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When We Hear Complaints Of The Wretchedness Or Vanity Of Human Life, The Proper Answer To Them Would Be That There Is Hardly Any One Who At Some Point Or Other Has Not Been In Love. If We Consider The High Abstraction Of This Feeling, Its Depth, Its Purity, Its Voluptuous Refinement, Even In The Meanest Breast, How Sacred And How Sweet It Is, This Alone May Reconcile Us To The Lot Of Humanity. That Drop Of Balm Turns The Bitter Cup To A Delicious Nectar.

-William Hazlitt

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When We Hear Complaints

William Hazlitt

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When We Hear Complaints Of The Wretchedness Or Vanity Of Human Life, The Proper Answer To Them Would Be That There Is Hardly Any One Who At Some Point Or Other Has Not Been In Love. If We Consider The High Abstraction Of This Feeling, Its Depth, Its Purity, Its Voluptuous Refinement, Even In The Meanest Breast, How Sacred And How Sweet It Is, This Alone May Reconcile Us To The Lot Of Humanity. That Drop Of Balm Turns The Bitter Cup To A Delicious Nectar.

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

Man Is A Poetical Animal, And Delights In Fiction.

We Have More Faith In A Well-written Romance While We Are Reading It Than In Common History. The Vividness Of The Representations In The One Case More Than Counterbalances The Mere Knowledge Of The Truth Of Facts In The Other.

Books Wind Into The Heart.

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

They Are, As It Were, Train-bearers In The Pageant Of Life, And Hold A Glass Up To Humanity, Frailer Than Itself. We See Ourselves At Second-hand In Them: They Show Us All That We Are, All That We Wish To Be, And All That We Dread To Be. What Brings The Resemblance Nearer Is, That, As They Imitate Us, We, In Our Turn, Imitate Them. There Is No Class Of Society Whom So Many Persons Regard With Affection As Actors.

To Get Others To Come Into Our Ways Of Thinking, We Must Go Over To Theirs; And It Is Necessary To Follow, In Order To Lead.

Learning Is Its Own Exceeding Great Reward; And At The Period Of Which We Speak, It Bore Other Fruits, Not Unworthy Of It.

I Hate Anything That Occupies More Space Than It Is Worth... I Hate To See A Parcel Of Big Words Without Anything In Them.

The Greatest Pleasure In Life Is That Of Reading While We Are Young. I Have Had As Much Of This Pleasure Perhaps As Any One.

A Great Chessplayer Is Not A Great Man, For He Leaves The World As He Found It.

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

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

The Public Is So In Awe Of Its Own Opinion That It Never Dares To Form Any, But Catches Up The First Idle Rumour, Lest It Should Be Behindhand In Its Judgment, And Echoes It Till It Is Deafened With The Sound Of Its Own Voice.

Great Thoughts Reduced To Practice Become Great Acts.

The Assumption Of Merit Is Easier, Less Embarrassing, And More Effectual Than The Actual Attainment Of It.

The Person Whose Doors I Enter With Most Pleasure, And Quit With Most Regret, Never Did Me The Smallest Favor.

Some People Break Promises For The Pleasure Of Breaking Them.

Keeping Promises

The Only Impeccable Writers Are Those Who Never Wrote.

The Greatest Reverses Of Fortune Are The Most Easily Borne From A Sort Of Dignity Belonging To Them.

We Are Cold To Others Only When We Are Dull In Ourselves.

The Objects That We Have Known In Better Days Are The Main Props That Sustain The Weight Of Our Affections, And Give Us Strength To Await Our Future Lot.

He Who Expects From A Great Name In Politics, In Philosophy, In Art, Equal Greatness In Other Things, Is Little Versed In Human Nature. Our Strength Lies In Our Weakness. The Learned In Books Are Ignorant Of The World. He Who Is Ignorant Of Books Is Often Well Acquainted With Other Things; For Life Is Of The Same Length In The Learned And Unlearned; The Mind Cannot Be Idle; If It Is Not Taken Up With One Thing, It Attends To Another Through Choice Or Necessity; And The Degree Of Previous Capacity In One Class Or Another Is A Mere Lottery.

