William Hazlitt

A wise traveler never despises his own country.

Books let us into their souls and lay open to us the secrets of our own.

If I have not read a book before it is for all intents and purposes new to me whether it was printed yesterday or three hundred years ago.

A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.

We can scarcely hate anyone that we know.

I would like to spend the whole of my life traveling, if I could anywhere borrow another life to spend at home.

Reflection makes men cowards.

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.

You know more of a road by having traveled it, than by all the conjectures and descriptions in the world.

Wit is the salt of conversation, not the food.

The public have neither shame or gratitude.

Hope is the best possession. None are completely wretched but those who are without hope. Few are reduced so low as that.

A nickname is the heaviest stone that the devil can throw at a man. It is a bugbear to the imagination, and though we do not believe in it, it still haunts our apprehensions.

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.

Genius, like humanity, rusts for want of use.

There is a secret pride in every human heart that revolts at tyranny. You may order and drive an individual, but you cannot make him respect you.

A grave blockhead should always go about with a lively one - they show one another off to the best advantage.

No truly great person ever thought themselves so.

Defoe says that there were a hundred thousand country fellows in his time ready to fight to the death against popery, without knowing whether popery was a man or a horse.

The incentive to ambition is the love of power.