Print at 100% scale on letter paper, with no added margins.
Pride and Prejudice
Mountaineers · 10th–12th
Elizabeth says to remember the past only as it gives pleasure, but Darcy says painful memories ought not to be pushed away. Which of them is wiser about the past?
The tension Elizabeth offers a cheerful rule, "Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure"; Darcy refuses it: "Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot, which ought not to be repelled."
Notice how Elizabeth’s thanks for Lydia’s rescue open the way to Darcy’s second offer, and how Lady Catherine’s interference worked the opposite of what she intended.
A few days after Lady Catherine’s visit, Bingley brings Darcy to Longbourn and, wanting to be alone with Jane, proposes a walk before Mrs. Bennet can mention the aunt. Mrs. Bennet and Mary stay at home; Bingley and Jane fall behind; Kitty, too afraid of Darcy to talk, leaves to call on Maria Lucas, and Elizabeth goes on alone with him. Acting on a resolution she has been forming, she thanks him for his kindness to Lydia, which Lydia’s thoughtlessness first betrayed to her. He is sorry she was told, and answers that her family owe him nothing, since he thought only of her. If her feelings are what they were last April, she should say so at once; his are unchanged, and one word will silence him for ever. She tells him, not very fluently, that her feelings have changed so much that she receives his assurances with gratitude and pleasure, and he expresses his happiness as warmly as a man violently in love can. Walking on without noticing where, she learns that Lady Catherine called on him in London and repeated Elizabeth’s words to win his promise, but that they taught him to hope: had she been irrevocably decided against him, she would have said so frankly. They dispute the blame for the evening of the first proposal. He calls his behaviour unpardonable and says her words about a more gentlemanlike manner have tortured him; she says neither behaved irreproachably, begs him not to repeat what she said, and owns she has long been ashamed of it. He asks about his letter; she explains how gradually it removed her prejudices. He hopes she has destroyed it, fearing its bitter opening; she says its end was charity itself and offers her philosophy, to think only of the past as it gives pleasure. He refuses it: her memories are free of reproach, his are not, and painful recollections ought not to be pushed away. He tells how he was given good principles but left to follow them in pride and conceit, spoiled at home into selfishness until she humbled him; in April he had come to her sure of being accepted. She owns that her manners may have misled him. He says his anger soon took a proper direction, that at Pemberley he meant to show her that her reproofs had been attended to, and that before he left the inn he had resolved to follow her from Derbyshire in search of her sister. After several miles they turn for home and talk of Jane and Bingley. Darcy had confessed to his friend that his interference was absurd, told him he believed Jane cared for him, and admitted that he had known of her three months in town and kept it from him; Bingley was angry, but has forgiven him. Elizabeth smiles at his easy manner of directing his friend and longs to joke that Bingley was so easily guided, but checks herself, because Darcy has yet to learn to be laughed at. In the hall they part.
Begin with the two rules. Read aloud Elizabeth’s “Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure” and Darcy’s reply, from “I cannot give you credit” to “ought not to be repelled.” Ask the student which rule they would rather live by, and leave the answer open. Then go back to the start of the walk and read the chapter with both rules in mind. Leave which of them is wiser for the last written question.
Retell The student retells the chapter in order: Bingley brings Darcy and proposes a walk; five set out, Bingley and Jane lag behind, and Kitty leaves for the Lucases’; Elizabeth’s “desperate resolution” and her thanks for his kindness to Lydia; his answer that her family “owe me nothing” and his second offer; her answer, told only by the narrator; Lady Catherine’s report, which “taught me to hope”; the quarrel over the greater share of blame, and the words “gentlemanlike manner”; the letter, and Elizabeth’s “philosophy”; Darcy’s refusal of it and his account of his upbringing; Pemberley, Georgiana and his resolve at the inn; Bingley and Jane, and Darcy’s confession to his friend; the joke Elizabeth keeps back; and the parting in the hall. Then the student picks the one sentence the whole chapter turns on and says why.
