In the society depicted in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, money was as much a social currency as it was a means of exchanging goods and services. Money was often commensurate with social rank, but there was sentiment against parvenus working for their fortunes. As a sign of an eligible bachelor or a path to nobility or a gentlemanly career, money had an important role to play in the society in which Pride and Prejudice, a novel of manners, is set. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in search of a wife.” This sentence, one of the most famous first lines in English literature, begins Pride and Prejudice, stating quite clearly the central position of marriage in the book and the central position of money in marriage. Mrs Bennet is obsessed with the worry of seeing her five daughters, who will not receive their father's estate, "well married", that is, married to a man of good conditions. Mrs Bennet and her neighbors are delighted with Mr Bingley's "four or five thousand pounds a year", and even more impressed with Mr Darcy's income of ten thousand pounds a year. Pride and Prejudice provides examples of purely mercenary encounters, and even the happiest marriages in the book have their economic concerns. Wickham is not a good friend due to his relative poverty, and is seen as a mercenary by the Bennet girls when he tries to marry Mrs King, heiress to a ten thousand pound fortune. The Bennets' shame at Wickham's elopement with Lydia is somewhat alleviated when Darcy purchases a respectable position in the army for Wickham, who was loath to ally himself with a girl of so little fortune as Lydia. Charlotte Lucas marries the unpleasant Mr. Collins because he lives comfortably under the patronage of Lady Catherine, and at the age of twenty-seven Charlotte is in danger of becoming an old maid. Elizabeth explains it well when, leaving Hunsford, she comments: "Poor Charlotte! -- it was sad to leave her in such company! -- But she had chosen him with her eyes open; [...] Her home and her household chores, his parish, his poultry and all their worries had not yet lost their charm." The two older Bennet girls are destined for happier marriages than these, but money still enters the picture. Even the level-headed Elizabeth, who rejects the advances of Mr. Collins and the immensely wealthy Mr. Darcy, is only half-joking when she answers Jane's question about when she began to love Darcy: "I think I must date him from the first time I saw the his beautiful gardens at Pemberley." In fact, when she visits Mr. Darcy's magnificent estate, she says to herself "that being Pemberley's mistress might be something!" Bingley's sisters complain that with Jane's "low connections" she will hardly be able to see herself "well settled." Bingley, in the spirit of love, says in response: "If they had enough uncles to fill all of Cheapside [(a less desirable district)], that wouldn't make them any less agreeable." Darcy says to this: "But that must very materially diminish their ability to marry men of any consideration in the world." This exchange is very significant: Bingley's sisters push Bingley away from Jane with Darcy's help, while Mrs. Bingley constantly reminds Darcy of the impropriety of his admiration for Elizabeth and "her beautiful eyes." When Darcy later overcomes his social limitations by marrying Elizabeth and reuniting Bingley and Jane,..