William Hazlitt Quotes - Page 16

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• We are the creatures of imagination, passion, and self-will, more than of reason or even of self-interest. Even in the common transactions and daily intercourse of life, we are governed by whim, caprice, prejudice, or accident. The falling of a teacup puts us out of temper for the day; and a quarrel that commenced about the pattern of a gown may end only with our lives.

  William Hazlitt

  Life, Fall, Passion

  William Hazlitt (1904). “The Collected Works of William Hazlitt: Fugitive writings”

  10 Copy quote

• What I mean by living to one's-self is living in the world, as in it, not of it: it is as if no one know there was such a person, and you wished no one to know it: it is to be a silent spectator of the mighty scene of things, not an object of attention or curiosity in it; to take a thoughtful, anxious interest in what is passing in the world, but not to feel the slightest inclination to make or meddle with it.

  William Hazlitt

  Mean, Thoughtful, Self

  William Hazlitt (1821). “Table-talk: Or Original Essays”, p.213

  7 Copy quote

• Good temper is an estate for life.

  William Hazlitt

  Life, Estates, Temper

  William Hazlitt (1848). “The Miscellaneous Works”

  7 Copy quote

• Vice, like disease, floats in the atmosphere.

  William Hazlitt

  Atmosphere, Vices, Disease

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1484, Delphi Classics

  7 Copy quote

• Of all virtues, magnanimity is the rarest. There are a hundred persons of merit for one who willingly acknowledges it in another.

  William Hazlitt

  Character, Personality, Merit

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1464, Delphi Classics

  7 Copy quote

• An orator can hardly get beyond commonplaces: if he does he gets beyond his hearers.

  William Hazlitt

  Doe, Public Speaking, Orators

  William Hazlitt (1845). “Table Talk: Essays on Men and Manners”

  4 Copy quote

• The only true retirement is that of the heart; the only true leisure is the repose of the passions. To such persons it makes little difference whether they are young or old; and they die as they have lived, with graceful resignation.

  William Hazlitt

  Retirement, Passion, Heart

  William Hazlitt (1918). “Twenty-two Essays of William Hazlitt”

  4 Copy quote

• The great requisite for the prosperous management of ordinary business is the want of imagination.

  William Hazlitt

  Imagination, Ordinary, Want

  William Hazlitt (1859). “Table talk”, p.117

  4 Copy quote

• Perhaps propriety is as near a word as any to denote the manners of the gentleman; elegance is necessary to the fine gentleman; dignity is proper to noblemen; and majesty to kings.

  William Hazlitt

  Kings, Gentleman, Noblemen

  William Hazlitt (1845). “Table Talk: Opinions on Books, Men, and Things”

  6 Copy quote

• Shall I faint, now that I have poured out the spirit of my mind to the world, and treated many subjects with truth, with freedom, with power, because I have been followed with one cry of abuse ever since for not being a Government tool?

  William Hazlitt

  Government, Abuse, Mind

  William Hazlitt (1926). “Essays”

  4 Copy quote

• Political truth is libel; religious truth, blasphemy.

  William Hazlitt

  Religious, Truth, Political

  William Hazlitt, William Ernest Henley (1904). “The Collected Works of William Hazlitt: Fugitive writings”

  16 Copy quote

• Well I've had a happy life.

  William Hazlitt

  Life, Happy Life, Last Words

  Last words, in W. C. Hazlitt 'Memoirs of William Hazlitt' (1867)

  4 Copy quote

• Believe all the good you can of everyone. Do not measure others by yourself. If they have advantages which you have not, let your liberality keep pace with their good fortune. Envy no one, and you need envy no one.

  William Hazlitt

  Believe, Envy, Needs

  4 Copy quote

• There is an unseemly exposure of the mind, as well as of the body.

  William Hazlitt

  Mind, Body, Exposure

  'Sketches and Essays' (1839) 'On Disagreeable People'

  11 Copy quote

• To be wiser than other men is to be honester than they; and strength of mind is only courage to see and speak the truth.

  William Hazlitt

  Men, Mind, Speak

  William Hazlitt (1852). “Men and manners: sketches and essays”, p.140

  55 Copy quote

• Society is a more level surface than we imagine. Wise men or absolute fools are hard to be met with, as there are few giants or dwarfs.

  William Hazlitt

  Wise, Men, Fool

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1470, Delphi Classics

  4 Copy quote

• The most violent friendships soonest wear themselves out.

  William Hazlitt

  Friendship, Emo, Violent

  William Hazlitt (1837). “Characteristics: in the manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims [by W. Hazlitt].”, p.87

  9 Copy quote

• If we wish to know the force of human genius, we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insignificance of human learning, we may study his commentators.

  William Hazlitt

  Reading, Intelligence, Wish

  William Hazlitt (1924). “Essays”

  7 Copy quote

• Few things tend more to alienate friendship than a want of punctuality in our engagements. I have known the breach of a promise to dine or sup to break up more than one intimacy.

  William Hazlitt

  Friendship, Breakup, Promise

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1873, Delphi Classics

  8 Copy quote

• There is no one thoroughly despicable. We cannot descend much lower than an idiot; and an idiot has some advantages over a wise man.

  William Hazlitt

  Wise, Men, Idiot

  William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.492

  11 Copy quote

• A scholar is like a book written in a dead language. It is not every one that can read in it.

  William Hazlitt

  Book, Language, Scholar

  William Hazlitt, James Thornton (1967). “Miscellaneous writings”

  16 Copy quote

• The love of letters is the forlorn hope of the man of letters. His ruling passion is the love of fame.

  William Hazlitt

  Passion, Men, Letters

  William Hazlitt (1852). “Men and manners: sketches and essays”, p.237

  7 Copy quote

• Love at first sight is only realizing an imagination that has always haunted us; or meeting with a face, a figure, or cast of expression in perfection that we have seen and admired in a less degree or in less favorable circumstances a hundred times before.

  William Hazlitt

  Sight, Expression, Imagination

  William Hazlitt, Percival Presland Howe (1925). “New writings by Willam Hazlitt”

  4 Copy quote

• To-day kings, to-marrow beggars, it is only when they are themselves that they are nothing.

  William Hazlitt

  Kings, Acting, Beggar

  4 Copy quote

• Books wind into the heart.

  William Hazlitt

  Book, Heart, Wind

  4 Copy quote

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