All my heart is yours, sir: it belongs to you; and with you it would remain, were fate to exile the rest of me from your presence forever.
Jane Eyre "I desired more...than was within my reach. Who blames me? Many call me discontented. I couldn't help it: the restlessness is in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects a longing for more than what is attainable and expresses an intrinsic restlessness in human nature.
In this quote from Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte captures the essence of human desire and discontent. The speaker acknowledges a profound yearning for more than what is currently available to them, suggesting that this feeling of restlessness is an inherent part of their character. Despite being labeled as discontented by others, the speaker feels that their desire for greater fulfillment is not something they can control, highlighting the struggle between aspirations and reality that many individuals face.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about personal growth, this quote could emphasize the importance of striving for more.
More from Charlotte Bronte
All quotes →Rochester: "I am no better than the old lightning-struck chestnut-tree in Thornfield orchard…And what right would that ruin have to bid a budding woodbine cover its decay with freshness?" Jane: "You are no ruin sir - no lighting-struck tree: you are green and vigorous. Plants will grow about your roots, whether you ask them or not, because they take delight in your bountiful shadow; and as they grow they will lean towards you, and wind round you, because your strength offers them so safe a prop.
I like to see flowers growing, but when they are gathered, they cease to please. I look on them as things rootless and perishable; their likeness to life makes me sad. I never offer flowers to those I love; I never wish to receive them from hands dear to me.
Peril, loneliness, an uncertain future, are not oppressive evils, so long as the frame is healthy and the faculties are employed; so long, especially, as Liberty lends us her wings, and Hope guides us by her star.
For a long time the fear of seeming singular scared me away; but by degrees, as people became accustomed to me and my habits, and to such shadows of peculiarity as were engrained in my nature - shades, certainly not striking enough to interest, and perhaps not prominent enough to offend, but born in and with me, and no more to be parted with than my identity - but slow degrees I became a frequenter of this straight narrow path.
But where are you going to, Helen? Can you see? Do you know?-I believe; I have faith: I am going to God.-Where is God? What is God?-My maker and yours, who will never destroy what He created. I rely implicitly on His power, and confide wholly in His goodness: I count the hours till that eventful one arrives which shall restore me to Him, reveal Him to me.
Similar quotes
In Gethsemane the holiest of all petitioners prayed three times that a certain cup might pass from Him. It did not.
We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edges of print. It gave us more freedom. We lived in the gaps between the stories.
I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.
Enjoy the elastic present, which can accommodate as little or as much as you want to put in there. Stretch it out, live inside of it.
Whatever you may be sure of, be sure of this, that you are dreadfully like other people.
To philosophize with open eyes is to philosophize in the dark. Only the blind can look straight at the sun.