Memorable Quotes from Episode Five

These quotes have been scrupulously collected and checked, but please do let us know if you see any mistakes.

Georgiana: Will you not play again? You played that song so beautifully.
Elizabeth: Not very beautifully, not faithfully at all.  You must have seen how I fudged and slurred my way through the difficult passages.  It is a beautiful instrument, though.
Georgiana: My brother gave it to me.  He is so good. I don't deserve it.
Elizabeth: Oh, I am sure you do. Your brother thinks you do, and as you know, he is never wrong.


Caroline Bingley: Pray, Miss Eliza, are the Militia still quartered at Meryton?
Elizabeth: No, they are encamped at Brighton for the summer.
Miss Bingley: That must be a great loss for your family.
Elizabeth: We're enduring it as best we can, Miss Bingley.
Miss Bingley: I should have thought one gentleman's absence might have caused particular pangs.
Elizabeth: I can't imagine who you mean.
Miss Bingley: I understood that certain ladies found the society of Mr Wickham curiously agreeable.


Miss Bingley: How very ill Eliza Bennet looked this evening! I've never in my life seen anyone so much altered as she is since the winter.
Louisa Hurst: Quite so, my dear.
Miss Bingley: She is grown so brown and coarse.  Louisa and I were agreeing that we should hardly know her. What do you say, Mr Darcy?
Mr. Darcy: I noticed no great difference. She is, I suppose, a little tanned. Hardly surprising when one travels in the summer.
Miss Bingley:  Mmm...for my part, I must confess, I never saw any beauty in her face. Her features are not at all handsome. Her complexion has no brilliancy. Oh, her teeth are tolerable, I suppose, but...nothing out of the common way. (Chuckles) And as for her eyes, which I have sometimes heard called fine,  I could never perceive anything extraordinary in them. And in her air altogether there's a self-sufficiency without fashion, which I find intolerable.
Mr. Bingley: I think--
Miss Bingley: I remember when we first knew her in Hertfordshire, how amazed we all were to find her a reputed beauty! I particularly recall you, Mr Darcy, one night after they'd been dining at Netherfield, saying: "She a beauty? I should as soon call her mother a wit!" Oh! But afterwards she seemed to improve on you. I even believe you thought her rather pretty at one time.
Mr. Darcy: Yes, I did. That was only when I first knew her.  For it has been many months since I have considered her one of the handsomest women of my acquaintance.


Miss Bingley: You are very quiet this evening, Mr Darcy. I sincerely hope you are not pining for the loss of Miss Eliza Bennet.
Mr. Darcy: What?!


Mrs. Bennet: And now here is Mr Bennet gone away.  And I know he will fight Wickham, and then he will be killed, and then what is to become of us all?  Those Collinses will turn us out before he is cold in his grave! And if you are not kind to us, brother, I don't know what we shall do!
Mr. Gardiner: Sister, calm down. Nothing dreadful will happen. I shall be in London tomorrow morning, and then we will consult as to what is best to be done.
Mrs. Bennet: Yes, yes, that is it! You must find them out, and if they be not married, you must make them marry. But above all, keep Mr Bennet from fighting!
Jane: Mamma, I am sure he does not mean to fight.
Mrs. Bennet: Oh yes, yes he does! And, and Wickham will kill him for sure, unless you can prevent it, brother!  You must tell him what a dreadful state I'm in! How I have such tremblings and flutterings all over me. Such spasms in my side and pains in my head and beatings at my heart, that I can get no rest either night or day!
Mr. Gardiner: Sister, calm yourself!


Mary: This is the most unfortunate affair, and will probably be much talked of.
Elizabeth: Yes, thank you, Mary. I think we have all apprehended that much.
Mary: We must stem the tide of malice, and pour into each other's wounded bosoms the balm of sisterly consolation.

Mary: Unhappy as the event must be for Lydia,  we must draw from it this useful lesson: that loss of virtue in a female is irretrievable.
Mrs. Gardiner: My dear Mary, this is hardly helpful.
Mary: For a woman's reputation is no less brittle than it is beautiful. Therefore we cannot be too guarded in our behavior towards the undeserving of the other sex.
Elizabeth: Yes... thank you, Mary.


Jane: Lizzy, I feel I am to blame. For it was I who urged you not to make Wickham's bad conduct known, and now poor Lydia is suffering for it.  No one else suspected him for a moment. I am, I am to blame!
Elizabeth: You are not to blame. No more than I, or Mr Darcy or anyone else deceived by Wickham. You have nothing to blame yourself for. Others are culpable, not you.


