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Conceit is vanity driven from all other shifts, and forced to appeal to itself for admiration.

William Hazlitt

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William Hazlitt
Journalist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Painter
Philosopher
Writer
Wm. Haslett
William Carew Hazlitt
Shifts
Conceit
Appeal
Admiration
Appeals
Forced
Vanity
Driven

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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.
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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.
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The most phlegmatic dispositions often contain the most inflammable spirits, as fire is struck from the hardest flints.
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No man would, I think, exchange his existence with any other man, however fortunate. We had as lief not be, as not be ourselves.
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The silence of a friend commonly amounts to treachery. His not daring to say anything in our behalf implies a tacit censure.
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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.
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Almost every sect of Christianity is a perversion of its essence, to accommodate it to the prejudices of the world.
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An orator can hardly get beyond commonplaces: if he does he gets beyond his hearers.
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There is nothing more to be esteemed than a manly firmness and decision of character.
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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.
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A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.
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Some one is generally sure to be the sufferer by a joke.
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Fashion is gentility running away from vulgarity and afraid of being overtaken
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Perhaps propriety is as near a word as any to denote the manners of the gentleman elegance is necessary to the fine gentleman dignity is proper to noblemen and majesty to kings.
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There is something captivating in spirit and intrepidity, to which, we often yield as to a resistless power nor can he reasonably expect, the confidence of others who too apparently distrusts himself.
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Our repugnance to death increases in proportion to our consciousness of having lived in vain.
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I have known persons without a friend--never any one without some virtue. The virtues of the former conspired with their vices to make the whole world their enemies.
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The incentive to ambition is the love of power.
William Hazlitt
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He who comes up to his own idea of greatness must always have had a very low standard of it in his mind.
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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.
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