Imitate the author After copying, the student writes two short pieces in Darcy’s manner about a mistake of their own, or one they imagine, now some months in the past. First, a short refusal of comfort, then one long sentence whose subject is held open by a list that grows (“of my … my … my …”) and whose verb is stretched by a correction (“is now, and has been …”) before it lands on how the memory feels. Then four sentences answering a friend who has offered an easy rule for forgetting: one that turns the friend’s own word back on them; one that sets “your” against “my” and breaks an antithesis with a short aside; a short one that turns to the self; and one that corrects itself in mid-flight, as “which cannot, which ought not” does.
Debate Take sides on the last written question. One side argues for Elizabeth’s rule, and gathers “The feelings of the person who wrote and the person who received it are now so widely different,” “The adieu is charity itself,” and the moment when Lydia’s rescue is “too painful a subject to each to be dwelt on farther.” The other side argues for Darcy’s, and gathers “Painful recollections will intrude,” the reproof that “tortured” him until he allowed its justice, and Elizabeth’s own “I have long been most heartily ashamed of it.” Each side must answer the other’s strongest line. No side may give the book’s final verdict, say that Elizabeth has nothing to regret, say that either of them is wholly changed, or say how the family at Longbourn will take the news.
Purpose Close on the last paragraph. The long walk ends on a joke Elizabeth does not make and five short words: “In the hall they parted.” Ask the student why Austen ends the reckoning there, with a laugh saved for later, and not on a vow.
Easier Read aloud Elizabeth’s thanks and Darcy’s answer, from “Mr. Darcy, I am a very selfish creature” to “silence me on this subject for ever”; the exchange from “The letter, perhaps, began in bitterness” to “ought not to be repelled”; and the last paragraph. Talk about what “contrariwise,” “abhorrence,” “inexpressibly,” “retrospections” and “diffidence” mean in the chapter. Talk through the questions on Elizabeth’s “very selfish creature” and on the joke she keeps back, then answer the last written question aloud before writing it.
On level Talk through all four discussion questions in order, then write all three written questions as a thesis, the strongest objection and a revised thesis, each with lines from the chapter.
Harder Ask for one argued essay that follows how the walk keeps turning from present joy back to old wrongs: the thanks, the April evening, the letter, Pemberley and Bingley. The student judges whether the chapter presents the lovers’ happiness as the fruit of that reckoning or as something apart from it, and meets the strongest objection. It must not draw on anything that happens later in the book.
1. Before she thanks him, Elizabeth calls herself “a very selfish creature.” What is selfish about saying thank you?Inference
What it asks It asks the student to take Elizabeth’s word for herself seriously, or to see through it. On the walk “Very little was said by either; Kitty was too much afraid of him to talk; Elizabeth was secretly forming a desperate resolution; and, perhaps, he might be doing the same.” When Kitty leaves them: “Now was the moment for her resolution to be executed; and while her courage was high, she immediately said,” and her first words are “Mr. Darcy, I am a very selfish creature, and for the sake of giving relief to my own feelings care not how much I may be wounding yours.” Darcy is “sorry, exceedingly sorry” that she was ever told, and blames Mrs. Gardiner. She thanks him again “in the name of all my family”; he answers that her family “owe me nothing,” that he “thought only of _you_,” and then asks whether her feelings “are still what they were last April.” The chapter never says what Elizabeth hoped the thanks would lead to, and the card does not settle it. Later in the walk Darcy uses the same word of himself: “I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle.”
Truly selfish, because the thanks break his secret. Darcy did the kindness so that it would not be known, and Elizabeth knows it: she cares “not how much I may be wounding yours.” To thank him is to tell him she has found out what he hid, and to risk his pain and his pride for her own relief. His first answer shows the risk was real: he is “sorry, exceedingly sorry,” and he blames her aunt. On this reading the word is honest: she knows her relief comes at his cost, and she speaks anyway.
Mr. Darcy, I am a very selfish creature, and for the sake of giving relief to my own feelings care not how much I may be wounding yours.
I did not think Mrs. Gardiner was so little to be trusted.
Hardly selfish at all; the word is a nervous way in. A woman who refused him in April cannot speak of a kindness done to her sister without raising the question of why he did it. The narrator sets her resolution beside his (“and, perhaps, he might be doing the same”), and within a few speeches he has answered that he “thought only of _you_” and asked whether her feelings have changed. On this reading she calls herself selfish to excuse her boldness in opening a subject closed since April, and the real risk is not his pain but what he will say.
