达什伍德家族在苏塞克斯定居已久。他们的庄园广袤，宅邸坐落于诺兰庄园，处在地产的中心位置；多少代以来，他们一直体面地生活在这里，赢得了周围相识之人的普遍好评。这座庄园已故的主人是个单身汉，寿数极高；他生命中的许多年，都由妹妹作伴并料理家务。然而，妹妹比他早十年离世，家中便发生了巨大变化；为了弥补这一损失，他邀请并接纳了侄子亨利·达什伍德先生一家住进府中。亨利·达什伍德是诺兰庄园的法定继承人，也是他打算遗赠产业的对象。在侄子、侄媳和他们的孩子们陪伴下，这位老绅士的日子过得舒心安逸。他对这一家人的感情与日俱增。亨利·达什伍德夫妇对他心愿的悉心照料，不单出自利益，更源于心地善良，让他年迈之躯享尽了实实在在的安慰；孩子们欢快活泼，更为他的生活添了几分滋味。
亨利·达什伍德先生前妻生有一子，现任妻子又为他生下三个女儿。那儿子是个稳重体面的青年，母亲留下大笔财产，他成年时继承了其中一半，生计已极宽裕；不久后他自行成婚，又增添了家财。因此，诺兰庄园的继承权对他而言，远不如对几个妹妹那般要紧；因为姐妹们除去父亲继承产业可能带来的收益外，自有财产少得可怜。她们的母亲身无分文，父亲也只能支配七千英镑；前妻遗产的剩余一半已划归她的孩子，他仅有生息享用之权。
老绅士过世了：遗嘱宣读后，像几乎每一份遗嘱那样，喜忧参半，令人失望。他既不曾不公，也不曾忘恩，将产业撇开侄子不传；——却以那样的条件留给他，致使遗赠的价值折去一半。达什伍德先生盼望得到产业，多为妻子女儿着想，而非为自己或儿子；——但产业却以这样的方式传给了他儿子，以及他儿子四岁的孩童，使他无力为最亲爱、最需周济的人做任何安排，既不能抵押庄园，也不能砍伐珍贵的林木变现。全部家业都被冻结，只为那孩子打算。这孩子随父母偶尔来诺兰做客，凭着两三岁孩童惯有的招人疼处——口齿不清、执意任性、狡黠顽皮、喧闹不休——竟博得伯父欢心，压过了多年来侄女与侄女们悉心奉养的分量。不过，他本无薄情之意，为表对三个姑娘的喜爱，每人留了一千英镑。
达什伍德先生起初极为失落；但他生性开朗乐观，尽可指望长寿，只要节俭度日，从本已丰厚、稍加经营便见起色的庄园收益中，积下一笔可观的钱财。然而，这迟来的家业到手仅十二个月，便随他而去；连同近笔遗赠在内，留给寡妻弱女的钱财不过一万英镑。
病情危急的消息一传开，便去请他儿子；达什伍德先生拼尽病中之力，恳切嘱托，要他顾念岳母与妹妹们。
约翰·达什伍德先生不像家中旁人那般情深意重；但此情此景下的这番嘱托，也触动了他，便答应竭尽所能，让她们安适。父亲听此承诺，心下宽慰；约翰·达什伍德这才得空思量，自己究竟能稳妥地替她们做多少。
他并非存心不良的青年，除非把冷淡自私算作不良；但平日里他循规蹈矩，倒也受人敬重。若娶得更为温良的妻室，他本可更受敬重，——甚至自身也能变得可亲；因他成婚极早，又极疼爱妻子。可是约翰·达什伍德太太恰是他性子的夸张写照；——更为狭隘自私。
向父亲许诺时，他暗自盘算，每人赠一千英镑，添补妹妹们的嫁资。那时他真以为自己办得到。除现有进项外，每年再加四千英镑，兼及生母遗产的剩余一半，这前景暖了他的心，自觉竟也慷慨得起。“对，给她们三千英镑：大方又体面！足以让她们全然无忧。三千英镑！省下这笔数目，也不甚为难。”他整日琢磨，连日不绝，也不曾反悔。
父亲丧礼方毕，约翰·达什伍德太太未向婆婆透半点口风，便带着孩子与仆从到了。无人能否认她来的权利；公公一咽气，宅子便是丈夫的；但她举止失礼更显不堪，对达什伍德太太这般心境、稍有常情便觉极不痛快的女子，自是大大不悦；——而达什伍德太太心中，荣誉感何等敏锐，慷慨又何等浪漫，无论何人施与受这等无礼，都令她永生厌弃。约翰·达什伍德太太向来不讨夫家欢喜；但直至今日，才得机会教他们见识，但凡需要，她待人安适可以何等漠然。
达什伍德太太深感受此冷遇，又极鄙薄儿媳所为；后者一到，她本要永离此宅，幸得长女苦劝，先思去留之宜，又念对三个孩子一片慈爱，终决定留下，为她们不与兄长决裂。
这长女埃莉诺，劝谏如此奏效，虽年仅十九，却因见识明达、判断冷静，足堪为母参谋，常能抑止达什伍德太太冒进的性子，惠及全家。她心地极好；——性情柔善，感受敏锐；却懂得克制：这功夫母亲尚待修习，一个妹妹则立誓不学。
玛丽安的才情，多处与埃莉诺不相上下。她明理聪慧；却事事热烈：悲欢皆无节制。她慷慨可爱，惹人怜惜：只少谨慎。她与母亲形似至极。
埃莉诺忧心妹妹过于多感；达什伍德太太却珍视纵容。二人悲苦之中，彼此助长。起初摧心之痛，竟自愿重温，刻意追寻，反复自苦。她们沉溺哀伤，于每缕愁思中觅更多凄楚，决意永不受慰。埃莉诺亦深悲，却能撑持，勉力而行。她与兄长商议，嫂子到来时以礼相待；又勉母亲同样振作，同样容让。
另一妹妹玛格丽特，是个脾气好、心肠善的姑娘；但十三岁的她，已染玛丽安许多浪漫，却少其聪慧，看来年长也难及两位姐姐。
The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. Their estate
was large, and their residence was at Norland Park, in the centre of
their property, where, for many generations, they had lived in so
respectable a manner as to engage the general good opinion of their
surrounding acquaintance. The late owner of this estate was a single
man, who lived to a very advanced age, and who for many years of his
life, had a constant companion and housekeeper in his sister. But her
death, which happened ten years before his own, produced a great
alteration in his home; for to supply her loss, he invited and received
