10 Inspiring Quotes from Charlotte Brontë

In honour of Charlotte Brontë's 206th birthday on April 21st, we've shared ten of her most empowering quotes. 

We of course had to begin our list with Charlotte Brontë's iconic quote from Jane Eyre, which has inspired so many of our gifts!

1.  "I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will." - Jane Eyre
2. “I would always rather be happy than dignified.” - Jane Eyre
3. "The human heart has hidden treasures, In secret kept, in silence sealed; The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures, Whose charms were broken if revealed.”  - Evening Solace (poem)
4. "If men could see us as we really are, they would be a little amazed; but the cleverest, the acutest men are often under an illusion about women: they do not read them in a true light: they misapprehend them, both for good and evil: their good woman is a queer thing, half doll, half angel; their bad woman almost always a fiend.” - Shirley
5. “I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.” - Jane Eyre
6. "But life is a battle: may we all be enabled to fight it well!" - The Letters of Charlotte Brontë
7. “Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilised by education: they grow there, firm as weeds among stones.” - Jane Eyre
8. “I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had the courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.” - Jane Eyre
9. "The wings of action and ambition could not long lie folded." - Shirley
10. "I believe that this life is not all; neither the beginning nor the end. I believe while I tremble; I trust while I weep." - Villette

To take a look at our full range of Charlotte Brontë inspired literature gifts, click here!

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