William Hazlitt Quotes

We had as lief not be as not be ourselves.

Poetry is all that is worth remembering in life.

A life of action and danger moderates the dread of death. It not only gives us fortitude to bear pai...

Look up, laugh loud, talk big, keep the color in your cheek and the fire in your eye, adorn your per...

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps for he is the only animal that is struck with the diff...

A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.

We may be willing to tell a story twice never to hear it more than once.

Love turns, with a little indulgence, to indifference or disgust; hatred alone is immortal.

The best part of our lives we pass in counting on what is to come.

If you give an audience a chance they will do half your acting for you.

Silence is one great art of conversation.

The most silent people are generally those who think most highly of themselves.

Poetry is only the highest eloquence of passion, the most vivid form of expression that can be given...

Let a man's talents or virtues be what they may he will only feel satisfaction in his society as he...

The difference between the vanity of a Frenchman and an Englishman seems to be this: The one thinks ...

Repose is necessary to great efforts, and he who is never idle, labours in vain!

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps for he is the only animal that is struck by the differ...

The world loves to be amused by hollow professions, to be deceived by flattering appearances, to liv...

The dupe of friendship, and the fool of love; have I not reason to hate and to despise myself? Indee...

To be capable of steady friendship or lasting love are the two greatest proofs not only of goodness...

All that men really understand is confined to a very small compass to their daily affairs and exper...

Few things tend more to alienate friendship than a want of punctuality in our engagements. I have kn...

There is nothing good to be had in the country or if there be they will not let you have it.

The soul of dispatch is decision.

We are not hypocrites in our sleep.

Anyone is to be pitied who has just sense enough to perceive his deficiencies.

We often choose a friend as we do a mistress for no particular excellence in themselves but merely...

Danger is a good teacher, and makes apt scholars. So are disgrace, defeat, exposure to immediate sco...

To write a genuine familiar or truly English style, is to write as any one would speak in common con...

Books let us into their souls and lay open to us the secrets of our

The more we do, the more we can do.

Sacrifices are no sacrifices when they are repaid a thousand fold.

Love turns, with little indulgence, to indifference or disgust: hatred alone is immortal.

The perceiving our own weaknesses enables us to give others excellent advice, but it does not teach ...

In some situations, if you say nothing, you are called dull; if you talk, you are thought impertinen...

He will never have true friends who is afraid of making enemies.

The art of conversation is the art of hearing as well as of being heard.

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

A great chessplayer is not a great man, for he leaves the world as he found it.

A man's life is his whole life, not the last glimmering snuff of the candle; and this, I say, is con...

He understands the texture and meaning of the visible universe, and 'sees into the life of things,' ...

Words are the only things that last for ever.

Good-nature, or what is often considered as such, is the most selfish of all the virtues: it is nine...

The world dread nothing so much as being convinced of their errors.

There is a secret pride in every human heart that revolts at tyranny. You may order and drive an ind...

If a person has no delicacy he has you in his power.

the old maxim... "there are three things necessary to success in life--Impudence! Impudence! Impuden...

The way to procure insults is to submit to them. A man meets with no more respect than he exacts.

Actors are the only honest hypocrites.

The most insignificant people are the most apt to sneer at others. They are safe from reprisals. And...

True friendship is self-love at second hand.

Learning is the knowledge of that which none but the learned know.

If we wish to know the force of human genius we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insi...

Calumny requires no proof. The throwing out of malicious imputations against any character leaves a ...

The seat of knowledge is in the head; of wisdom, in the heart. We are sure to judge wrong, if we do ...

Modern fanaticism thrives in proportion to the quanitity of contradictions and nonsense it poures do...

A hypocrite despises those whom he deceives, but has no respect for himself. He would make a dupe of...

One truth discovered one pang of regret at not being able to express it is better than all the flu...

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is struck with the diff...

Poetry is the universal language which the heart holds with nature and itself. He who has a contempt...

Prejudice is the child of ignorance.

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

A nickname is the heaviest stone that the devil can throw at a man. It is a bugbear to the imaginati...

We do not see nature with our eyes, but with our understandings and our hearts.

Man is a make-believe animal - he is never so truly himself as when he is acting a part.

Those people who are uncomfortable in themselves are disagreeable to others.

I am not, in the ordinary acceptation of the term, a good-natured man; that is, many things annoy me...

The love of liberty is the love of others the love of power is the love of ourselves.

The same reason makes a man a religious enthusiast that makes a man an enthusiast in any other way: ...

Prosperity is a great teacher adversity is a greater. Possession pampers the mind privation trains...

The love of liberty is the love of others the love of power is the love of ourselves.

Wit is the salt of conversation, not the food.

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

The path of genius is free, and its own

Without the aid of prejudice and custom I should not be able to find my way across the room.

You know more of a road by having traveled it than by all the conjectures and descriptions in the wo...

We do not die wholly at our deaths: we have moldered away gradually long before. Faculty after facul...

An honest man speaks the truth, though it may give offence; a vain man, in order that it may.

THE rule for travelling abroad is to take our common sense with us, and leave our prejudices behind ...

None but those who are happy in themselves can make others so.

Never so sure our rapture to createAs when it touch'd the brink of all we hate.

The only impeccable writers are those who never wrote.

As is our confidence so is our capacity.

The public have neither shame nor gratitude.

Grace in women has more effect than beauty.

We must be doing something to be happy.

Reflection makes men cowards.

The same reason makes a man a religious enthusiast that makes a man an enthusiast in any other way ....

To get others to come into our ways of thinking we must go over to theirs and it is necessary to f...

Rules and models destroy genius and art.

Our energy is in proportion to the resistance it meets. We attempt nothing great but from a sense of...

Zeal will do more than knowledge.

We are very much what others think of us. The reception our observations meet with gives us courage ...

Simplicity of character is the natural result of profound thought.

If we wish to know the force of human genius we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insig...

Learning is its own exceeding great reward.

It is well there is no one without fault for he would not have a friend in the world. He would seem...

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps for he is the only animal that is struck with the diff...

Horus non numero nisi serenas (I count only the sunny hours).

We occasionally see something on the stage that reminds us a

Great thoughts reduced to practice become great acts.