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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

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There Is Nothing So

William Hazlitt

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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.

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The Vain Man Makes A Merit Of Misfortune, And Triumphs In His Disgrace.

The More A Man Writes, The More He Can Write.

A Knave Thinks Himself A Fool, All The Time He Is Not Making A Fool Of Some Other Person.

To Display The Greatest Powers, Unless They Are Applied To Great Purposes, Makes Nothing For The Character Of Greatness.

What I Mean By Living To One's Self Is Living In The World, As In It, Not Of It.

Art Must Anchor In Nature, Or It Is The Sport Of Every Breath Of Folly.

If Mankind Had Wished For What Is Right, They Might Have Had It Long Ago.

Religion Either Makes Men Wise And Virtuous, Or It Makes Them Set Up False Pretenses To Both.

We Do Not Attend To The Advice Of The Sage And Experienced Because We Think They Are Old, Forgetting That They Once Were Young And Placed In The Same Situations As Ourselves.

The Smallest Pain In Our Little Finger Gives Us More Concern Than The Destruction Of Millions Of Our Fellow Beings.

There Are Few Things In Which We Deceive Ourselves More Than In The Esteem We Profess To Entertain For Our Firends. It Is Little Better Than A Piece Of Quackery. The Truth Is, We Think Of Them As We Please, That Is, As They Please Or Displease Us.

Fashion Is Gentility Running Away From Vulgarity And Afraid Of Being Overtaken

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.

Charity, Like Nature, Abhors A Vacuum. Next To Putting It In A Bank, Men Like To Squander Their Superfluous Wealth On Those To Whom It Is Sure To Be Doing The Least Possible Good.

The Way To Procure Insults Is To Submit To Them. A Man Meets With No More Respect Than He Exacts.

Dandyism Is A Species Of Genius.

The Corpse Of Friendship Is Not Worth Embalming.

Features Alone Do Not Run In The Blood; Vices And Virtues, Genius And Folly, Are Transmitted Through The Same Sure But Unseen Channel.

Prejudice Is Never Easy Unless It Can Pass Itself Off For Reason.

To Be Forward To Praise Others Implies Either Great Eminence, That Can Afford To, Part With Applause; Or Great Quickness Of Discernment, With Confidence In Our Own Judgments; Or Great Sincerity And Love Of Truth, Getting The Better Of Our Self-love.

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.

Fashion Is The Abortive Issue Of Vain Ostentation And Exclusive Egotism ... Tied To No Rule, And Bound To Conform To Every Whim Of The Minute.

Asleep, Nobody Is A Hypocrite

Envy Among Other Ingredients Has A Mixture Of The Love Of Justice In It. We Are More Angry At Undeserved Than At Deserved Good-fortune.

The More We Do, The More We Can Do.

Leisure Activities

Famous Motivational

Pure Good Soon Grows Insipid, Wants Variety And Spirit. Pain Is A Bittersweet, Which Never Surfeits. Love Turns, With A Little Indulgence, To Indifference Or Disgust. Hatred Alone Is Immortal.

I Am Then Never Less Alone Than When Alone

Old Friendships Are Like Meats Served Up Repeatedly, Cold, Comfortless, And Distasteful. The Stomach Turns Against Them.

It Is Only Necessary To Raise A Bugbear Before The English Imagination In Order To Govern It At Will. Whatever They Hate Or Fear, They Implicitly Believe In, Merely From The Scope It Gives To These Passions.

Everything Is In Motion. Everything Flows. Everything Is Vibrating.

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.

Within My Heart Is Lurking Suspicion, And Base Fear, And Shame And Hate; But Above All, Tyrannous Love Sits Throned, Crowned With Her Graces, Silent And In Tears.

There Is Evil Poured Upon The Earth From The Overflowings Of Corruption-- Sickness, And Poverty, And Pain, And Guilt, And Madness, And Sorrow; But, As The Water From A Fountain Riseth And Sinketh To Its Level, Ceaselessly Toileth Justice To Equalize The Lots Of Men.

