Sentence No. 82 · 17 June 2026
It might be only her own consciousness; but it seemed as if an angel only could have been quite without resentment under such a stroke.
Jane Austen, Emma
Jane Austen — Emma (1815) · Read it at Project Gutenberg
What holds this sentence together
The semicolon divides two self-contained clauses: the hedged admission "It might be only her own consciousness" and the contrasting elaboration that begins "but it seemed as if an angel." Whenever "but" comes straight after a semicolon, it anchors the second clause — never the first.
How it appears in Sentle
On Sentle this sentence arrives in 7 pieces, shuffled, with the lines that lead up to it for context. A reflection on resentment after a stroke of misfortune. Putting it back in the author’s order is the puzzle — and the order is rarely arbitrary, which is what the note above is about.
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