Mrs Darcy's Message Forum
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Welcome, Leia! You've come to the right place, we're all crazy about P&P and cannot get enough of the novel and all the stories based on it.
She was softened already thanks to the letter, but I believe visiting his estate softened Lizzy further. Obviously, at the time it was vital for a woman to marry, and preferably to marry well. In fact it was here only ambition, since study or career were impossible.
The actual confrontation (which is different from the abstract knowledge she had in Hertfordshire) with his wealth, taste and distinction on his own estate must have been such a revelation for her. However, I think that his civil, welcoming behaviour towards her and her aunt and uncle must have made her realize she cared for him as much as he did for her; not his possessions, although she had this sort of self-reproaching observation she could have been the mistress of it all... I liked the way she sort of laconically resigned in her own stupidity at that moment. 
Most definitely, Leia...
Chapter 43:
..." The rooms were lofty and handsome, and their furniture suitable to the fortune of their proprietor; but Elizabeth saw, with admiration of his taste, that it was neither gaudy nor uselessly fine; with less of splendor, and more real elegance, than the furniture of Rosings.
``And of this place,'' thought she, ``I might have been mistress! With these rooms I might now have been familiarly acquainted! Instead of viewing them as a stranger, I might have rejoiced in them as my own, and welcomed to them as visitors my uncle and aunt. -- But no,'' -- recollecting herself, -- ``that could never be: my uncle and aunt would have been lost to me: I should not have been allowed to invite them.'' This was a lucky recollection -- it saved her from something like regret.
The last sentence is quite telling, I think. She has a change of heart, but protects herself against it by reminding herself of her station and his opinion on that...
R~ 
