sea

“In all we do, and hear, and see,
Is restless Toil and Vanity.
While yet the rolling earth abides,
Men come and go like ocean tides”
― Anne Brontë, Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell

“I wished to tell the truth, for truth always conveys its own moral to those who are able to receive it. But as the priceless treasure too frequently hides at the bottom of a well, it needs some courage to dive for it, especially as he that does so will be likely to incur more scorn and obloquy for the mud and water into which he has ventured to plunge, than thanks for the jewel he procures...”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“Already, I seemed to feel my intellect deteriorating, my heart petrifying, my soul contracting; and I
trembled lest my very moral perceptions should become deadened, my distinctions of right and wrong confounded, and all my better faculties be sunk, at last, beneath the baneful influence of such a mode of life. The gross vapors of earth were gathering around me, and closing in upon my inward heaven; and thus it was that Mr. Weston rose at length upon me, appearing like the morning star in my horizon, to save me from the fear of utter darkness; and I rejoiced that I now had a subject for contemplation that was above me, not beneath.”
― Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey

“I hate talking where there is no exchange of ideas or sentiments, and no good given or received”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall