William Hazlitt Quotes
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Honesty is one part of eloquence. We persuade others by being in earnest ourselves.
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There are no rules for friendship. It must be left to itself. We cannot force it any more than love.
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A great chessplayer is not a great man, for he leaves the world as he found it.
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Let a man's talents or virtues be what they may, he will only feel satisfaction in his society as he is satisfied in himself.
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I'm not smart, but I like to observe. Millions saw the apple fall, but Newton was the one who asked why.
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The most violent friendships soonest wear themselves out.
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An honest man speaks the truth, though it may give offence; a vain man, in order that it may.
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A distinction has been made between acuteness and subtlety of understanding. This might be illustrated by saying that acuteness consists in taking up the points or solid atoms, subtlety in feeling the air of truth.
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The silence of a friend commonly amounts to treachery. His not daring to say anything in our behalf implies a tacit censure.
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I am proud up to the point of equality; everything above or below that appears to me arrant impertinence or abject meanness.
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Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense; a substitute for true knowledge.
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A life of action and danger moderates the dread of death. It not only gives us fortitude to bear pain, but teaches us at every step the precarious tenure on which we hold our present being.
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He who would see old Hoghton right Must view it by the pale moonlight.
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One shining quality lends a lustre to another, or hides some glaring defect.
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Humour is the making others act or talk absurdly and unconsciously; wit is the pointing out and ridiculing that absurdity consciously, and with more or less ill-nature.
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Those who make their dress a principal part of themselves, will, in general, become of no more value than their dress.
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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.
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The only impeccable writers are those who never wrote.
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We prefer a person with vivacity and high spirits, though bordering upon insolence, to the timid and pusillanimous; we are fonder of wit joined to malice than of dullness without it.
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The poetical impression of any object is that uneasy, exquisite sense of beauty or power that cannot be contained within itself; that is impatient of all limit; that (as flame bends to flame) strives to link itself to some other image of kindred beauty or grandeur; to enshrine itself, as it were, in the highest forms of fancy, and to relieve the aching sense of pleasure by expressing it in the boldest manner.
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A grave blockhead should always go about with a lively one - they show one another off to the best advantage.
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If mankind had wished for what is right, they might have had it long ago.
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If the world were good for nothing else, it is a fine subject for speculation.
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We never do anything well till we cease to think about the manner of doing it. This is the reason why it is so difficult for any but natives to speak a language correctly or idiomatically.