Quote

Comedy naturally wears itself out - destroys the very food on which it lives and by constantly and successfully exposing the follies and weaknesses of mankind to ridicule, in the end leaves itself nothing worth laughing at.

William Hazlitt

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TAGS & TOPICS

William Hazlitt
Journalist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Painter
Philosopher
Writer
Wm. Haslett
William Carew Hazlitt
Laughing
Ridicule
Worth
Weaknesses
Comedy
Folly
Food
Naturally
Follies
Lives
Leaves
Exposing
Ends
Constantly
Successfully
Nothing
Weakness
Wears
Mankind
Destroys

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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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I do not think there is anything deserving the name of society to be found out of London.
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The diffusion of taste is not the same thing as the improvement of taste.
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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.
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It is only those who never think at all, or else who have accustomed themselves to blood invariably on abstract ideas, that ever feel ennui.
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There is no flattery so adroit or effectual as that of implicit assent.
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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.
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You shall yourself be judge. Reason, with most people, means their own opinion.
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Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense a substitute for true knowledge. Books are less often made use of as spectacles to look at nature with, than as blinds to keep out its strong light and shifting scenery from weak eyes and indolent dispositions. The learned are mere literary drudges.
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The world loves to be amused by hollow professions, to be deceived by flattering appearances, to live in a state of hallucination and can forgive everything but the plain, downright, simple, honest truth.
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[Science is] the desire to know causes.
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Common sense, to most people, is nothing more than their own opinions.
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Words are the only things that last for ever.
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Old friendships are like meats served up repeatedly, cold, comfortless, and distasteful. The stomach turns against them.
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The assumption of merit is easier, less embarrassing, and more effectual than the actual attainment of it.
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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.
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Love may turn to indifference with possession.
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The greatest reverses of fortune are the most easily borne from a sort of dignity belonging to them.
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We would willingly, and without remorse, sacrifice not only the present moment, but all the interval (no matter how long) that separates us from any favorite object.
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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.
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