Prejudice Is The Child Of Ignorance.

People Do Not Persist In Their Vices Because They Are Not Weary Of Them, But Because They Cannot Leave Them Off. It Is The Nature Of Vice To Leave Us No Resource But In Itself.

Kings Ought Never To Be Seen Upon The Stage. In The Abstract, They Are Very Disagreeable Characters: It Is Only While Living That They Are 'the Best Of Kings'. It Is Their Power, Their Splendour, It Is The Apprehension Of The Personal Consequences Of Their Favour Or Their Hatred That Dazzles The Imagination And Suspends The Judgement Of Their Favourites Or Their Vassals; But Death Cancels The Bond Of Allegiance And Of Interest; And Seen As They Were, Their Power And Their Pretensions Look Monstrous And Ridiculous.

A Hair In The Head Is Worth Two In The Brush.

I Am Always Afraid Of A Fool. One Cannot Be Sure That He Is Not A Knave As Well.

Affectation Is As Necessary To The Mind As Dress Is To The Body.

Death Puts An End To Rivalship And Competition. The Dead Can Boast No Advantage Over Us, Nor Can We Triumph Over Them.

The Most Violent Friendships Soonest Wear Themselves Out.

In Some Situations, If You Say Nothing, You Are Called Dull; If You Talk, You Are Thought Impertinent And Arrogant. It Is Hard To Know What To Do In This Case. The Question Seems To Be, Whether Your Vanity Or Your Prudence Predominates.

A Life Of Action And Danger Moderates The Dread Of Death.

The Great Requisite For The Prosperous Management Of Ordinary Business Is The Want Of Imagination.

The Severest Critics Are Always Those Who Have Either Never Attempted, Or Who Have Failed In Original Composition.

To Create An Unfavorable Impression, It Is Not Necessary That Certain Things Should Be True, But That They Have Been Said.

It Is A False Principle That Because We Are Entirely Occupied With Ourselves, We Must Equally Occupy The Thoughts Of Others. The Contrary Inference Is The Fair One.

The Greatest Offence Against Virtue Is To Speak Ill Of It.

There Is Nothing Good To Be Had In The Country, Or If There Is, They Will Not Let You Have It.

Love Turns, With A Little Indulgence, To Indifference Or Disgust; Hatred Alone Is Immortal.

With Women, The Great Business Of Life Is Love; And They Generally Make A Mistake In It. They Consult Neither The Heart Nor The Head, But Are Led Away By Mere Humour And Fancy. If Instead Of A Companion For Life, They Had To Choose A Partner In A Country-dance Or To Trifle Away An Hour With, Their Mode Of Calculation Would Be Right. They Tie Their True-lover's Knot With Idle, Thoughtless Haste, While The Institutions Of Society Render It Indissoluble.

Tyrants Forego All Respect For Humanity In Proportion As They Are Sunk Beneath It. Taught To Believe Themselves Of A Different Species, They Really Become So, Lose Their Participation With Their Kind, And In Mimicking The God Dwindle Into The Brute.

Whatever Interests Is Interesting.

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.

The Devil Was A Great Loss In The Preternatural World. He Was Always Something To Fear And To Hate; He Supplied The Antagonist Powers Of The Imagination, And The Arch Of True Religion Hardly Stands Firm Without Him.

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 Most Silent People Are Generally Those Who Think Most Highly Of Themselves.

Nothing Gives Such A Blow To Friendship As The Detecting Another In An Untruth. It Strikes At The Root Of Our Confidence Ever After.

You Know More Of A Road By Having Traveled It Than By All The Conjectures And Descriptions In The World.

The World Dread Nothing So Much As Being Convinced Of Their Errors.

A Nickname Is The Hardest Stone That The Devil Can Throw At A Man.

Those Who Make Their Dress A Principal Part Of Themselves, Will, In General, Become Of No More Value Than Their Dress.

A Thought Must Tell At Once, Or Not At All.

