How original are the first six words of the famously much-quoted opening sentence of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (published in 1813), often apparently cited as if these were a formulation uniquely hers? Was this merely a phrase current at the time, or had she perhaps borrowed it? For example, she might have seen it in a book by the French refugee in England, Mr Gros, whose preface to his Complete French Spelling Book, Or Rules for Pronouncing the French Language, According to the Decisions of the Academy, and the Best Grammarians (London: C Gros and Dulau and Co) published in 1805, opens with the phrase: "it is a truth universally acknowledged".

Christopher Husbands, Battle, East Sussex

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