nothin…"

"Now they were as strangers; nay, worse than strangers, for they could never become acquainted."

"How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!"