A Hypocrite Despises Those Whom He Deceives, But Has No Respect For Himself. He Would Make A Dupe Of Himself Too, If He Could.

Without Life There Can Be No Action — No Objects Of Pursuit — No Restless Desires — No Tormenting Passions. Hence It Is That We Fondly Cling To It — That We Dread Its Termination As The Close, Not Of Enjoyment, But Of Hope.

The Look Of A Gentleman Is Little Else Than The Reflection Of The Looks Of The World.

Love At First Sight Is Only Realizing An Imagination That Has Always Haunted Us; Or Meeting With A Face, A Figure, Or Cast Of Expression In Perfection That We Have Seen And Admired In A Less Degree Or In Less Favorable Circumstances A Hundred Times Before.

All Is Without Form And Void. Someone Said Of His Landscapes That They Were Pictures Of Nothing And Very Like.

The Last Pleasure In Life Is The Sense Of Discharging Our Duty.

We Must Overact Our Part In Some Measure, In Order To Produce Any Effect At All.

Gallantry To Women - The Sure Road To Their Favor - Is Nothing But The Appearance Of Extreme Devotion To All Their Wants And Wishes, A Delight In Their Satisfaction, And A Confidence In Yourself As Being Able To Contribute Toward It

Grace In Women Has More Effect Than Beauty. We Sometimes See A Certain Fine Self-possession, An Habitual Voluptuousness Of Character, Which Reposes On Its Own Sensations And Derives Pleasure From All Around It, That Is More Irresistible Than Any Other Attraction. There Is An Air Of Languid Enjoyment In Such Persons, "in Their Eyes, In Their Arms, And Their Hands, And Their Face," Which Robs Us Of Ourselves, And Draws Us By A Secret Sympathy Towards Them.

Power Is Pleasure; And Pleasure Sweetens Pain.

Any One May Mouth Out A Passage With A Theatrical Cadence, Or Get Upon Stilts To Tell His Thoughts; But To Write Or Speak With Propriety And Simplicity Is A More Difficult Task. Thus It Is Easy To Affect A Pompous Style, To Use A Word Twice As Big As The Thing You Want To Express; It Is Not So Easy To Pitch Upon The Very Word That Exactly Fits It.

The World Judge Of Men By Their Ability In Their Profession, And We Judge Of Ourselves By The Same Test: For It Is On That On Which Our Success In Life Depends.

We Prefer Ourselves To Others, Only Because We A Have More Intimate Consciousness And Confirmed Opinion Of Our Own Claims And Merits Than Of Any Other Person's.

The Most Learned Are Often The Most Narrow Minded.

Open Mindedness

You Will Hear More Good Things On The Outside Of A Stagecoach From London To Oxford Than If You Were To Pass A Twelvemonth With The Undergraduates, Or Heads Of Colleges, Of That Famous University.

No Really Great Man Ever Thought Himself So.

It Is Essential To The Triumph Of Reform That It Should Never Succeed.

Humanity Is To Be Met With In A Den Of Robbers.

We Can Be Said Only To Fulfil Our Destiny In The Place That Gave Us Birth. I Should On This Account Like Well Enough To Spend The Whole Of My Life In Travelling Abroad, If I Could Anywhere Borrow Another Life To Spend Afterwards At Home!

The Characteristic Of Chaucer Is Intensity: Of Spencer, Remoteness: Of Milton Elevation And Of Shakespeare Everything.

A Whig Is Properly What Is Called A Trimmer - That Is, A Coward To Both Sides Of The Question, Who Dare Not Be A Knave Nor An Honest Man, But Is A Sort Of Whiffing, Shuffling, Cunning, Silly, Contemptible, Unmeaning Negation Of The Two.

Our Energy Is In Proportion To The Resistance It Meets. We Attempt Nothing Great But From A Sense Of The Difficulties We Have To Encounter, We Persevere In Nothing Great But From A Pride In Overcoming Them.

Anyone Must Be Mainly Ignorant Or Thoughtless, Who Is Surprised At Everything He Sees; Or Wonderfully Conceited Who Expects Everything To Conform To His Standard Of Propriety.