When We Forget Old Friends, It Is A Sign We Have Forgotten Ourselves.

Those People Who Are Uncomfortable In Themselves Are Disagreeable To Others.

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

Every One In A Crowd Has The Power To Throw Dirt; None Out Of Ten Have The Inclination.

Let A Man's Talents Or Virtues Be What They May, He Will Only Feel Satisfaction In His Society As He Is Satisfied In Himself.

There Is Some Virtue In Almost Every Vice, Except Hypocrisy; And Even That, While It Is A Mockery Of Virtue, Is At The Same Time A Compliment To It.

The Greatest Grossness Sometimes Accompanies The Greatest Refinement, As A Natural Relief.

It Is Well There Is No One Without Fault; For He Would Not Have A Friend In The World. He Would Seem To Belong To S Different Species.

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

It Is Easier Taking The Beaten Path Than Making Our Way Over Bogs And Precipices. The Great Difficulty In Philosophy Is To Come To Every Question With A Mind Fresh And Unshackled By Former Theories, Though Strengthened By Exercise And Information.

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

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.

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.

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

His Hypothesis Goes To This - To Make The Common Run Of His Readers Fancy They Can Do All That Can Be Done By Genius, And To Make The Man Of Genius Believe He Can Only Do What Is To Be Done By Mechanical Rules And Systematic Industry. This Is Not A Very Feasible Scheme; Nor Is Sir Joshua Sufficiently Clear And Explicit In His Reasoning In Support Of It.

Books Are A World In Themselves, It Is True; But They Are Not The Only World. The World Itself Is A Volume Larger Than All The Libraries In It.

A Man's Reputation Is Not In His Own Keeping, But Lies At The Mercy Of The Profligacy Of Others. Calumny Requires No Proof. The Throwing Out [of] Malicious Imputations Against Any Character Leaves A Stain, Which No After-refutation Can Wipe Out. To Create An Unfavorable Impression, It Is Not Necessary That Certain Things Should Be True, But That They Have Been Said. The Imagination Is Of So Delicate A Texture That Even Words Wound It.

The Measure Of Any Man's Virtue Is What He Would Do, If He Had Neither The Laws Nor Public Opinion, Nor Even His Own Prejudices, To Control Him.

The More We Do, The More We Can Do; The More Busy We Are, The More Leisure We Have.

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

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

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

A Man Who Does Not Endeavour To Seem More Than He Is Will Generally Be Thought Nothing Of. We Habitually Make Such Large Deductions For Pretence And Imposture That No Real Merit Will Stand Against Them. It Is Necessary To Set Off Our Good Qualities With A Certain Air Of Plausibility And Self-importance, As Some Attention To Fashion Is Necessary.

The Idea Of What The Public Will Think Prevents The Public From Ever Thinking At All, And Acts As A Spell On The Exercise Of Private Judgment.

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

Principle Is A Passion For Truth.

Men Will Die For An Opinion As Soon As For Anything Else.

The Present Is An Age Of Talkers, And Not Of Doers; And The Reason Is, That The World Is Growing Old. We Are So Far Advanced In The Arts And Sciences, That We Live In Retrospect, And Dote On Past Achievement.

There Is A Quiet Repose And Steadiness About The Happiness Of Age, If The Life Has Been Well Spent. Its Feebleness Is Not Painful. The Nervous System Has Lost Its Acuteness. But, In Mature Years We Feel That A Burn, A Scald, A Cut, Is More Tolerable Than It Was In The Sensitive Period Of Youth.

I Like A Friend The Better For Having Faults That One Can Talk About.

From The Height From Which The Great Look Down On The World All The Rest Of Mankind Seem Equal.

No Young Man Ever Thinks He Shall Die.

The Worst Old Age Is That Of The Mind.

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.

We Judge Of Others For The Most Part By Their Good Opinion Of Themselves; Yet Nothing Gives Such Offense Or Creates So Many Enemies, As That Extreme Self-complacency Or Superciliousness Of Manner, Which Appears To Set The Opinion Of Every One Else At Defiance.