Elizabeth was secretly forming a desperate resolution; and, perhaps, he might be doing the same.
Much as I respect them, I believe I thought only of you.
A strong answer A strong response decides whether the word is earned and grounds the choice in how she begins. One reader takes her at her word: she knows her relief may cost him pain, since he did the kindness in secret, and his “sorry, exceedingly sorry” shows that it does. Another hears a nervous way in: thanks for a kindness done for her sake invite him to say why he did it, and the word excuses her for opening a subject closed since April. The best answers notice that the narrator calls her resolution “desperate,” gives Darcy one too, and names neither.
2. We hear Darcy ask in his own words, but the narrator only reports Elizabeth’s yes. What would be lost if Austen had let her say it herself?Author's choice
What it asks It asks the student to imagine the proposal told another way, and to say what that way would cost. Darcy speaks for himself: “You are too generous to trifle with me. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. _My_ affections and wishes are unchanged; but one word from you will silence me on this subject for ever.” Elizabeth’s answer comes only in report: she “now forced herself to speak; and immediately, though not very fluently, gave him to understand that her sentiments had undergone so material a change since the period to which he alluded, as to make her receive with gratitude and pleasure his present assurances.” His joy is reported too: he “expressed himself on the occasion as sensibly and as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to do.” Elizabeth cannot meet his eyes, “but though she could not look she could listen.” Then: “There was too much to be thought, and felt, and said, for attention to any other objects,” and most of what follows, given in their own words, is talk about the past.
Her privacy, and the narrator’s smile. Elizabeth speaks “not very fluently,” and a quoted stammer would make the moment awkward. The narrator turns it into one long, formal sentence, and does the same for Darcy, who speaks “as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to do,” a phrase with a dry smile in it. On this reading a quoted yes would lose the lovers’ rawest words, kept private, and the narrator’s fond, amused distance.
though not very fluently
as sensibly and as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to do.
The chapter’s balance. The yes takes one sentence, and even that sentence is about the past: her feelings have changed “since the period to which he alluded.” What we hear in full is the long reckoning that follows: the first proposal, the letter, Pemberley. In her own words the yes would become the high point, and the walk after it an afterword. On this reading what would be lost is the weight that falls on the scene where they work out how they came to be wrong.
her sentiments had undergone so material a change since the period to which he alluded
There was too much to be thought, and felt, and said, for attention to any other objects.
A strong answer A strong response names what a quoted yes would cost and grounds it in the passage. One reader would lose tact and comedy: Elizabeth says yes “not very fluently,” and the narrator spares her the stammer while smiling at both lovers. Another would lose the chapter’s balance: the yes is over in a sentence, put as a change since April, so that the lovers’ own voices are saved for the reckoning with the past. The best answers notice that Darcy’s joy is reported too, so Austen holds back both of them just where a reader most expects to hear them.
3. Darcy hopes Elizabeth has destroyed his letter, but he says he will never forget her words to him in April. Why get rid of his own hard words and keep hers?Character
What it asks It asks the student to set two of Darcy’s wishes side by side: his own bitter words gone, hers kept. Of the April evening he says: “The recollection of what I then said, of my conduct, my manners, my expressions during the whole of it, is now, and has been many months, inexpressibly painful to me,” and he quotes her reproof word for word: “Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget.” Of the letter he says: “I hope you have destroyed the letter. There was one part, especially the opening of it, which I should dread your having the power of reading again. I can remember some expressions which might justly make you hate me.” Elizabeth answers: “The letter shall certainly be burnt, if you believe it essential to the preservation of my regard; but, though we have both reason to think my opinions not entirely unalterable, they are not, I hope, quite so easily changed as that implies.” He adds that it was written “in a dreadful bitterness of spirit”; she replies that “The adieu is charity itself.” The chapter does not say whether the letter is burnt.
Because the letter can hurt her, and the memory hurts only him. What he dreads is “your having the power of reading again” its bitter opening. His own recollections torture him, but that pain does him good: it keeps him honest about who he was. On this reading Darcy is consistent. He will carry his own shame, but he will not leave in her hands a page that can wound her again.
There was one part, especially the opening of it, which I should dread your having the power of reading again.
Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget
Because the letter is a past she could judge him by. The memory of April is his to manage; the letter is in her keeping, and he fears its “expressions which might justly make you hate me.” Elizabeth hears this and gently teases him: her regard is not “so easily changed as that implies.” On this reading the wish to destroy the letter is a lover’s fear of her judgment, and it sits a little oddly beside his refusal to let painful things go.
I can remember some expressions which might justly make you hate me.
they are not, I hope, quite so easily changed as that implies.
A strong answer A strong response finds a difference between the two pasts and grounds it in Darcy’s words. One reader finds him consistent: the memory pains only him and keeps him honest, while the letter could hurt her again. Another finds a lover’s fear: the letter is evidence she could judge him by, and her own reply teases him for doubting her. The best answers notice that Elizabeth agrees to burn it only “if you believe it essential,” and that the chapter never says whether she does.
4. Elizabeth once said harsh things to Darcy’s face, yet now she keeps a joke about Bingley to herself. Has she changed, or is she only waiting for a better time?Character
What it asks It asks the student to decide what the chapter’s last turn shows: a lesson learned, or the old wit kept for later. Early in the walk Elizabeth laughs at her own past: “After abusing you so abominably to your face, I could have no scruple in abusing you to all your relations.” Near the end Darcy tells how he confessed to Bingley: “I told him of all that had occurred to make my former interference in his affairs absurd and impertinent,” and how “his reliance on mine made everything easy.” Elizabeth has already teased him once: “That is to say, you had given your permission. I guessed as much,” and she “could not help smiling at his easy manner of directing his friend.” Then: “Elizabeth longed to observe that Mr. Bingley had been a most delightful friend; so easily guided that his worth was invaluable; but she checked herself. She remembered that he had yet to learn to be laughed at, and it was rather too early to begin.” A few lines later, “In the hall they parted.” The card does not say that Elizabeth, or Darcy, is wholly changed.
Changed, a little. The joke would land on Darcy as much as on Bingley, since Darcy did the guiding, and she sees that a man whom her words have “tortured” for months is not ready for more. She once abused him “so abominably to your face,” and she admits that her “spirits might often lead me wrong.” Now she checks them. On this reading the silence is a small, new kindness.
She remembered that he had yet to learn to be laughed at, and it was rather too early to begin.
my spirits might often lead me wrong.
Only waiting. She is still Elizabeth. She thinks the joke in full, and its sting is aimed at Darcy’s “easy manner of directing his friend,” the very habit he has just confessed. It is only “rather too early to begin”: she means to teach him to be laughed at, just not yet. On this reading the moment is comedy, and her wit has come through the engagement whole, kept for later.
so easily guided that his worth was invaluable
Elizabeth could not help smiling at his easy manner of directing his friend.
A strong answer A strong response decides whether the silence shows change or only waiting, and grounds the choice in the last paragraph. One reader sees restraint newly learned: the joke would hit Darcy’s guiding of his friend, and she spares a man still raw from her old words. Another sees the old Elizabeth, wit intact: she thinks the joke in full, and “too early to begin” promises that she will begin. The best answers notice that both can be true, and that a long walk spent on old wrongs ends on a laugh saved for later, not on a vow.
1. Darcy will not let Elizabeth share the blame for that evening in April. How much pride is left in a man who insists the fault was mostly his?
What it asks It asks the student to weigh Darcy’s self-blame for what it shows of him. He asks: “What did you say of me that I did not deserve? For though your accusations were ill-founded, formed on mistaken premises, my behaviour to you at the time had merited the severest reproof. It was unpardonable. I cannot think of it without abhorrence.” “We will not quarrel for the greater share of blame annexed to that evening,” said Elizabeth. “The conduct of neither, if strictly examined, will be irreproachable; but since then we have both, I hope, improved in civility.” Darcy: “I cannot be so easily reconciled to myself.” When she begs, “Oh, do not repeat what I then said,” she adds, “I assure you that I have long been most heartily ashamed of it.” Later he tells her: “_Your_ retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of ignorance,” and gives his history: “I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit,” and “Such I was, from eight to eight-and-twenty.” He confesses: “I came to you without a doubt of my reception,” and “What will you think of my vanity? I believed you to be wishing, expecting my addresses.” The card does not say that either of them is wholly changed, or that Elizabeth has nothing to regret.