The Admiration Of Power In Others Is As Common To Man As The Love Of It In Himself; The One Makes Him A Tyrant, The Other A Slave.

The Art Of Life Is To Know How To Enjoy A Little And To Endure Very Much.

Persons Of Slender Intellectual Stamina Dread Competition, As Dwarfs Are Afraid Of Being Run Over In The Street.

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.

Any Woman May Act The Part Of A Coquette Successfully Who Has The Reputation Without The Scruples Of Modesty. If A Woman Passes The Bounds Of Propriety For Our Sakes, And Throws Herself Unblushingly At Our Heads, We Conclude It Is Either From A Sudden And Violent Liking, Or From Extraordinary Merit On Our Parts, Either Of Which Is Enough To Turn Any Man's Head Who Has A Single Spark Of Gallantry Or Vanity In His Composition.

I Have A Much Greater Ambition To Be The Best Racket Player Than The Best Prose Writer.

Believe All The Good You Can Of Everyone. Do Not Measure Others By Yourself. If They Have Advantages Which You Have Not, Let Your Liberality Keep Pace With Their Good Fortune. Envy No One, And You Need Envy No One.

The Slaves Of Power Mind The Cause They Have To Serve, Because Their Own Interest Is Concerned; But The Friends Of Liberty Always Sacrifice Their Cause, Which Is Only The Cause Of Humanity, To Their Own Spleen, Vanity, And Self-opinion.

Painting Gives The Object Itself; Poetry What It Implies. Painting Embodies What A Thing Contains In Itself; Poetry Suggests What Exists Out Of It, In Any Manner Connected With It.

...greatness Sympathises With Greatness, And Littleness Shrinks Into Itself.

Spleen Can Subsist On Any Kind Of Food.

Books Let Us Into Their Souls And Lay Open To Us The Secrets Of Our Own.

Life Is A Continued Struggle To Be What We Are Not, And To Do What We Cannot.

Virtue Steals, Like A Guilty Thing, Into The Secret Haunts Of Vice And Infamy, Clings To Their Devoted Victim, And Will Not Be Driven Quite Away. Nothing Can Destroy The Human Heart.

The Truth Is, We Pamper Little Griefs Into Great Ones, And Bear Great Ones As Well As We Can.

Every Man, In Judging Of Himself, Is His Own Contemporary. He May Feel The Gale Of Popularity, But He Cannot Tell How Long It Will Last. His Opinion Of Himself Wants Distance, Wants Time, Wants Numbers, To Set It Off And Confirm It.

Envy Is A Littleness Of Soul, Which Cannot See Beyond A Certain Point, And If It Does Not Occupy The Whole Space Feels Itself Excluded.

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.

He Who Would See Old Hoghton Right Must View It By The Pale Moonlight.

To-day Kings, To-marrow Beggars, It Is Only When They Are Themselves That They Are Nothing.

To Think Justly, We Must Understand What Others Mean. To Know The Value Of Our Thoughts, We Must Try Their Effect On Other Minds.

To A Superior Race Of Being The Pretensions Of Mankind To Extraordinary Sanctity And Virtue Must Seem... Ridiculous.

We Had Rather Do Anything Than Acknowledge The Merit Of Another If We Can Help It. We Cannot Bear A Superior Or An Equal. Hence Ridicule Is Sure To Prevail Over Truth, For The Malice Of Mankind, Thrown Into The Scale, Gives The Casting Weight.

Perhaps The Best Cure For The Fear Of Death Is To Reflect That Life Has A Beginning As Well As An End.

Our Lives Are Ruled By Impermanence. The Challenge Is How To Create Something Of Enduring Value Within The Context Of Our Impermanent Lives. Soka Gakkai Great Thoughts Reduced To Practice Become Great Acts.

