William Hazlitt
William Hazlitt
William Hazlittwas an English writer, drama and literary critic, painter, social commentator, and philosopher. He is now considered one of the greatest critics and essayists in the history of the English language, placed in the company of Samuel Johnson and George Orwell. He is also acknowledged as the finest art critic of his age. Despite his high standing among historians of literature and art, his work is currently little read and mostly out of print...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionCritic
Date of Birth10 April 1778
moving men way
A man who is determined never to move out of the beaten road cannot lose his way.
sports art anchors
Art must anchor in nature, or it is the sport of every breath of folly.
names argument eloquence
Of all eloquence a nickname is the most concise; of all arguments the most unanswerable.
honesty people office
The confession of our failings is a thankless office. It savors less of sincerity or modesty than of ostentation. It seems as if we thought our weaknesses as good as other people's virtues.
kindness wish favors
Our friends are generally ready to do everything for us, except the very thing we wish them to do.
sacrifice self vanity
The slaves of power mind the cause they have to serve, because their own interest is concerned; but the friends of liberty always sacrifice their cause, which is only the cause of humanity, to their own spleen, vanity, and self-opinion.
peace long-ago society
If mankind had wished for what is right, they might have had it long ago.
littles speakers
We talk little when we do not talk about ourselves.
idols race giving
Mankind are an incorrigible race. Give them but bugbears and idols -- it is all that they ask; the distinctions of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood, of good and evil, are worse than indifferent to them.
pain giving bears
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.
heaven care next
Those who have had none of the cares of this life to harass and disturb them, have been obliged to have recourse to the hopes and fears of the next to vary the prospect before them.
peace war humanity
Those who are at war with others are not at peace with themselves.
love disappointment passion
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!
attitude leisure-activities busy
The more we do, the more we can do; the more busy we are, the more leisure we have.