Jane: I've been thinking about what you said this afternoon. That it is not only Lydia's reputation that has been ruined.
Elizabeth: I was angry and upset. I should not have said it. It does no good to dwell on it.
Jane: You meant, I suppose, that you and I, and Mary and Kitty, have been tainted by association. That our chances of making a good marriage have been materially damaged by Lydia's disgrace.
Elizabeth: The chances of any of us making a good marriage were never very great; and now I should say, they are nonexistent. No one will solicit our society after this. Mr Darcy made that very clear to me.
Jane: Mr Darcy? Does he know our troubles?
Elizabeth: He happened upon me a moment after I first read your letter. He was very kind, very gentlemanlike... but he made it very clear he wanted nothing more than to be out of my sight. He will not be renewing his addresses to me. He'll make very sure his friend doesn't renew his to you.
Jane: I never expected Mr Bingley would renew his addresses, Lizzy. I am quite reconciled to that. And surely you do not desire Mr Darcy's attentions, do you?
Elizabeth: No, no. I never sought them.
Jane: But you do think he was intending to renew them? You think he is still in love with you?
Elizabeth: I don't know. I don't know what he was two days ago. All I know is that now he, or any other respectable man, will want nothing to do with any of us.


Mr. Collins: The death of your sister would have been a blessing in comparison. And it is more to be lamented, because there is reason to suppose, my dear Charlotte informs me, that this licentiousness of behavior in your sister has proceeded from a faulty degree of indulgence, though I am inclined to think that her disposition must be naturally bad. Now, howsoever that may be, you are grievously to be pitied.
Jane: We are very grateful, sir, for your...
Mr. Collins:  In which opinion I am joined by Lady Catherine de Bourgh and her daughter, to whom I have related the affair in full. They agree with me in apprehending that this false step in one sister must be injurious to the fortunes of all the others. "For who," as Lady Catherine herself condescendingly says, "will connect themselves with such a family?"
Elizabeth: Who, indeed, sir.  Now, perhaps, in view of that consideration, you may feel that it would be unwise to stay any longer now.
Mr. Collins: Well, well, perhaps you are right Yes, perhaps you are right, cousin Elizabeth.
Elizabeth: I always feel that a clergyman cannot be too careful. Especially one so fortunate as to enjoy the condescension and patronage of Lady Catherine de Bourgh.
Mr. Collins: Your thoughtfulness does you credit, cousin Elizabeth. I am very, very sorry for you all!


Elizabeth: Insufferable man!
Jane: I suppose he means well.
Elizabeth: Then you suppose wrongly, Jane. His purpose in coming was to enjoy our misfortunes and congratulate himself on his own happy situation!
Mary: I think it kind of him to visit and condole with us.
Kitty: (Peeking around the corner) Is he gone?
Elizabeth: Yes!
Kitty: (Sighs) Good.
Elizabeth: Forever, with any luck.


Jane: I must take mamma her tea.
Mr. Bennet: She still keeps her state above stairs, does she?  Good. It lends such an elegance to our misfortune. Another time I'll do the same.  I'll sit in my library, in my nightcap and powdering gown, and I'll give as much trouble as I can. Perhaps I may defer it, till Kitty runs away.
Kitty: I'm not going to run away, Papa. If I should go to Brighton, I would behave better than Lydia.
Mr. Bennet: You? Go to Brighton? I wouldn't trust you as near it as Eastbourne. Not for fifty pounds. No, Kitty, I have at last learnt to be cautious, and you will feel the effects of it. No officer is ever to enter my house again. Or even to pass through the village! Balls will be absolutely prohibited, unless you stand up with one of your sisters! And you are never to stir out of doors until you can prove you have spent ten minutes of every day in a rational manner.
(Kitty weeps)
Mr. Bennet: Well, well, well, don't make yourself unhappy, my dear. If you're a good girl for the next ten years, I'll take you to a revue at the end of them.


Elizabeth: How can it be possible he will marry her for so little?
Jane: He must not be undeserving as we thought. He must truly be in love with her, I think.
Mr. Bennet: You think that, Jane, if it gives you comfort.


Elizabeth: I wish I had never spoken a word of this whole affair to Mr Darcy.
Jane: Dear Lizzy, please do not distress yourself. I'm sure Mr Darcy will respect your confidence.
Elizabeth: I'm sure he will. That is not what distresses me.
Jane: What, then?
Elizabeth: I don't know! How he must be congratulating himself on his escape! How he must despise me now.
Jane: But Lizzy, you never sought his love. Nor welcomed it when he offered it. If he has withdrawn his high opinion of you, why should you care?
Elizabeth: I don't know! I can't explain it. I know I shall probably never see him again. I cannot bear to think that he is alive in the world... and thinking ill of me.