I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.

Sir,' I interrupted him, 'you are inexorable for that unfortunate lady; you speak of her with hate --- with vindictive antipathy. It is cruel --- she cannot help being mad.

Your station is in my heart, and on the necks of those who would insult you.

On the contrary, I'm a universal patriot, if you could understand me rightly: my country is the world.

I only want an easy mind, sir; not crushed by crowded obligations.

I think I must admit so fair a guest when it asks entrance to my heart.

All these relics gave... Thornfield Hall the aspect of a home of the past: a shrine to memory. I liked the hush, the gloom, the quaintness of these retreats in the day; but I by no means coveted a night's repose on one of those wide and heavy beds: shut in, some of them, with doors of oak; shaded, others, with wrought old-English hangings crusted with thick work, portraying effigies of strange flowers, and stranger birds, and strangest human beings, all which would have looked strange, indeed, by the pallid gleam of moonlight.