Jo knew nothing about philosophy or metaphysics of any sort, but a curious excitement, half pleasurable, half painful, came over her, as she listened with a sense of being turned adrift into time and space, like a young balloon out on a holiday.
A very precious and lovely part, but not all,” continued Rose. “Neither should it be for a woman: for we’ve got minds and souls as well as hearts; ambition and talents as well as beauty and accomplishments; and we want to live and learn as well as love and be loved. I’m sick of being told that is all a woman is fit for! I won’t have anything to do with love till I prove that I am something besides a housekeeper and baby-tender!
That engagement was such a farce, that she never had much faith in it, so she put her love way in a corner of her heart, and tried to forget it, hoping it would either die, or have a right to live... Polly had a pang, and thought she couldn’t possibly bear it. But she always found she could, and so came to the conclusion that it was a merciful provision of nature that girls’ hearts could stand so much, and their appetites continue good, when unrequited love was starving.
I want my daughters to be beautiful, accomplished, and good; to be admired, loved, and respected, to have a happy youth, to be well and wisely married, and to lead useful, pleasant lives, with as little care and sorrow to try them as God sees fit to send. To be loved and chosen by a good man is the best and sweetest thing which can happen to a woman; and I sincerely hope my girls may know this beautiful experience.
I want to tell; but some things even you couldn’t forgive; and if you let go of me, I’m afraid I can’t keep afloat.′ ‘Mothers can forgive anything!
If Marmee shook her fist instead of kissing her hand to us, it would serve us right, for more ungrateful wretches than we are were never seen,” cried Jo, taking a remorseful satisfaction in the snowy walk and bitter wind.
Because they are mean is no reason why I should be. I hate such things, and though I think I’ve a right to be hurt, I don’t intend to show it. They will feel that more than angry speeches or huffy actions, won’t they, Marmee?
While we wait we may all work, so that these hard days need not be wasted.
She doesn’t look like my Beth, and there’s nobody to help us bear it. Mother and father both gone, and God seems so far away I can’t find Him.
I beg your pardon for being so rude, but sometimes you forget to put down the curtain at the window where the flowers are. And when the lamps are lighted, it’s like looking at a picture to see the fire, and you all around the table with your mother. Her face is right opposite, and it looks so sweet behind the flowers, I can’t help watching it. I haven’t got any mother, you know.
Kate looked surprised, but said nothing and stood looking at the fire as if turning the matter over in her mind and trying to answer the question she was too polite to ask – how could they have a grandmother and know so little about her?
For these foolish, affectionate people made a jubilee of every little household joy.
I seldom ask questions of men, as they are not fond of gossip.
We’ll never draw that curtain any more, and I give you leave to look as much as you like. I just wish, though, instead of peeping, you’d come over and see us.
At the Kings’ she daily saw all she wanted, for the children’s older sisters were just out, and Meg caught frequent glimpses of dainty ball dresses and bouquets, heard lively gossip about theaters, concerts, sleighing parties, and merrymakings of all kinds, and saw money lavished on trifles which would have been so precious to her. Poor.
That’s just why, because talent isn’t genius, and no amount of energy can make it so. I want to be great, or nothing. I won’t be a common-place dauber, so I don’t intend to try any more.
I was wondering how you and Amy get on together.
My lady,” as her friends called her, sincerely desired to be a genuine lady, and was so at heart, but had yet to learn that money cannot buy refinement of nature, that rank does not always confer nobility, and that true breeding makes itself felt in spite of external drawbacks.
Amy, though the youngest, was a most important person, in her own opinion at least.
Wealth is certainly a most desirable thing, but poverty has its sunny side, and one of the sweet uses of adversity is the genuine satisfaction which comes from hearty work of head or hand, and to the inspiration of necessity, we owe half the wise, beautiful, and useful blessings of the world. Jo enjoyed a taste of this satisfaction, and ceased to envy richer girls, taking great comfort in the knowledge that she could supply her own wants, and need ask no one for a penny.