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William Hazlitt

William Hazlitt Quotes

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Famous William Hazlitt Quotes

“The love of fame is too high and delicate a feeling in the mind to be mixed up with realities, it is a solitary abstraction. * * * A name "fast anchored in the deep abyss of time" is like a star twinkling in the firmament, cold, silent, distant, but eternal and sublime; and our transmitting one to posterity is as if we should contemplate our translation to the skies.”

IfsShouldMindFeelingsRealityNamesStarsSkyColdFameEternalSilentDelicateContemplatingSolitarySublimeAbyssAbstractionTranslationsPosterityFirmamentTwinkling
Author:William Hazlitt
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“Persons without education certainly do not want either acuteness or strength of mind in what concerns themselves, or in things immediately within their observation; but they have no power of abstraction, no general standard of taste, or scale of opinion. They see their objects always near, and never in the horizon. Hence arises that egotism which has been remarked as the characteristic of self-taught men.”

MenWantMindPersonsHas BeensSelfOpinionObjectsTaughtTasteStandardsConcernScalesAriseObservationCharacteristicsHorizonAbstractionEgotismStrength Of MindSelf Taught
Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“The confined air of a metropolis is hurtful to the minds and bodies of those who have never lived out of it. It is impure, stagnant--without breathing-space to allow a larger view of ourselves or others--and gives birth to a puny, sickly, unwholesome, and degenerate race of beings.”

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Book:The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt
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“People try to reconcile you to a disappointment in love by asking why you should cherish a passion for an object that has proved itself worthless. Had you known this before, you would not have encouraged the passion; but that having been once formed, knowledge does not destroy it. If we have drank poison, finding it out does not prevent its being in our veins: so passion leaves its poison in the mind!”

PeopleIfsLoveShouldTryingMindDoePassionKnownObjectsFindingsAskingDisappointmentPoisonCherishWorthlessVeinsDrankReconcileAsking WhyDisappointment Love
Book:The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt
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“We cannot by a little verbal sophistry confound the qualities of different minds, nor force opposite excellences into a union by all the intolerance in the world. If we have a taste for some one precise style or manner, we may keep it to ourselves and let others have theirs. If we are more catholic in our notions, and want variety of excellence and beauty, it is spread abroad for us to profusion in the variety of books and in the several growth of men's minds, fettered by no capricious or arbitrary rules.”

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Author:William Hazlitt
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“Art is the microscope of the mind, which sharpens the wit as the other does the sight; and converts every object into a little universe in itself. Art may be said to draw aside the veil from nature. To those who are perfectly unskilled in the practice, unimbued with the principles of art, most objects present only a confused mass.”

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Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“There is nothing so remote from vanity as true genius. It is almost as natural for those who are endowed with the highest powers of the human mind to produce the miracles of art, as for other men to breathe or move. Correggio, who is said to have produced some of his divinest works almost without having seen a picture, probably did not know that he had done anything extraordinary.”

KnowsMenMindHumansArtSaidDoneMovingNaturalProduceGeniusHighestMiracleExtraordinaryBreatheVanityHuman MindTrue Genius
Book:The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt
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“By conversing with the mighty dead, we imbibe sentiment with knowledge. We become strongly attached to those who can no longer either hurt or serve us, except through the influence which they exert over the mind. We feel the presence of that power which gives immortality to human thoughts and actions, and catch the flame of enthusiasm from all nations and ages.”

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Book:The Letters of William Hazlitt
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“He who expects from a great name in politics, in philosophy, in art, equal greatness in other things, is little versed in human nature. Our strength lies in our weakness. The learned in books are ignorant of the world. He who is ignorant of books is often well acquainted with other things; for life is of the same length in the learned and unlearned; the mind cannot be idle; if it is not taken up with one thing, it attends to another through choice or necessity; and the degree of previous capacity in one class or another is a mere lottery.”

IfsWorldMindHumansWellsLittlesArtBookPhilosophyLife IsLyingChoicesNamesClassTakenOne ThingHuman NatureGreatnessEqualDegreesWeaknessCapacityMereIgnorantLengthIdleLotteryVersatility
Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“Tears may be considered as the natural and involuntary resource of the mind overcome by some sudden and violent emotion, before ithas had time to reconcile its feelings to the change in circumstances: while laughter may be defined to be the same sort of convulsive and involuntary movement, occasioned by mere sur prise or contrast (in the absence of any more serious emotion), before it has time to reconcile its belief to contradictory appearances.”

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Book:Lectures on the English Comic Writers
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“To be capable of steady friendship or lasting love, are the two greatest proofs, not only of goodness of heart, but of strength of mind.”

MindHeartTwoFriendshipStrengthFriendsGoodnessCapableProofConfusionLastingSteadyRomantic LoveReal FriendsLasting LoveStrength Of MindLong LastingLasting Friendship
Book:The Collected Works of William Hazlitt: Memoirs of Thomas Holcroft. Liber amoris. Characteristics
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“Happy are they who live in the dream of their own existence, and see all things in the light of their own minds; who walk by faith and hope; to whom the guiding star of their youth still shines from afar, and into whom the spirit of the world has not entered! They have not been "hurt by the archers", nor has the iron entered their souls. The world has no hand on them.”

WorldMindStillsSoulDreamHandsLightSpiritStarsHurtWalksExistenceYouthAll ThingsShiningIronAfarHope And FaithArcherBeen HurtWalk By FaithGuiding Stars
Book:The Complete Works of William Hazlitt
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“It is easier taking the beaten path than making our way over bogs and precipices. The great difficulty in philosophy is to come to every question with a mind fresh and unshackled by former theories, though strengthened by exercise and information.”

WayMindPhilosophyPathInformationTheoryEasierExerciseDifficultyFormerBeatenPrecipiceBogsBeaten Path
Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“This is the test and triumph of originality, not to show us what has never been, and what we may therefore very easily never have dreamt of, but to point out to us what is before our eyes and under our feet, though we have had no suspicion of its existence, for want of sufficient strength of intuition, of determined grasp of mind to seize and retain it.”

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Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“Prosperity is a great teacher; adversity is a greater. Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens it.”

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Book:Sketches and Essays
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“I do not think that what is called Love at first sight is so great an absurdity as it is sometimes imagined to be. We generally make up our minds beforehand to the sort of person we should like, grave or gay, black, brown, or fair; with golden tresses or raven locks; - and when we meet with a complete example of the qualities we admire, the bargain is soon struck.”

ThinkingLoveShouldMindFirstsPersonsSometimesBlackQualityExampleGayFairsSightGravesAdmireGoldenBrownLocksLove At First SightAbsurdityBargainsRavensTresses
Book:Table Talk: Opinions on Books, Men, and Things
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“I hate to be near the sea, and to hear it roaring and raging like a wild beast in its den. It puts me in mind of the everlasting efforts of the human mind, struggling to be free, and ending just where it began.”

MindHumansHateEffortStruggleSeaI HateRageBeastHuman MindEverlastingRoaringDensWild BeastsOcean SeaOceans And SeasSailors And The SeaWild Sea
Book:The Collected Works of William Hazlitt: Fugitive writings
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“If goodness were only a theory, it were a pity it should be lost to the world. There are a number of things, the idea of which is a clear gain to the mind. Let people, for instance, rail at friendship, genius, freedom, as long as they will -the very names of these despised qualities are better than anything else that could be substituted for them, and embalm even the most envenomed satire against them.”

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Author:William Hazlitt
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