By Conversing With The Mighty Dead, We Imbibe Sentiment With Knowledge. We Become Strongly Attached To Those Who Can No Longer Either Hurt Or Serve Us, Except Through The Influence Which They Exert Over The Mind. We Feel The Presence Of That Power Which Gives Immortality To Human Thoughts And Actions, And Catch The Flame Of Enthusiasm From All Nations And Ages.

Danger Is A Good Teacher, And Makes Apt Scholars. So Are Disgrace, Defeat, Exposure To Immediate Scorn And Laughter. There Is No Opportunity In Such Cases For Self-delusion, No Idling Time Away, No Being Off Your Guard (or You Must Take The Consequences) - Neither Is There Any Room For Humour Or Caprice Or Prejudice.

Poetry Is Only The Highest Eloquence Of Passion, The Most Vivid Form Of Expression That Can Be Given To Our Conception Of Anything, Whether Pleasurable Or Painful, Mean Or Dignified, Delightful Or Distressing. It Is The Perfect Coincidence Of The Image And The Words With The Feeling We Have, And Of Which We Cannot Get Rid In Any Other Way, That Gives An Instant "satisfaction To The Thought." This Is Equally The Origin Of Wit And Fancy, Of Comedy And Tragedy, Of The Sublime And Pathetic.

Few Things Tend More To Alienate Friendship Than A Want Of Punctuality In Our Engagements. I Have Known The Breach Of A Promise To Dine Or Sup To Break Up More Than One Intimacy.

A Grave Blockhead Should Always Go About With A Lively One - They Show One Another Off To The Best Advantage.

The Seat Of Knowledge Is In The Head; Of Wisdom, In The Heart. We Are Sure To Judge Wrong, If We Do Not Feel Right.

None But Those Who Are Happy In Themselves Can Make Others So.

We Are Governed By Sympathy; And The Extent Of Our Sympathy Is Determined By That Of Our Sensibility

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.

Those Who Are At War With Others Are Not At Peace With Themselves.

Want Of Principle Is Power. Truth And Honesty Set A Limit To Our Efforts, Which Impudence And Hypocrisy Easily Overleap.

Vice Is Man's Nature: Virtue Is A Habit -- Or A Mask. . . . The Foregoing Maxim Shows The Difference Between Truth And Sarcasm.

Men Of Gravity Are Intellectual Stammerers, Whose Thoughts Move Slowly.

No Truly Great Person Ever Thought Themselves So.

Perhaps The Best Cure For The Fear Of Death Is To Reflect That Life Has A Beginning As Well As An End. There Was A Time When We Were Not: This Gives Us No Concern. Why, Then, Should It Trouble Us That A Time Will Come When We Shall Cease To Be?

One Of The Pleasantest Things In The World Is Going On A Journey; But I Like To Go By Myself.

So I Have Loitered My Life Away, Reading Books, Looking At Pictures, Going To Plays, Hearing, Thinking, Writing On What Pleased Me Best. I Have Wanted Only One Thing To Make Me Happy, But Wanting That Have Wanted Everything.

The Temple Of Fame Stands Upon The Grave: The Flame That Burns Upon Its Altars Is Kindled From The Ashes Of Great Men.

He Who Comes Up To His Own Idea Of Greatness Must Always Have Had A Very Low Standard Of It In His Mind.

To Give A Reason For Anything Is To Breed A Doubt Of It.

That Humanity And Sincerity Which Dispose Men To Resist Injustice And Tyranny Render Them Unfit To Cope With The Cunning And Power Of Those Who Are Opposed To Them. The Friends Of Liberty Trust To The Professions Of Others Because They Are Themselves Sincere, And Endeavour To Secure The Public Good With The Least Possible Hurt To Its Enemies, Who Have No Regard To Anything But Their Own Unprincipled Ends, And Stick At Nothing To Accomplish Them.

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.

To Write A Genuine Familiar Or Truly English Style Is To Write As Anyone Would Speak In Common Conversation, Who Had A Thorough Command And Choice Of Words, Or Who Could Discourse With Ease, Force, And Perspicuity, Setting Aside All Pedantic And Oratorical Flourishes.

