A mother would have been always present. A mother would have been a constant friend; her influence would have been beyond all other.

A single woman with a narrow income must be a ridiculous, disagreeable old maid, the proper sport of boys and girls, but a single woman of fortune is always respectable, and may be as sensible and pleasant as anybody else.

It sometimes is a disadvantage to be so very guarded. If a woman conceals her affection from the object of it, she may loose the opportunity of fixing him.

Indulge your imagination in every possible flight.

No: the years which had destroyed her youth and bloom had only given him a more glowing, manly, open look, in no respect lessening his personal advantages. She had seen the same Frederick Wentworth.

She knew that when she played she was giving pleasure only to herself; but this was no new sensation

There is safety in reserve, but no attraction. One cannot love a reserved person.