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
passion reflection men
Reflection brakes men cowards. There is no object that can be put in competition with life, unless it is viewed through the medium of passion, and we are hurried away by the impulse of the moment.
honesty power hypocrisy
Want of principle is power. Truth and honesty set a limit to our efforts, which impudence and hypocrisy easily overleap.
envy justice mind
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.
lying faces opinion
Our opinions are not our own, but in the power of sympathy. If a person tells us a palpable falsehood, we not only dare not contradict him, but we dare hardly disbelieve him to his face. A lie boldly uttered has the effect of truth for the instant.
lying force acknowledgement
Lying is the strongest acknowledgement of the force of truth.
running blood literature
Literature, like nobility, runs in the blood.
imagination texture delicate
The imagination is of so delicate a texture that even words wound it.
heart habit chains
The chain of habit coils itself around the heart like a serpent, to gnaw and stifle it.
giving habit
Habit is necessary to give power.
men rogues ifs
Many a man would have turned rogue if he knew how.
understanding littles reason
In what we really understand, we reason but little.
greatness men people
Those people who are always improving never become great. Greatness is an eminence, the ascent to which is steep and lofty, and which a man must seize on at once by natural boldness and vigor, and not by patient, wary steps.
prejudice easy reason
Prejudice is never easy unless it can pass itself off for reason.
pain power pleasure
Power is pleasure; and pleasure sweetens pain.