Some One Is Generally Sure To Be The Sufferer By A Joke.

The Love Of Fame Is Almost Another Name For The Love Of Excellence; Or It Is The Ambition To Attain The Highest Excellence, Sanctioned By The Highest Authority, That Of Time.

A Really Great Man Has Always An Idea Of Something Greater Than Himself.

Habit In Most Cases Hardens And Encrusts By Taking Away The Keener Edge Of Our Sensations: But Does It Not In Others Quicken And Refine, By Giving A Mechanical Facility And By Engrafting An Acquired Sense?

The Most Rational Cure After All For The Inordinate Fear Of Death Is To Set A Just Value On Life.

The Youth Is Better Than The Old Age Of Friendship.

A Certain Excess Of Animal Spirits With Thoughtless Good-humor Will Often Make More Enemies Than The Most Deliberate Spite And Ill-nature, Which Is On Its Guard, And Strikes With Caution And Safety.

I Like A Person Who Knows His Own Mind And Sticks To It; Who Sees At Once What, In Given Circumstances, Is To Be Done, And Does It.

We Never Do Anything Well Till We Cease To Think About The Manner Of Doing It.

A Situation In A Public Office Is Secure, But Laborious And Mechanical, And Without The Great Springs Of Life, Hope And Fear.

Humour Is The Making Others Act Or Talk Absurdly And Unconsciously; Wit Is The Pointing Out And Ridiculing That Absurdity Consciously, And With More Or Less Ill-nature.

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.

No Young Man Ever Thinks He Shall Die.

True Friendship Is Self-love At Second-hand.

When One Can Do Better Than Everyone Else In The Same Walk, One Does Not Make Any Very Painful Exertions To Outdo Oneself. The Progress Of Improvement Ceases Nearly At The Point Where Competition Ends.

Wherever The Government Does Not Emanate...from The People, The Principle Of The Government, The Esprit De Corps, The Point Of Honour, In All Those Connected With It, And Raised By It To Privileges Above The Law And Above Humanity, Will Be Hatred To The People.

The English (it Must Be Owned) Are Rather A Foul-mouthed Nation.

A Man In Love Prefers His Passion To Every Other Consideration, And Is Fonder Of His Mistress Than He Is Of Virtue. Should She Prove Vicious, She Makes Vice Lovely In His Eyes.

By Despising All That Has Preceded Us, We Teach Others To Despise Ourselves.

Whatever Excites The Spirit Of Contradiction Is Capable Of Producing The Last Effects Of Heroism; Which Is Only The Highest Pitch Of Obstinacy, In A Good Or Bad Cause, In Wisdom Or Folly.

Painting For A Whole Morning Gives One As Excellent An Appetite For One's Dinner, As Old Abraham Tucker Acquired For His By Riding Over Banstead Downs.

A Man Knows His Companion In A Long Journey And A Little Inn.

Pride Erects A Little Kingdom Of Its Own, And Acts As Sovereign In It.

What Are The Publications That Succeed? Those That Pretend To Teach The Public That The Persons They Have Been Accustomed Unwittingly To Look Up To As The Lights Of The Earth Are No Better Than Themselves.

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.

A Person Who Talks With Equal Vivacity On Every Subject, Excites No Interest In Any. Repose Is As Necessary In Conversation As In A Picture.

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.

The Safest Kind Of Praise Is To Foretell That Another Will Become Great In Some Particular Way. It Has The Greatest Show Of Magnanimity And The Least Of It In Reality.

What Passes In The World For Talent Or Dexterity Or Enterprise Is Often Only A Want Of Moral Principle. We May Succeed Where Others Fail, Not From A Greater Share Of Invention, But From Not Being Nice In The Choice Of Expedients.

The Mind Of Man Is Like A Clock That Is Always Running Down, And Requires To Be Constantly Wound Up.

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.

He Who Does Nothing Renders Himself Incapable Of Doing Any Thing; But While We Are Executing Any Work, We Are Preparing And Qualifying Ourselves To Undertake Another.