The Imagination Is Of So Delicate A Texture That Even Words Wound It.

The Insolence Of The Vulgar Is In Proportion To Their Ignorance. They Treat Everything With Contempt Which They Do Not Understand.

Man Is The Only Animal That Laughs And Weeps; For He Is The Only Animal That Is Struck With The Difference Between What Things Are, And What They Ought To Be.

Zeal Will Do More Than Knowledge.

No Act Terminating In Itself Constitutes Greatness.

The Garb Of Religion Is The Best Cloak For Power.

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.

Horus Non Numero Nisi Serenas (i Count Only The Sunny Hours).

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

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

The Essence Of Poetry Is Will And Passion.

We Find Many Things To Which The Prohibition Of Them Constitutes The Only Temptation.

Love And Joy Are Twins Or Born Of Each Other.

It May Be Made A Question Whether Men Grow Wiser As They Grow Older, Anymore Than They Grow Stronger Or Healthier Or Honest.

The Thing Is Plain. All That Men Really Understand, Is Confined To A Very Small Compass; To Their Daily Affairs And Experience; To What They Have An Opportunity To Know, And Motives To Study Or Practice. The Rest Is Affectation And Imposture.

He Who Is As Faithful To His Principles As He Is To Himself Is The True Partisan.

We Do Not See Nature With Our Eyes, But With Our Understandings And Our Hearts.

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

Language, If It Throws A Veil Over Our Ideas, Adds A Softness And Refinement To Them, Like That Which The Atmosphere Gives To Naked Objects.

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

The Number Of Objects We See From Living In A Large City Amuses The Mind Like A Perpetual Raree-show, Without Supplying It With Any Ideas.

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

Mankind Are An Incorrigible Race. Give Them But Bugbears And Idols -- It Is All That They Ask; The Distinctions Of Right And Wrong, Of Truth And Falsehood, Of Good And Evil, Are Worse Than Indifferent To Them.

Man Is A Make-believe Animal: He Is Never So Truly Himself As When He Is Acting A Part.

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.

The Fear Of Approaching Death, Which In Youth We Imagine Must Cause Inquietude To The Aged, Is Very Seldom The Source Of Much Uneasiness.

To Be Capable Of Steady Friendship Or Lasting Love, Are The Two Greatest Proofs, Not Only Of Goodness Of Heart, But Of Strength Of Mind.

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.

There Are Only Three Pleasures In Life Pure And Lasting, And All Derived From Inanimate Things-books, Pictures And The Face Of Nature.

Habit Is Necessary To Give Power.

A Gentleman Is One Who Understands And Shows Every Mark Of Deference To The Claims Of Self-love In Others, And Exacts It In Return From Them.

That Which Is Not, Shall Never Be; That Which Is, Shall Never Cease To Be. To The Wise, These Truths Are Self-evident.

The Way To Get On In The World Is To Be Neither More Nor Less Wise, Neither Better Nor Worse Than Your Neighbours.

The More We Do, The More We Can Do.

Leisure Activities

Famous Motivational

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

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.

Silence Is One Great Art Of Conversation.

Wit Is The Rarest Quality To Be Met With Among People Of Education, And The Most Common Among The Uneducated.

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

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

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.

There Is Room Enough In Human Life To Crowd Almost Every Art And Science In It. If We Pass ""no Day Without A Line""-visit No Place Without The Company Of A Book-we May With Ease Fill Libraries Or Empty Them Of Their Contents. The More We Do, The More Busy We Are, The More Leisure We Have.

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 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.

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.

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

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

Pride Is Founded Not On The Sense Of Happiness, But On The Sense Of Power.

Or Have I Passed My Time In Pouring Words Like Water Into Empty Sieves, Rolling A Stone Up A Hill And Then Down Again, Trying To Prove An Argument In The Teeth Of Facts, And Looking For Causes In The Dark, And Not Finding Them?

Grace In Women Has More Effect Than Beauty.

