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Those who aim at faultless regularity will only produce mediocrity, and no one ever approaches perfection except by stealth, and unknown to themselves.

— William Hazlitt

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Character

More quotes by William Hazlitt

The true barbarian is he who thinks every thing barbarous but his own tastes and prejudices.

Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.

Political Essays (1819)

The art of life is to know how to enjoy a little and to endure much.

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are, and what they ought to be.

Lectures on the English Comic Writers (1819)

Man is a make-believe animal — he is never so truly himself as when he is acting a part.

Notes of a Journey through France and Italy (1824)

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Men accept servility in order to acquire wealth; as if they could acquire anything of their own when they cannot even assert that they belong to themselves.

Étienne de La Boétie Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1548)

The confusion of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.

George Bernard Shaw Man and Superman (1903)

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

C. S. Lewis God in the Dock (1970)

Affectation hides three times as many virtues as charity does sins.

Horace Mann Thoughts Selected from the Writings of Horace Mann (1867)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: William Hazlitt (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.