William Hazlitt Quotes

The vain man makes a merit of misfortune, and triumphs in his disgrace.

I like a friend the better for having faults that one can talk about.

There is nothing more to be esteemed than a manly firmness and decision of character.

Experience makes us wise.

Books are a world in themselves, it is true; but they are not the only world. The world itself is a volume larger than all the libraries in it.

Those who wish to forget painful thoughts do well to absent themselves for a while from, the ties and objects that recall them; but we can be said only to fulfill our destiny in the place that gave us birth.

We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.

That which anyone has been long learning unwillingly, he unlearns with proportional eagerness and haste.

We can scarcely hate anyone that we know.

[Science is] the desire to know causes.

True friendship is self-love at second hand; where, as in a flattering mirror we may see our virtues magnified and our errors softened, and where we may fancy our opinion of ourselves confirmed by an impartial and faithful witness.

The player envies only the player, the poet envies only the poet.

A full-dressed ecclesiastic is a sort of go-cart of divinity; an ethical automaton. A clerical prig is, in general, a very dangerous as well as contemptible character. The utmost that those who thus habitually confound their opinions and sentiments with the outside coverings of their bodies can aspire to, is a negative and neutral character, like wax-work figures, where the dress is done as much to the life as the man, and where both are respectable pieces of pasteboard, or harmless compositions of fleecy hosiery.

We must overact our part in some measure, in order to produce any effect at all.

It is hard for any one to be an honest politician who is not born and bred a Dissenter.

Violence ever defeats its own ends. Where you cannot drive you can always persuade. A gentle word, a kind look, a god-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles. There is a secret pride in every human heart than revolts at tyranny. You may order and drive an individual, but you cannot make him respect you.

The way to get on in the world is to be neither more nor less wise, neither better nor worse than your neighbours.

The origin of all science is the desire to know causes, and the origin of all false science is the desire to accept false causes rather than none; or, which is the same thing, in the unwillingness to acknowledge our own ignorance.

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.

The only vice that cannot be forgiven is hypocrisy. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy.

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.

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

The English (it must be owned) are rather a foul-mouthed nation.

Walk groundly, talk profoundly, drink roundly, sleep soundly.

Poetry is the universal language which the heart holds with nature and itself. He who has a contempt for poetry, cannot have much respect for himself, or for anything else.

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.

People of genius do not excel in any profession because they work in it, they work in it because they excel.

No man would, I think, exchange his existence with any other man, however fortunate. We had as lief not be, as not be ourselves.

Time,--the most independent of all things.

The imagination is of so delicate a texture that even words wound it.

To expect an author to talk as he writes is ridiculous; or even if he did you would find fault with him as a pedant.

In public speaking, we must appeal either to the prejudices of others, or to the love of truth and justice. If we think merely of displaying our own ability, we shall ruin every cause we undertake.

The idea of what the public will think prevents the public from ever thinking at all, and acts as a spell on the exercise of private judgment.

It is better to be able neither to read nor write than to be able to do nothing else.

There are many who talk on from ignorance rather than from knowledge, and who find the former an inexhaustible fund of conversation.

Popularity disarms envy in well-disposed minds. Those are ever the most ready to do justice to others who feel that the world has done them justice. When success has not this effect in opening the mind, it is a sign that it has been ill deserved.

It is essential to the triumph of reform that it should never succeed.

We are governed by sympathy; and the extent of our sympathy is determined by that of our sensibility

Shall I faint, now that I have poured out the spirit of my mind to the world, and treated many subjects with truth, with freedom, with power, because I have been followed with one cry of abuse ever since for not being a Government tool?

Popularity is neither fame nor greatness.

Some one is generally sure to be the sufferer by a joke.

I hate anything that occupies more space than it is worth... I hate to see a parcel of big words without anything in them.

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.

The best way to make ourselves agreeable to others is by seeming to think them so. If we appear fully sensible of their good qualities they will not complain of the want of them in us.

As a general rule, those who are dissatisfied with themselves will seek to go out of themselves into an ideal world. Persons in strong health and spirits, who take plenty of air and exercise, who are "in favor with, their stars," and have a thorough relish of the good things of this life, seldom devote themselves in despair to religion or the muses. Sedentary, nervous, hypochondriacal people, on the contrary, are forced, for want of an appetite for the real and substantial, to look out for a more airy food and speculative comforts.

He who lives wisely to himself and his own heart looks at the busy world through the loopholes of retreat, and does not want to mingle in the fray.

To be wiser than other men is to be honester than they; and strength of mind is only courage to see and speak the truth.

We are cold to others only when we are dull in ourselves.