Very little. Darcy names his faults plainly (“unpardonable,” “abhorrence,” “selfish and overbearing”) and owns a vanity that costs him to confess. He grants that her charges were “ill-founded” and still says he deserved them. A proud man defends himself on the facts; Darcy gives up the facts and keeps the blame. On this reading his refusal of an even share is humility, the kind that will not take an easy peace it has not earned.
What did you say of me that I did not deserve?
What will you think of my vanity? I believed you to be wishing, expecting my addresses.
More than he knows. Elizabeth offers a fair verdict, “The conduct of neither, if strictly examined, will be irreproachable,” and Darcy overrules it, as sure of himself as when he came to her in April “without a doubt of my reception.” He tells her that her memories are “void of reproach,” though she has already said she is “most heartily ashamed.” His long account of himself puts him at the centre of a whole life, “from eight to eight-and-twenty.” On this reading even his self-blame keeps him in charge of the story, and her share is waved away.
I cannot be so easily reconciled to myself.
Your retrospections must be so totally void of reproach
A strong answer A strong response might argue that Darcy’s self-blame is real humility: he grants that her charges were “ill-founded” and still says he deserved the reproof, and he confesses a vanity no proud man would want to admit. Key evidence to consider includes “It was unpardonable” and “I believed you to be wishing, expecting my addresses.” The strongest objection is that he overrules Elizabeth’s even-handed verdict and tells her that her memories are “void of reproach” when she has already said she is ashamed. A revised thesis might hold that his humility is real but still masterful: he takes the blame as confidently as he once expected her yes, and leaves her little room to own her part.
2. “By you, I was properly humbled,” Darcy tells Elizabeth. Who did the humbling?
What it asks It asks the student to decide where the change in Darcy came from. He says: “Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget: ‘Had you behaved in a more gentlemanlike manner.’ Those were your words. You know not, you can scarcely conceive, how they have tortured me; though it was some time, I confess, before I was reasonable enough to allow their justice.” Elizabeth: “I was certainly very far from expecting them to make so strong an impression.” Later: “such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled.” Asked whether he hated her, he says: “I was angry, perhaps, at first, but my anger soon began to take a proper direction.” At Pemberley he hoped to lessen her ill opinion “by letting you see that your reproofs had been attended to.” The letter worked on her in turn: “I knew,” said he, “that what I wrote must give you pain, but it was necessary,” and she tells him “how gradually all her former prejudices had been removed.” The card does not say that either of them is wholly changed.
Elizabeth did. Her words are the cause he names, and he can still quote them exactly. She meant them as a refusal, not a lesson, and was “very far from expecting them to make so strong an impression,” but they did the work. His upbringing, by his own account, never corrected his temper; her reproof did. Without it, he says, he “might still have been” the man of “eight to eight-and-twenty.” On this reading he gives the credit where it belongs.
Those were your words.
such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth!
Darcy did, with her words as the occasion. The reproof alone changed nothing at first: “it was some time” before he was “reasonable enough to allow their justice,” and his anger had to “take a proper direction” before it did him good. Her charges, he admits, were “ill-founded”; the change came from what he chose to make of them. The same happened to her: his letter, which he knew “must give you pain,” removed her prejudices only “gradually.” On this reading each was humbled by the other’s hard words, but the humbling was each one’s own work.
but my anger soon began to take a proper direction.
how gradually all her former prejudices had been removed.
A strong answer A strong response might argue that Elizabeth did the humbling: Darcy names her reproof as the cause, quotes it word for word, and says that without her he might still be the man of “eight to eight-and-twenty.” Key evidence to consider includes “such I might still have been but for you.” The strongest objection is that her words worked only once he was “reasonable enough to allow their justice,” after his anger had turned in “a proper direction,” and that his letter did the same slow work on her. A revised thesis might hold that each gave the other a hard truth, and each had to do the humbling alone.
3. Elizabeth says to remember the past only as it gives pleasure, but Darcy says painful memories ought not to be pushed away. Which of them is wiser about the past?