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

Success In Business Is Seldom Owing To Uncommon Talents Or Original Power Which Is Untractable And Self-willed, But To The Greatest Degree Of Commonplace Capacity.

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.

The Best Way To Make Ourselves Agreeable To Others Is By Seeming To Think Them So. If We Appear Fully Sensible Of Their Good Qualities They Will Not Complain Of The Want Of Them In Us.

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.

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

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.

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.

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

Our Contempt For Others Proves Nothing But The Illiberality And Narrowness Of Our Own Views.

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.".

We Prefer A Person With Vivacity And High Spirits, Though Bordering Upon Insolence, To The Timid And Pusillanimous; We Are Fonder Of Wit Joined To Malice Than Of Dullness Without It.

Indolence Is A Delightful But Distressing State; We Must Be Doing Something To Be Happy. Action Is No Less Necessary Than Thought To The Instinctive Tendencies Of The Human Frame.

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

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

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.

Belief Is With Them Mechanical, Voluntary: They Believe What They Are Paid For - They Swear To That Which Turns To Account. Do You Suppose, That After Years Spent In This Manner, They Have Any Feeling Left Answering To The Difference Between Truth And Falsehood?

Well I've Had A Happy Life.

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.

Without The Aid Of Prejudice And Custom, I Should Not Be Able To Find My Way Across The Room.

First Impressions Are Often The Truest, As We Find (not Unfrequently) To Our Cost When We Have Been Wheedled Out Of Them By Plausible Professions Or Actions. A Man's Look Is The Work Of Years, It Is Stamped On His Countenance By The Events Of His Whole Life, Nay, More, By The Hand Of Nature, And It Is Not To Be Got Rid Of Easily.

By Retaliating Our Sufferings On The Heads Of Those We Love, We Get Rid Of A Present Uneasiness And Incur Lasting Remorse. With The Accomplishment Of Our Revenge Our Fondness Returns; So That We Feel The Injury We Have Done Them, Even More Than They Do.

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

There Is Not A More Mean, Stupid, Dastardly, Pitiful, Selfish, Spiteful, Envious, Ungrateful Animal Than The Public. It Is The Greatest Of Cowards, For It Is Afraid Of Itself.

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.

In What We Really Understand, We Reason But Little.

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.

We Uniformly Applaud What Is Right And Condemn What Is Wrong, When It Costs Us Nothing But The Sentiment.

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.

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.

If We Wish To Know The Force Of Human Genius, We Should Read Shakespeare. If We Wish To See The Insignificance Of Human Learning, We May Study His Commentators.

Fame Is The Inheritance Not Of The Dead, But Of The Living. It Is We Who Look Back With Lofty Pride To The Great Names Of Antiquity.

Knowledge Is Pleasure As Well As Power.

Do Not Keep On With A Mockery Of Friendship After The Substance Is Gone - But Part, While You Can Part Friends. Bury The Carcass Of Friendship: It Is Not Worth Embalming.

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.

Genius Only Leaves Behind It The Monuments Of Its Strength.

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.

He Who Draws Upon His Own Resources Easily Comes To An End Of His Wealth.

The Corpse Of Friendship Is Not Worth Embalming.

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

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

A Wise Traveler Never Despises His Own Country.

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

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.

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.

Popularity Is Neither Fame Nor Greatness.

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.

Painters... Are The Most Lively Observers Of What Passes In The World About Them, And The Closest Observers Of What Passes In Their Own Minds.

While We Desire, We Do Not Enjoy; And With Enjoyment Desire Ceases.

There Is A Feeling Of Eternity In Youth Which Makes Us Amends For Everything. To Be Young Is To Be As One Of The Immortals.

He Will Never Have True Friends Who Is Afraid Of Making Enemies.

Hope Is The Best Possession.

The Love Of Letters Is The Forlorn Hope Of The Man Of Letters. His Ruling Passion Is The Love Of Fame.

Talent Is The Capacity Of Doing Anything That Depends On Application And Industry And It Is A Voluntary Power, While Genius Is Involuntary.