If I Have Not Read A Book Before, It Is, For All Intents And Purposes, New To Me Whether It Was Printed Yesterday Or Three Hundred Years Ago.

Weakness Has Its Hidden Resources, As Well As Strength. There Is A Degree Of Folly And Meanness Which We Cannot Calculate Upon, And By Which We Are As Much Liable To Be Foiled As By The Greatest Ability Or Courage.

It Is Better To Desire Than To Enjoy, To Love Than To Be Loved.

Our Repugnance To Death Increases In Proportion To Our Consciousness Of Having Lived In Vain.

In Love We Do Not Think Of Moral Qualities, And Scarcely Of Intellectual Ones. Temperament And Manner Alone, With Beauty, Excite Love.

A Man's Reputation Is Not In His Own Keeping, But Lies At The Mercy Of The Profligacy Of Others. Calumny Requires No Proof.

Just As Much As We See In Others We Have In Ourselves.

Self Confidence

The Worst Old Age Is That Of The Mind.

Political Truth Is Libel; Religious Truth, Blasphemy.

Whatever Is Placed Beyond The Reach Of Sense And Knowledge, Whatever Is Imperfectly Discerned, The Fancy Pieces Out At Its Leisure; And All But The Present Moment, But The Present Spot, Passion Claims For Its Own, And Brooding Over It With Wings Outspread, Stamps It With An Image Of Itself. Passion Is Lord Of Infinite Space, And Distant Objects Please Because They Border On Its Confines And Are Moulded By Its Touch.

Habit Is Necessary To Give Power.

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

Habitual Liars Invent Falsehoods Not To Gain Any End Or Even To Deceive Their Hearers, But To Amuse Themselves. It Is Partly Practice And Partly Habit. It Requires An Effort In Them To Speak Truth.

Violent Antipathies Are Always Suspicious, And Betray A Secret Affinity.

When I Am In The Country, I Wish To Vegetate Like The Country.

Wit Is, In Fact, The Eloquence Of Indifference.

One Truth Discovered, One Pang Of Regret At Not Being Able To Express It, Is Better Than All The Fluency And Flippancy In The World.

Genius Only Leaves Behind It The Monuments Of Its Strength.

Humour Is The Describing The Ludicrous As It Is In Itself; Wit Is The Exposing It, By Comparing Or Contrasting It With Something Else. Humour Is, As It Were, The Growth Of Nature And Accident; Wit Is The Product Of Art And Fancy.

If You Think You Can Win, You Can Win. Faith Is Necessary To Victory.

It Is Remarkable How Virtuous And Generously Disposed Every One Is At A Play.

Natural Affection Is A Prejudice; For Though We Have Cause To Love Our Nearest Connections Better Than Others, We Have No Reason To Think Them Better Than Others.

Malice Often Takes The Garb Of Truth.

The Perfect Joys Of Heaven Do Not Satisfy The Cravings Of Nature.

The Dupe Of Friendship, And The Fool Of Love; Have I Not Reason To Hate And To Despise Myself? Indeed I Do; And Chiefly For Not Having Hated And Despised The World Enough.

Lost Friendship

Those Only Deserve A Monument Who Do Not Need One; That Is, Who Have Raised Themselves A Monument In The Minds And Memories Of Men.

Despair Swallows Up Cowardice.

There Is A Softness And A Harmony In The Words And In The Thought Unparalleled. Of All Conceits It Is Surely The Most Classical. "i Count Only The Hours That Are Serene.".

The Most Phlegmatic Dispositions Often Contain The Most Inflammable Spirits, As Fire Is Struck From The Hardest Flints.

To Die Is Only To Be As We Were Before We Were Born; Yet No One Feels Any Remorse, Or Regret, Or Repugnance, In Contemplating This Last Idea.

In What We Really Understand, We Reason But Little.

If You Give An Audience A Chance They Will Do Half Your Acting For You.

When You Find Out A Man's Ruling Passion, Beware Of Crossing Him In It.

Well I've Had A Happy Life.

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