Quote

The selective instinct of the artist tells him when his language should be homely, and when it should be more elevated and it is precisely in the imperceptible blending of the plain with the ornate that a great writer is distinguished. He uses the simplest phrases without triviality, and the grandest without a suggestion of grandiloquence.

George Henry Lewes

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George Henry Lewes
Age: 61 †
Born: 1817
Born: April 18
Died: 1878
Died: November 30
Journalist
Literary Critic
Philosopher
Theatre Critic
Writer
London
England
Great
Phrases
Suggestion
Tells
Selective
Ornate
Instinct
Suggestions
Imperceptible
Writer
Distinguished
Grandest
Language
Simplest
Blending
Use
Plain
Triviality
Artist
Uses
Homely
Without
Precisely
Elevated

More quotes by George Henry Lewes

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Remember that every drop of rain that falls bears into the bosom of the earth a quality of beautiful fertility.
George Henry Lewes
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If you feel yourself to be above the mass, speak so as to raise the mass to the height of your argument.
George Henry Lewes
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Originality is independence, not rebellion it is sincerity, not antagonism.
George Henry Lewes
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To one man a stream is so much water-power, to another a rendezvous for lovers.
George Henry Lewes
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In the air we breathe, in the water we drink, in the earth we tread on, Life is every where. Nature lives: every pore is bursting with Life every death is only a new birth, every grave a cradle.
George Henry Lewes
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There are occasions when the simplest and fewest words surpass in effect all the wealth of rhetorical amplification.
George Henry Lewes
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It is unhappily true that much insincere Literature and Art, executed solely with a view to effect, does succeed by deceiving the public.
George Henry Lewes
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Roger Bacon, a disciple of the Arabs, also insisted on the primary necessity of Mathematics, without which no other science can be known yet by Mathematics it is clear that he meant something very different from what we mean, including under that head even dancing, singing, gesticulation, and performance on musical instruments.
George Henry Lewes
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The air is crowded with birds -- beautiful, tender, intelligent birds -- to whom life is a song.
George Henry Lewes
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The great desire of this age is for a doctrine which may serve to condense our knowledge, guide our researches, and shape our lives, so that conduct may really be the consequence of belief
George Henry Lewes
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To his [ Plato's ] great disappointment, he found Anaxagoras adducing simple physical reasons, instead of the teleological reasons, which he had expected. Such a teacher could no longer allure him.
George Henry Lewes
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Murder, like talent, seems occasionally to run in families.
George Henry Lewes
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Bad acting, like bad writing, has a remarkable uniformity, whether seen on the French, German, or English stages it all seems modeled after two or three types, and those the least like types of good acting. The fault generally lies less in the bad imitation of a good model, than in the successful imitation of a bad model.
George Henry Lewes
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The history of the race is but that of the individual writ large.
George Henry Lewes
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Many a genius has been slow of growth. Oaks that flourish for a thousand years do not spring up into beauty like a reed.
George Henry Lewes
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The art of writing is not, as many seem to imagine, the art of bringing fine phrases into rhythmical order, but the art of placing before the reader intelligible symbols of the thoughts and feelings in the writer's mind.
George Henry Lewes
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Books minister to our knowledge, to our guidance, and to our delight, by their truth, their uprightness, and their art.
George Henry Lewes
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In Science the paramount appeal is to the Intellect-its purpose being instruction in Art, the paramount appeal is to the Emotions-its purpose being pleasure.
George Henry Lewes
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The discoverer and the poet are inventors and they are so because their mental vision detects the unapparent, unsuspected facts, almost as vividly as ocular vision rests on the apparent and familiar.
George Henry Lewes
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Individual experiences being limited and individual spontaneity feeble, we are strengthened and enriched by assimilating the experience of others.
George Henry Lewes