Robert Aris Willmott Quotes - Page 2

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• One interesting feature of criticism is seen in the ease with which it discovers what Addison called the specific quality of an author. In Livy, it will be the manner of telling the story; in Sallust, personal identification with the character; in Tacitus, the analysis of the deed into its motive. If the same test be applied to painters, it will find the prominent faculty of Correggio to be manifested in harmony of effect; of Poussin, in the sentiment of his landscapes; and of Raffaelle, in the general comprehension of his subject.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Character, Interesting, Quality

  4 Copy quote

• The gloomy recess of an ecclesiastical library is like a harbor, into which a far-traveling curiosity has sailed with its freight, and cast anchor. The ponderous tomes are bales of the mind's merchandise. Odors of distant countries and times steal from the red leaves, the swelling ridges of vellum, and the titles in tarnished gold.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Country, Anchors, Curiosity

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• Taste is often one of the aspects of fashion.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Fashion, Taste, Aspect

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.73

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• Taste is not stationary. It grows every day, and is improved by cultivation, as a good temper is refined by religion. In its most advanced state it takes the title of judgment. Hume quotes Fontenelle's ingenious distinction between the common watch that tells the hours, and the delicately constructed one that marks the seconds and smallest differences of time.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Differences, Taste, Titles

  Robert Aris Willmott (1907). “Pleasures of Literature”

  7 Copy quote

• Whatever is pure is also simple. It does not keep the eye on itself. The observer forgets the window in the landscape it displays. A fine style gives the view of fancy--its figures, its trees, or its palaces,--without a spot.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Eye, Simple, Views

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.39

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• The exhibition of real strength is never grotesque. Distortion is the agony of weakness. It is the dislocated mind whose movements are spasmodic.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Strength, Real, Agony

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.40

  7 Copy quote

• How deep is the magic of sound may be learned by breaking some sweet verses into prose. The operation has been compared to gathering dew-drops, which shine like jewels upon the flower, but run into water in the hand. The elements remain, but the sparkle is gone.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Running, Sweet, Flower

  Robert Aris Willmott (1907). “Pleasures of Literature”

  8 Copy quote

• Poetry deserves the honor it obtains as the eldest offspring of literature, and the fairest. It is the fruitfulness of many plants growing into one flower and sowing itself over the world in shapes of beauty and color, which differ with the soil that receives and the sun that ripens the seed. In Persia, it comes up the rose of Hafiz; in England, the many-blossomed tree of Shakespeare.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Flower, Plants Growing, Color

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• Poetical taste is the only magician whose wand is not broken. No hand, except its own, can dissolve the fabric of beauty in which it dwells. Genii, unknown to Arabian fable, wait at the portal. Whatever is most precious from the loom or the mine of fancy is poured at its feet. Love, purified by contemplation, visits and cheers it; unseen musicians are heard in the dark; it is Psyche in the palace of Cupid.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Cheer, Dark, Hands

  Robert Aris Willmott (1866). “Pleasures, Objects, and Advantages of Literature”, p.92

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• Few footprints of the great remain in the sand before the ever-flowing tide. Long ago it washed out Homer's. Curiosity follows him in vain; Greece and Asia perplex us with a rival Stratford-upon-Avon. The rank of Aristophanes is only conjectured from his gift to two poor players in Athens. The age made no sign when Shakespeare, its noblest son, passed away.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Son, Player, Greatness

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• From numberless books the fluttering reader, idle and inconstant, bears away the bloom that only clings to the outer leaf; but genius has its nectaries, delicate glands, and secrecies of sweetness, and upon these the thoughtful mind must settle in its labor, before the choice perfume of fancy and wisdom is drawn forth.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Reading, Book, Thoughtful

  Robert Aris Willmott (1907). “Pleasures of Literature”

  11 Copy quote

• A good reader is nearly as rare as a good writer. People bring their prejudices, whether friendly or adverse. They are lamp and spectacles, lighting and magnifying the page.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Reading, People, Friendly

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.87

  7 Copy quote

• It is supposable that, in the eyes of angels, a struggle down a dark lane and a battle of Leipsic differ in nothing but excess of wickedness.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Struggle, Eye, Angel

  Robert Aris Willmott (1866). “Pleasures, Objects, and Advantages of Literature”, p.120

  7 Copy quote

• Occasionally a single anecdote opens a character; biography has its comparative anatomy, and a saying or a sentiment enables the skilful hand to construct the skeleton.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Character, Skeletons, Hands

  Robert Aris Willmott (1858). “Summer Time in the Country”, p.44

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• Some gifted adventurer is always sailing round the world of art and science, to bring home costly merchandise from every port.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Art, Home, Science

  Robert Aris Willmott (1907). “Pleasures of Literature”

  4 Copy quote

• Winckelmann wished to live with a work of art as a friend. The saying is true of pen and pencil. Fresh lustre shoots from Lycidas in a twentieth perusal. The portraits of Clarendon are mellowed by every year of reflection.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Art, Reflection, Years

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.91

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• Art, not less eloquently than literature, teaches her children to venerate the single eye. Remember Matsys. His representations of miser-life are breathing. A forfeited bond twinkles in the hard smile. But follow him to an altar-piece. His Apostle has caught a stray tint from his usurer. Features of exquisite beauty are seen and loved; but the old nature of avarice frets under the glow of devotion. Pathos staggers on the edge of farce.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Art, Children, Eye

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.46

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• Genius is nourished from within and without.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Science, Genius

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• Education is the apprenticeship of life

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Education, Inspiration, Science

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.22

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• Attention makes the genius; all learning, fancy, science and skills depend upon it. Newton traced his discoveries to it. It builds bridges, opens new worlds, heals diseases, carries on the business of the world. Without it taste is useless, and the beauties of literature unobserved.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Science, Bridges, Skills

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• In literature and art memory is a synonym for invention. It is the life-blood of imagination, which faints and dies when the veins are empty.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Art, Memories, Blood

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• Newton found that a star, examined through a glass tarnished by smoke, was diminished into a speck of light. But no smoke ever breathed so thick a mist as envy or detraction.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Stars, Science, Glasses

  Robert Aris Willmott (1907). “Pleasures of Literature”

  4 Copy quote

• The drama embraces and applies all the beauties and decorations of poetry. The sister arts attend and adorn it. Painting, architecture, and music are her handmaids. The costliest lights of a people's intellect burn at her show. All ages welcome her.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Art, Drama, Light

  Robert Aris Willmott (1866). “Pleasures, Objects, and Advantages of Literature”, p.87

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• Every fresh acquirement is another remedy against affliction and time.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Education, Affliction, Remedy

  Robert Aris WILLMOTT (1851). “Pleasures,objects and advantages of literature”, p.295

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• It is only dislocated minds whose movements are spasmodic.

  Robert Aris Willmott

  Mind, Movement, Firmness

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