Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.
Jane AustenTo be so bent on Marriage - to pursue a man merely for the sake of situation - is a sort of thing that shocks me; I cannot understand it. Poverty is a great Evil, but to a woman of Education and feeling it ought not, it cannot be the greatest. I would rather be a teacher at a school (and I can think of nothing worse) than marry a man I did not like.
Jane AustenProvided that nothing like useful knowledge could be gained from them, provided they were all story and no reflection, she had never any objection to books at all.
Jane AustenHappiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other or ever so similar beforehand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.
Jane Austen