Date: 1778, 1779

"A confused idea now for the first time entered my head, something I had heard of the rules of assemblies; but I was never at one before,--I have only danced at school,--and so giddy and heedless I was, that I had not once considered the impropriety of refusing one partner, and afterwards accepti...

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I was thunderstruck at the recollection: but, while these thoughts were rushing into my head, Lord Orville, with some warmth, said, 'This lady, Sir, is incapable of meriting such an accusation!'"

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"Some of the songs seemed to melt my very soul."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"Yet I will hope every thing from the unsullied whiteness of your soul, and the native liveliness of your disposition."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"Far be it from me," said Lord Orville, "to dispute the magnetic power of beauty, which irresistibly draws and attracts whatever has soul and sympathy."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"But I am happy to observe, that he seems to have made no impression upon your heart, and therefore a very little care and prudence may secure you from those designs which I fear he has formed."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I must be divested, not merely of a filial piety, but of all humanity, could I ever think upon this subject, and not be wounded to the soul."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I know that, upon first hearing, this plan conveys ideas that must shock you; but I know too, that your mind is superior to being governed by prejudices, or to opposing any important cause on account of a few disagreeable attendant circumstances."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"For, when I observed the artless openness, the ingenuous simplicity of her nature; when I saw that her guileless and innocent soul fancied all the world to be pure and disinterested as herself, and that her heart was open to every impression with which love, pity, or art might assail it."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"My imagination changes the scene perpetually: at one moment, I am embraced by a kind and relenting parent, who takes me to that heart from which I have hitherto been benished, and supplicates, through me, peace and forgiveness from the ashes of my mother!--at another, he regards me with detestat...

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)