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Most of the methods for measuring the lapse of time have, I believe, been the contrivance of monks and religious recluses, who, finding time hang heavy on their hands, were at some pains to see how they got rid of it.

William Hazlitt

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William Hazlitt
Journalist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Painter
Philosopher
Writer
Wm. Haslett
William Carew Hazlitt
Pain
Pains
Hands
Methods
Contrivance
Believe
Hang
Lapse
Time
Findings
Recluse
Finding
Monks
Heavy
Lapses
Method
Measuring
Religious
Monk

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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.
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Prosperity is a great teacher adversity is a greater. Possession pampers the mind privation trains and strengthens it.
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We grow tired of everything but turning others into ridicule, and congratulating ourselves on their defects.
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When we forget old friends, it is a sign we have forgotten ourselves.
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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.
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[Science is] the desire to know causes.
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The discussing the characters and foibles of common friends is a great sweetness and cement of friendship.
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Prejudice is the child of ignorance.
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There is no prejudice so strong as that which arises from a fancied exemption from all prejudice.
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They [corporations] feel neither shame, remorse, gratitude, nor goodwill.
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We all wear some disguise, make some professions, use some artifice, to set ourselves off as being better than we are and yet it is not denied that we have some good intentions and praiseworthy qualities at bottom.
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It is not the passion of a mind struggling with misfortune, or the hopelessness of its desires, but of a mind preying on itself, and disgusted with, or indifferent to all other things.
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Man is a make-believe animal: he is never so truly himself as when he is acting a part.
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We often choose a friend as we do a mistress - for no particular excellence in themselves, but merely from some circumstance that flatters our self-love.
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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.
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Our energy is in proportion to the resistance it meets.
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Familiarity confounds all traits of distinction interest and prejudice take away the power of judging.
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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.
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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.
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When I am in the country, I wish to vegetate like the country.
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