Quote of the Week- Week 55

This weeks quote is from the wonderful Mansfield Park.

"Oh! I know nothing of your furlongs, but I am sure it is a very long wood, and that we have been winding in and out ever since we came into it; and therefore, when I say that we have walked a mile in it, I must speak within compass."

"We have been exactly a quarter of an hour here," said Edmund, taking out his watch. "Do you think we are walking four miles an hour?"

"Oh! do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch."

A few steps farther brought them out at the bottom of the very walk they had been talking of; and standing back, well shaded and sheltered, and looking over a ha-ha into the park, was a comfortable-sized bench, on which they all sat down.

This is taken from chapter 9 of the novel and is spoken by Mary Crawford (this antagonist gets all the best lines!) Mary Crawford, Fanny Price and Edmund Bertram are taking a walk in the wood and Mary and Edmund are debating the distance in which they have walked.

Mary is a very skeptical character and I think that there is some depth to this line (in bold). I might be completely wrong in my stance so please do correct me if you think I am.

I think that Jane Austen has some very philosophical thinking and is highly aware of not only the people, but the society and philosophy of her time. I think that we can see examples of this in her novels, i.e. my chosen quote of the week. I think that this line is questioning the concept of truth and certainty; highly philosophical principles. I love it.

I would really like to explore more of her lines to analyse them and wonder whether she sometimes did have a philosophical purpose when she was writing........

Pic 1: Mary, Edmund and Fanny, taken from the Austen Prose Site