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.

You Shall Yourself Be Judge. Reason, With Most People, Means Their Own Opinion.

Hope Is The Best Possession. None Are Completely Wretched But Those Who Are Without Hope. Few Are Reduced So Low As That.

Hoping For The Best

Friendship Is Cemented By Interest, Vanity, Or The Want Of Amusement; It Seldom Implies Esteem, Or Even Mutual Regard.

No Truly Great Person Ever Thought Themselves So.

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

Those Who Can Command Themselves Command Others.

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

Vulgar Prejudices Are Those Which Arise Out Of Accident, Ignorance, Or Authority; Natural Prejudices Are Those Which Arise Out Of The Constitution Of The Human Mind Itself.

Man Is An Intellectual Animal, And Therefore An Everlasting Contradiction To Himself. His Senses Centre In Himself, His Ideas Reach To The Ends Of The Universe; So That He Is Torn In Pieces Between The Two, Without A Possibility Of Its Ever Being Otherwise.

He Is A Hypocrite Who Professes What He Does Not Believe; Not He Who Does Not Practice All He Wishes Or Approves.

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

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.

Landscape Painting Is The Obvious Resource Of Misanthropy.

Landscape Painting

Those Who Are Pleased With The Fewest Things Know The Least, As Those Who Are Pleased With Everything Know Nothing.

Modesty Is The Lowest Of The Virtues, And Is A Real Confession Of The Deficiency It Indicates. He Who Undervalues Himself Is Justly Undervalued By Others.

Poverty, Labor, And Calamity Are Not Without Their Luxuries, Which The Rich, The Indolent, And The Fortunate In Vain Seek For.

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

Dandyism Is A Variety Of Genius.

When The Imagination Is Continually Led To The Brink Of Vice By A System Of Terror And Denunciations, People Fling Themselves Over The Precipice From The Mere Dread Of Falling.

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.

It Has Been The Resolution Of Mankind In All Ages Of The World. No People, No Age, Ever Threw Away The Fruits Of Past Wisdom, Or The Enjoyment Of Present Blessings, For Visionary Schemes Of Ideal Perfection. It Is The Knowledge Of The Past, The Actual Infliction Of The Present, That Has Produced All Changes, All Innovations, And All Improvements - Not (as Is Pretended) The Chimerical Anticipation Of Possible Advantages, But The Intolerable Pressure Of Long-established, Notorious, Aggravated, And Growing Abuses.

A Scholar Is Like A Book Written In A Dead Language. It Is Not Every One That Can Read In It.

To Great Evils We Submit, We Resent Little Provocations.

The Discussing The Characters And Foibles Of Common Friends Is A Great Sweetness And Cement Of Friendship.

The Most Insignificant People Are The Most Apt To Sneer At Others. They Are Safe From Reprisals. And Have No Hope Of Rising In Their Own Self Esteem But By Lowering Their Neighbors.

A Gentle Word, A Kind Look, A Good-natured Smile Can Work Wonders And Accomplish Miracles.

When A Thing Ceases To Be A Subject Of Controversy, It Ceases To Be A Subject Of Interest.

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.

The Definition Of Genius Is That It Acts Unconsciously, And Those Who Have Produced Immortal Works Have Done So Without Knowing How Or Why.

Those Who Are Fond Of Setting Things To Rights, Have No Great Objection To Seeing Them Wrong.

There Is Nothing More Likely To Drive A Man Mad, Than The Being Unable To Get Rid Of The Idea Of The Distinction Between Right And Wrong, And An Obstinate, Constitutional Preference Of The True To The Agreeable.

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

Human Life May Be Regarded As A Succession Of Frontispieces. The Way To Be Satisfied Is Never To Look Back.

I Am Then Never Less Alone Than When Alone

We Imagine That The Admiration Of The Works Of Celebrated Men Has Become Common, Because The Admiration Of Their Names Has Become So.

The Truly Proud Man Knows Neither Superiors Or Inferiors. The First He Does Not Admit Of - The Last He Does Not Concern Himself About.

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.

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