Set in the early 1800’s, Pride and Prejudice is a timeless classic based fully on love, class, and most importantly, reputation. In Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, we encounter two characters that are seemingly opposite, but we learn that everyone has something in common. In this time period, young girls are completely focused on marriage. Without marriage, girls are forced into a live of solitude without ever having a home of their own. With the books opening sentence, Mrs. Bennet states, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife” (Pg. 1, Austen). This establishes a main focus of the novel, advantageous marriage. The pressure to find a husband has many girls, such as Lydia and Charlotte, accepting marriage proposals from the unlikeliest of men. Elizabeth Bennet is a young girl of age twenty, the second oldest of five girls in her family. She makes a name for herself by refusing two proposals from two upper-class men. Elizabeth is strong enough to stand guard and not accept a proposal from anyone whom she does not love. With the news of Fitzwilliam Darcy and Charles Bingly’s arrival, the Bennet family attends a ball dressed to the nines in the hopes that one of the girls will catch the eye of one of the two new and mysterious men. While Bingley is open to surrounding himself with people of a lower class, Darcy is appalled by the idea of even being at this ball, much less dancing with girls that are “slighted by other men” (Pg. 21, Austen). Overhearing this comment, Elizabeth takes an immediate disliking to Darcy. Elizabeth’s pride is centered around the fact that she believes that she can judge people clearly for what they are. She is proud of herself for not dancing with Darcy just because of his status. Darcy’s pride is based on his class and values, which explains why he feels that he is above everyone from Longbourn; he feels that they d