Emma Morality and Ethics Quotes Page 2
Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
| Quote #4 Yet he would speak. He owed it to her, to risk any thing that might be involved in an unwelcome interference, rather than her welfare; to encounter any thing, rather than the remembrance of neglect in such a cause. (41.30) |
Knightley’s honor always trumps his better (or more selfish) instincts. It seems like he loves Emma by now, but he’s willing to risk her respect to tell her the truth.
| Quote #5 She never stopt till she had gone through the whole; and though it was impossible not to feel that he had been wrong, yet he had been less wrong than she had supposed—and he had suffered, and was very sorry—[…] and she was so happy herself, that there was no being severe; and could he have entered the room, she must have shaken hands with him as heartily as ever. (51.1) |
As Austen’s narrator takes us through Emma’s response to Frank’s letter, she’s also teaching us how to read – how to be sympathetic to characters we encounter.
| Quote #6 […] such extreme and perpetual cautiousness of word and manner, such a dread of giving a distinct idea about any body, is apt to suggest suspicions of there being something to conceal. (24.42) |
Ironically, gossip is the fuel for most misunderstandings in this novel – and yet Emma recognizes the all-too-human propensity for gossip by pointing out how unnatural personal reserve seems in Highbury.
