could she think, without feeling that she had been blind, partial,

prejudiced, absurd.
“How despicably have I acted!” she cried. “I, who have prided myself on

my discernment! I, who have valued myself on my abilities! who have

often disdained the generous candour of my sister, and gratified my

vanity in useless or blameless distrust. How humiliating is this

discovery! Yet, how just a humiliation! Had I been in love, I could not

have been more wretchedly blind. But vanity, not love, has been my

folly. Pleased with the preference of one, and offended by the neglect

of the other, on the very beginning of our acquaintance, I have courted

prepossession and ignorance, and driven reason away where either were

concerned. Till this moment, I never knew myself.”
From herself to Jane, from Jane to Bingley, her thoughts were in a line

which soon brought to her recollection that Mr. Darcy’s explanation

there had appeared very insufficient; and she read it again. Widely

different was the effect of a second perusal. How could she deny that

credit to his assertions, in one instance, which she had been obliged to

give in the other? He declared himself to have been totally unsuspicious

of her sister’s attachment; and she could not help remembering what

Charlotte’s opinion had always been. Neither could she deny the justice

of his description of Jane. She felt that Jane’s feelings, though

fervent, were little displayed, and that there was a constant

complacency in her air and manner, not often united with great

sensibility.
When she came to that part of the letter in which her family were

mentioned, in tones of such mortifying, yet merited, reproach, her sense

of shame was severe. The{260} justice of the charge struck her too forcibly

for denial; and the circumstances to which he particularly alluded, as

having passed at the Netherfield ball, and as confirming all his first

disapprobation, could not have made a stronger impression on his mind