The personal cost of misinterpretation

Quote

Character

Chapter no.

“‘Emma never thinks of herself, if she can do good to others,’ rejoined Mr Woodhouse, understanding but in part. ‘But, my dear, pray do not make any more matches; they are silly things, and break up one’s family circle grievously.’”

Mr Wood- house

Volume I, Chapter 1

“Upon my word, Emma, to hear you abusing the reason you have, is almost enough to make me think so too. Better be without sense, than misapply it as you do.”

Mr Knightley

Volume I, Chapter 8

“Can it be possible for this man [Mr Elton] to be beginning to transfer his affections from Harriet to me?”

Emma

Volume I, Chapter 14

“The first error and the worst lay at her door. It was foolish, it was wrong, to take so active a part in bringing any two people together.”

Omniscient narrator

Volume I, Chapter 16

“It was badly done, indeed! [. . . ] and the pride of the moment, laugh at her, humble her—and before her niece, too—and before others, many of whom (certainly some,) would be entirely guided by your treatment of her.”

Mr Knightley

Volume III, Chapter 43

“A few minutes were sufficient for making her acquainted with her own heart. A mind like hers, once opening to suspicion, made rapid progress. She touched—she admitted—she acknowledged the whole truth.”

Omniscient narrator

Volume III, Chapter 47

“With insufferable vanity had she believed herself in the secret of every body’s feelings; with unpardonable arrogance proposed to arrange every body’s destiny. She was proved to have been universally mistaken; and she had not quite done nothing—for she had done mischief. She had brought evil on Harriet, on herself, and she too much feared, on Mr Knightley.”

Omniscient narrator

Volume III, Chapter 47

“If Harriet, from being humble, were grown vain, it was her doing too.”

Omniscient narrator

Volume III, Chapter 47