William Hazlitt Quotes
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The severest critics are always those who have either never attempted, or who have failed in original composition.
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We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.
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The contemplation of truth and beauty is the proper object for which we were created, which calls forth the most intense desires of the soul, and of which it never tires.
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If our hours were all serene, we might probably take almost as little note of them as the dial does of those that are clouded.
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I do not think there is anything deserving the name of society to be found out of London.
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Those are ever the most ready to do justice to others, who feel that the world has done them justice.
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Whatever is placed beyond the reach of sense and knowledge, whatever is imperfectly discerned, the fancy pieces out at its leisure; and all but the present moment, but the present spot, passion claims for its own, and brooding over it with wings outspread, stamps it with an image of itself. Passion is lord of infinite space, and distant objects please because they border on its confines and are moulded by its touch.
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As hypocrisy is said to be the highest compliment to virtue, the art of lying is the strongest acknowledgment of the force of truth.
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We often forget our dreams so speedily: if we cannot catch them as they are passing out at the door, we never set eyes on them again.
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Perhaps the best cure for the fear of death is to reflect that life has a beginning as well as an end. There was a time when we were not: this gives us no concern. Why, then, should it trouble us that a time will come when we shall cease to be?
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Those who speak ill of the spiritual life, although they come and go by day, are like the smith's bellows: they take breath but are not alive.
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A nickname is the heaviest stone that the devil can throw at a man. It is a bugbear to the imagination, and, though we do not believe in it, it still haunts our apprehensions.
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In some situations, if you say nothing, you are called dull; if you talk, you are thought impertinent and arrogant. It is hard to know what to do in this case. The question seems to be, whether your vanity or your prudence predominates.
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The Princess Borghese, Bonaparte's sister, who was no saint, sat to Canova as a reclining Venus, and being asked if she did not feel a little uncomfortable, replied, "No. There was a fire in the room."
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They [corporations] feel neither shame, remorse, gratitude, nor goodwill.
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Horus non numero nisi serenas (I count only the sunny hours).
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The devil was a great loss in the preternatural world. He was always something to fear and to hate; he supplied the antagonist powers of the imagination, and the arch of true religion hardly stands firm without him.
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We grow tired of ourselves, much more of other people.
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A certain excess of animal spirits with thoughtless good-humor will often make more enemies than the most deliberate spite and ill-nature, which is on its guard, and strikes with caution and safety.
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The perfect joys of heaven do not satisfy the cravings of nature.
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The worst old age is that of the mind.
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A man is a hypocrite only when he affects to take a delight in what he does not feel, not because he takes a perverse delight in opposite things.
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To be remembered after we are dead, is but poor recompense for being treated with contempt while we are living.
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The assumption of merit is easier, less embarrassing, and more effectual than the actual attainment of it.