William Hazlitt Quotes - Page 22

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We grow tired of ourselves, much more of other people.

William Hazlitt

Tired, People, Grows

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.493

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Every man depends on the quantity of sense, wit, or good manners he brings into society for the reception he meets with in it.

William Hazlitt

Men, Good Man, Society

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1227, Delphi Classics

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The humblest painter is a true scholar; and the best of scholars the scholar of nature.

William Hazlitt

Painter, Scholar

William Hazlitt (1844). “Criticisms on Art”, p.11

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Every man, in judging of himself, is his own contemporary. He may feel the gale of popularity, but he cannot tell how long it will last. His opinion of himself wants distance, wants time, wants numbers, to set it off and confirm it.

William Hazlitt

Distance, Men, Numbers

William Hazlitt (1845). “Table Talk: Opinions on Books, Men, and Things”, p.38

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Any one may mouth out a passage with a theatrical cadence, or get upon stilts to tell his thoughts; but to write or speak with propriety and simplicity is a more difficult task. Thus it is easy to affect a pompous style, to use a word twice as big as the thing you want to express; it is not so easy to pitch upon the very word that exactly fits it.

William Hazlitt

Writing, Simplicity, Style

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1270, Delphi Classics

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To write a genuine familiar or truly English style is to write as anyone would speak in common conversation, who had a thorough command and choice of words, or who could discourse with ease, force, and perspicuity, setting aside all pedantic and oratorical flourishes.

William Hazlitt

Writing, Choices, Style

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1270, Delphi Classics

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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”

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The look of a gentleman is little else than the reflection of the looks of the world.

William Hazlitt

Reflection, Gentleman, Looks

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We judge of others for the most part by their good opinion of themselves; yet nothing gives such offense or creates so many enemies, as that extreme self-complacency or superciliousness of manner, which appears to set the opinion of every one else at defiance.

William Hazlitt

Self, Giving, Judging

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.452

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There cannot be a surer proof of low origin, or of an innate meanness of disposition, than to be always talking and thinking of being genteel.

William Hazlitt

Thinking, Talking, Proof

William Hazlitt (1859). “Table talk”

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A situation in a public office is secure, but laborious and mechanical, and without the great springs of life, hope and fear.

William Hazlitt

Spring, Office, Anxiety

William Hazlitt, Herschel Moreland Sikes, William Hallam Bonner, Gerald Lahey (1979). “The Letters of William Hazlitt”, p.235, Springer

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Men of the greatest genius are not always the most prodigal of their encomiums. But then it is when their range of power is confined, and they have in fact little perception, except of their own particular kind of excellence.

William Hazlitt

Men, Perception, Excellence

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1465, Delphi Classics

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Nothing gives such a blow to friendship as the detecting another in an untruth. It strikes at the root of our confidence ever after.

William Hazlitt

Blow, Roots, Giving

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.488

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To create an unfavorable impression, it is not necessary that certain things should be true, but that they have been said.

William Hazlitt

Gossip, Should, Said

William Hazlitt (1837). “Characteristics: in the manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims [by W. Hazlitt].”, p.76

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The most phlegmatic dispositions often contain the most inflammable spirits, as fire is struck from the hardest flints.

William Hazlitt

Anger, Fire, Spirit

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Death puts an end to rivalship and competition. The dead can boast no advantage over us, nor can we triumph over them.

William Hazlitt

Competition, Triumph, Advantage

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.525

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Grace in women has more effect than beauty. We sometimes see a certain fine self-possession, an habitual voluptuousness of character, which reposes on its own sensations and derives pleasure from all around it, that is more irresistible than any other attraction. There is an air of languid enjoyment in such persons, "in their eyes, in their arms, and their hands, and their face," which robs us of ourselves, and draws us by a secret sympathy towards them.

William Hazlitt

Character, Eye, Air

William Hazlitt (1872). “Sketches and Essays: And Winterslow (essays Written There).”, p.365

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Repose is as necessary in conversation as in a picture.

William Hazlitt

Conversation, Repose

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.483

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The number of objects we see from living in a large city amuses the mind like a perpetual raree-show, without supplying it with any ideas.

William Hazlitt

Cities, Ideas, Numbers

William Hazlitt (1837). “Characteristics: in the manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims [by W. Hazlitt].”, p.140

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There are persons who are never easy unless they are putting your books and papers in order--that is, according to their notions of the matter--and hide things lest they should be lost, where neither the owner nor anybody else can find them. This is a sort of magpie faculty. If anything is left where you want it, it is called litter. There is a pedantry in housewifery, as well as in the gravest concerns. Abraham Tucker complained that whenever his maid servant had been in his library, he could not see comfortably to work again for several days.

William Hazlitt

Book, Order, Library

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There is a feeling of Eternity in youth which makes us amends for everything. To be young is to be as one of the Immortals.

William Hazlitt

Feelings, Youth, Eternity

William Hazlitt (1859). “Table talk”, p.1

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There is something captivating in spirit and intrepidity, to which, we often yield as to a resistless power; nor can he reasonably expect, the confidence of others who too apparently distrusts himself.

William Hazlitt

Confidence, Yield, Spirit

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We learn to curb our will and keep our overt actions within the bounds of humanity, long before we can subdue our sentiments and imaginations to the same mild tone.

William Hazlitt

Anger, Long, Imagination

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1916, Delphi Classics

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The truth is, we pamper little griefs into great ones, and bear great ones as well as we can.

William Hazlitt

Grief, Littles, Bears

William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1256, Delphi Classics

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To get others to come into our ways of thinking, we must go over to theirs; and it is necessary to follow, in order to lead.

William Hazlitt

Thinking, Order, Way

William Hazlitt (1913). “Selections from William Hazlitt”, Boston, New York etc. Ginn [c1913]

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Born: April 10, 1778
Died: September 18, 1830
Occupation: Writer
Cite this Page: Citation

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