into his house the family of his nephew Mr. Henry Dashwood, the legal
inheritor of the Norland estate, and the person to whom he intended to
bequeath it. In the society of his nephew and niece, and their
children, the old Gentleman’s days were comfortably spent. His
attachment to them all increased. The constant attention of Mr. and
Mrs. Henry Dashwood to his wishes, which proceeded not merely from
interest, but from goodness of heart, gave him every degree of solid
comfort which his age could receive; and the cheerfulness of the
children added a relish to his existence.
By a former marriage, Mr. Henry Dashwood had one son: by his present
lady, three daughters. The son, a steady respectable young man, was
amply provided for by the fortune of his mother, which had been large,
and half of which devolved on him on his coming of age. By his own
marriage, likewise, which happened soon afterwards, he added to his
wealth. To him therefore the succession to the Norland estate was not
so really important as to his sisters; for their fortune, independent
of what might arise to them from their father’s inheriting that
property, could be but small. Their mother had nothing, and their
father only seven thousand pounds in his own disposal; for the
remaining moiety of his first wife’s fortune was also secured to her
child, and he had only a life-interest in it.
The old gentleman died: his will was read, and like almost every other
will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure. He was neither so
unjust, nor so ungrateful, as to leave his estate from his nephew;—but
he left it to him on such terms as destroyed half the value of the
bequest. Mr. Dashwood had wished for it more for the sake of his wife
and daughters than for himself or his son;—but to his son, and his
son’s son, a child of four years old, it was secured, in such a way, as
to leave to himself no power of providing for those who were most dear
to him, and who most needed a provision by any charge on the estate, or
by any sale of its valuable woods. The whole was tied up for the
benefit of this child, who, in occasional visits with his father and
mother at Norland, had so far gained on the affections of his uncle, by
such attractions as are by no means unusual in children of two or three
years old; an imperfect articulation, an earnest desire of having his
own way, many cunning tricks, and a great deal of noise, as to outweigh
all the value of all the attention which, for years, he had received
from his niece and her daughters. He meant not to be unkind, however,
and, as a mark of his affection for the three girls, he left them a
thousand pounds a-piece.