What it asks It asks the whole question of the chapter. Elizabeth, on the letter: “The letter, perhaps, began in bitterness, but it did not end so. The adieu is charity itself. But think no more of the letter. The feelings of the person who wrote and the person who received it are now so widely different from what they were then, that every unpleasant circumstance attending it ought to be forgotten. You must learn some of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.” Darcy: “I cannot give you credit for any philosophy of the kind. _Your_ retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of ignorance. But with _me_, it is not so. Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot, which ought not to be repelled.” Earlier, of her own words in April, Elizabeth begged: “Oh, do not repeat what I then said. These recollections will not do at all. I assure you that I have long been most heartily ashamed of it.” Darcy has kept her reproof: “Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget,” though “it was some time, I confess, before I was reasonable enough to allow their justice.” Of Lydia’s rescue: “She expressed her gratitude again, but it was too painful a subject to each to be dwelt on farther.” The card does not give the book’s final verdict, say that Elizabeth has nothing to regret, or say that either of them is wholly changed.
Elizabeth. Her rule is not forgetfulness but a kind of mercy: the people who wrote and read the letter “are now so widely different from what they were then” that dwelling on it helps no one. Darcy has already learned what the painful memory had to teach; to keep reopening it is to stay the man of April. She practises her rule with a light hand, reading the letter’s end as “charity itself.” And at the one subject too painful for either, Lydia, both of them let it drop. On this reading hers is the wiser rule for two people starting over.
The feelings of the person who wrote and the person who received it are now so widely different from what they were then
it was too painful a subject to each to be dwelt on farther.
Darcy. Painful memory is what changed him: her words “tortured” him until he was “reasonable enough to allow their justice.” A rule of remembering only the pleasant would have left him in “pride and conceit.” Nor does Elizabeth live by her rule: she has “long been most heartily ashamed,” and she begs him, “do not repeat what I then said.” On this reading her rule is a kindness to him in the moment, but his is the truth about how people change, and his charge that her calm comes “of ignorance” is praise with an edge.
Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot, which ought not to be repelled.
I assure you that I have long been most heartily ashamed of it.
A strong answer A strong response might argue that Darcy is wiser: the painful memory of her reproof is what changed him, and a rule of remembering only the pleasant would have spared him the lesson. Key evidence to consider includes “Painful recollections will intrude, which cannot, which ought not to be repelled,” and Elizabeth’s own shame at what she said. The strongest objection is that Elizabeth offers her rule to a man who has already learned his lesson, so that it is mercy, not forgetting, and that both of them let the painful subject of Lydia drop. A revised thesis might hold that each is right about a different time: Darcy about how they came to be here, Elizabeth about how to go on from it.
But, unluckily for her Ladyship, its effect had been exactly contrariwise.In the opposite way; the reverse of what was meant (contrary, with the old ending -wise, “in the manner of,” as in clockwise). Lady Catherine repeated Elizabeth’s defiance to make her nephew give her up. The narrator’s old-fashioned, faintly comic word marks how completely the plan turned round: the report “taught me to hope.”
I cannot think of it without abhorrence.A deep, shuddering disgust (from Latin abhorrere, to shrink back from, the root shared with horror). Darcy turns the word on his own behaviour in April, not on anyone else’s. It is the strongest word he uses against himself in the chapter, and it comes just after he has called her charges “ill-founded.”
The recollection of what I then said, of my conduct, my manners, my expressions during the whole of it, is now, and has been many months, inexpressibly painful to me.So much that words cannot say it (in-, not, with expressible, able to be put into words). Darcy uses it of his memory of the April evening, in the same sentence where he lists his “expressions” among his faults. A man who says his pain is beyond words then goes on to put it into many words, and the strain shows how much the memory still costs him.
Your retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of ignorance.Looks back over the past; acts of remembering what one has done (Latin retro, backward, with specere, to look, as in inspect). Darcy’s word for Elizabeth’s memories. He uses it to turn her cheerful rule into something less flattering: her calm comes not from wisdom, he says, but from having nothing to regret.
His diffidence had prevented his depending on his own judgment in so anxious a case, but his reliance on mine made everything easy.Shyness that comes from doubting yourself; a lack of trust in your own judgment (from Latin diffidere, to distrust, the opposite of confidence). Darcy says it kindly of Bingley, as the reason his friend leaned on him. Elizabeth’s private name for the same trait is “so easily guided.”