The most learned are often the most narrow minded. William Hazlitt More Quotes by William Hazlitt More Quotes From William Hazlitt Silence is one great art of conversation. William Hazlitt communicationsilenceart 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. William Hazlitt doelittlespeace It is essential to the triumph of reform that it should never succeed. William Hazlitt triumphreformessentials We never do anything well till we cease to think about the manner of doing it. This is the reason why it is so difficult for any but natives to speak a language correctly or idiomatically. William Hazlitt languagereason-whythinking The great have private feelings of their own, to which the interests of humanity and justice must curtsy. Their interests are so far from being the same as those of the community, that they are in direct and necessary opposition to them; their power is at the expense of OUR weakness; their riches of OUR poverty; their pride of OUR degradation; their splendour of OUR wretchedness; their tyranny of OUR servitude. William Hazlitt communitypridejustice Man is a poetical animal, and delights in fiction. William Hazlitt animalmenfiction Genius only leaves behind it the monuments of its strength. William Hazlitt monumentbehindsgenius Men of the greatest genius are not always the most prodigal of their encomiums. But then it is when their range of power is confined, and they have in fact little perception, except of their own particular kind of excellence. William Hazlitt excellenceperceptionmen There is nothing so remote from vanity as true genius. It is almost as natural for those who are endowed with the highest powers of the human mind to produce the miracles of art, as for other men to breathe or move. Correggio, who is said to have produced some of his divinest works almost without having seen a picture, probably did not know that he had done anything extraordinary. William Hazlitt menartmoving There cannot be a surer proof of low origin, or of an innate meanness of disposition, than to be always talking and thinking of being genteel. William Hazlitt prooftalkingthinking The expression of a gentleman's face is not so much that of refinement, as of flexibility, not of sensibility and enthusiasm as of indifference; it argues presence of mind rather than enlargement of ideas. William Hazlitt presence-of-mindexpressionideas Poverty is the test of civility and the touchstone of friendship. William Hazlitt civilitypovertytests Poverty, when it is voluntary, is never despicable, but takes an heroical aspect. William Hazlitt despicableaspectpoverty We often choose a friend as we do a mistress - for no particular excellence in themselves, but merely from some circumstance that flatters our self-love. William Hazlitt mistressexcellenceself Principle is a passion for truth. William Hazlitt passionprinciples A man's reputation is not in his own keeping, but lies at the mercy of the profligacy of others. Calumny requires no proof. William Hazlitt reputationmenlying 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. William Hazlitt heartretirementworld Many a man would have turned rogue if he knew how. William Hazlitt roguesifsmen Nothing gives such a blow to friendship as the detecting another in an untruth. It strikes at the root of our confidence ever after. William Hazlitt rootsblowgiving As we are poetical in our natures, so we delight in fable. William Hazlitt delightfables