Mr. Dashwood’s disappointment was, at first, severe; but his temper was
cheerful and sanguine; and he might reasonably hope to live many years,
and by living economically, lay by a considerable sum from the produce
of an estate already large, and capable of almost immediate
improvement. But the fortune, which had been so tardy in coming, was
his only one twelvemonth. He survived his uncle no longer; and ten
thousand pounds, including the late legacies, was all that remained for
his widow and daughters.
His son was sent for as soon as his danger was known, and to him Mr.
Dashwood recommended, with all the strength and urgency which illness
could command, the interest of his mother-in-law and sisters.
Mr. John Dashwood had not the strong feelings of the rest of the
family; but he was affected by a recommendation of such a nature at
such a time, and he promised to do every thing in his power to make
them comfortable. His father was rendered easy by such an assurance,
and Mr. John Dashwood had then leisure to consider how much there might
prudently be in his power to do for them.
He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather cold hearted
and rather selfish is to be ill-disposed: but he was, in general, well
respected; for he conducted himself with propriety in the discharge of
his ordinary duties. Had he married a more amiable woman, he might have
been made still more respectable than he was:—he might even have been
made amiable himself; for he was very young when he married, and very
fond of his wife. But Mrs. John Dashwood was a strong caricature of
himself;—more narrow-minded and selfish.
When he gave his promise to his father, he meditated within himself to
increase the fortunes of his sisters by the present of a thousand
pounds a-piece. He then really thought himself equal to it. The
prospect of four thousand a-year, in addition to his present income,
besides the remaining half of his own mother’s fortune, warmed his
heart, and made him feel capable of generosity. “Yes, he would give
them three thousand pounds: it would be liberal and handsome! It would
be enough to make them completely easy. Three thousand pounds! he could
spare so considerable a sum with little inconvenience.” He thought of
it all day long, and for many days successively, and he did not repent.
No sooner was his father’s funeral over, than Mrs. John Dashwood,
without sending any notice of her intention to her mother-in-law,
arrived with her child and their attendants. No one could dispute her
right to come; the house was her husband’s from the moment of his
father’s decease; but the indelicacy of her conduct was so much the
greater, and to a woman in Mrs. Dashwood’s situation, with only common
feelings, must have been highly unpleasing;—but in _her_ mind there was
a sense of honor so keen, a generosity so romantic, that any offence of
the kind, by whomsoever given or received, was to her a source of
immovable disgust. Mrs. John Dashwood had never been a favourite with
any of her husband’s family; but she had had no opportunity, till the
present, of showing them with how little attention to the comfort of
other people she could act when occasion required it.
So acutely did Mrs. Dashwood feel this ungracious behaviour, and so
earnestly did she despise her daughter-in-law for it, that, on the
arrival of the latter, she would have quitted the house for ever, had
not the entreaty of her eldest girl induced her first to reflect on the
propriety of going, and her own tender love for all her three children
determined her afterwards to stay, and for their sakes avoid a breach
with their brother.
Elinor, this eldest daughter, whose advice was so effectual, possessed
a strength of understanding, and coolness of judgment, which qualified
her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her mother, and
enabled her frequently to counteract, to the advantage of them all,
that eagerness of mind in Mrs. Dashwood which must generally have led
to imprudence. She had an excellent heart;—her disposition was
affectionate, and her feelings were strong; but she knew how to govern
them: it was a knowledge which her mother had yet to learn; and which
one of her sisters had resolved never to be taught.
Marianne’s abilities were, in many respects, quite equal to Elinor’s.
She was sensible and clever; but eager in everything: her sorrows, her
joys, could have no moderation. She was generous, amiable, interesting:
she was everything but prudent. The resemblance between her and her
mother was strikingly great.
Elinor saw, with concern, the excess of her sister’s sensibility; but
by Mrs. Dashwood it was valued and cherished. They encouraged each
other now in the violence of their affliction. The agony of grief which
overpowered them at first, was voluntarily renewed, was sought for, was
created again and again. They gave themselves up wholly to their
sorrow, seeking increase of wretchedness in every reflection that could
afford it, and resolved against ever admitting consolation in future.
Elinor, too, was deeply afflicted; but still she could struggle, she
could exert herself. She could consult with her brother, could receive
her sister-in-law on her arrival, and treat her with proper attention;
and could strive to rouse her mother to similar exertion, and encourage
her to similar forbearance.
Margaret, the other sister, was a good-humored, well-disposed girl; but
as she had already imbibed a good deal of Marianne’s romance, without
having much of her sense, she did not, at thirteen, bid fair to equal
her sisters at a more advanced period of life.
