William Hazlitt quotes - page 13

A great chess-player is not a great man, for he leaves the world as he found it. No act terminating in itself constitutes greatness. This will apply to all displays of power or trials of skill, which are confined to the momentary, individual effort, and construct no permanent image or trophy of themselves without them. (William Hazlitt)
The greatest offence against virtue is to speak ill of it. View quote
William Hazlitt
A thing is not vulgar merely because it is common. View quote
William Hazlitt
Like a rustic at a fair, we are full of amazement and rapture, and have no thought of going home, or that it will soon be night. View quote
William Hazlitt
Walk groundly, talk profoundly, drink roundly, sleep soundly. View quote
William Hazlitt
There are many who talk on from ignorance rather than from knowledge, and who find the former an inexhaustible fund of conversation. View quote
William Hazlitt
The most silent people are generally those who think most highly of themselves. View quote
William Hazlitt
We learn to curb our will and keep our overt actions within the bounds of humanity, long before we can subdue our sentiments and imaginations to the same mild tone. View quote
William Hazlitt
Silence is one great art of conversation. He is not a fool who knows when to hold his tongue and a person may gain credit for sense, eloquence, wit, who merely says nothing to lessen the opinion which others have of these qualities in themselves. View quote
William Hazlitt
We pamper little grief's into great ones, And bear great ones as well as we can. View quote
William Hazlitt
You will hear more good things on the outside of a stagecoach from London to Oxford than if you were to pass a twelve-month with the undergraduates, or heads of colleges, of that famous university. (William Hazlitt)
Taste is nothing but an enlarged capacity for receiving pleasure from works of imagination. View quote
William Hazlitt
In what we really understand, we reason but little. View quote
William Hazlitt
Honesty is one part eloquence. We persuade others by being in earnest ourselves. View quote
William Hazlitt
The difference between the vanity of a Frenchman and an Englishman seems to be this The one thinks everything right that is French, the other thinks everything wrong that is not English. View quote
William Hazlitt
The Irish are hearty, the Scotch plausible, the French polite, the Germans good-natured, the Italians courtly, the Spaniards reserved and decorous - the English alone seem to exist in taking and giving offense. View quote
William Hazlitt
People do not seem to talk for the sake of expressing their opinions, but to maintain an opinion for the sake of talking. View quote
William Hazlitt
The truly proud man is satisfied with his own good opinion, and does not seek to make converts to it. View quote
William Hazlitt
The only true retirement is that of the heart the only true leisure is the repose of the passions. To such persons it makes little difference whether they are young or old and they die as they have lived, with graceful resignation. View quote
William Hazlitt
General principles are not the less true or important because from their nature they elude immediate observation they are like the air, which is not the less necessary because we neither see nor feel it. View quote
William Hazlitt
The assumption of merit is easier, less embarrassing, and more effectual than the actual attainment of it. (William Hazlitt)
There are only 3 pleasures in life pure and lasting, and they all are derived from inanimate things books, pictures, and the face of nature. View quote
William Hazlitt
As we advance in life, we acquire a keener sense of the value of time. Nothing else, indeed, seems of any consequence and we become misers in this respect. View quote
William Hazlitt
Genius is a native to the soil where it grows - is fed by the air, and warmed by the sun and is not a hothouse plant or an exotic. View quote
William Hazlitt
Sincerity has to do with the connect between our words and thoughts, and not between our belief and actions. View quote
William Hazlitt