On this page
- Departments (1)
-
Text (4)
-
Untitled Article
-
DISQUISITION ON THE GENIUS, WHITINGS, AND CHARACTER OF WILLIAM HAZLITT. By the Author of the * Exposition of the False Medium Stye*
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
William Hazlitt began to think deeply at an early period , and while others of the same age were devoting their animal spirits to sportive games ,, or their minds to boyish projects , he was speculating on the abstract rights of humanity . His letter to the editor of the ' Shrewsbury Chronicle / written at the age of thirteen , on the persecution of Dr . Priestley , is a sufficient proof of this masculine predisposition of his intellect and feelings . It was his first
literary production , and was printed immediately . But who shall say at what far earlier dawn of youth his heart with voiceless sensibility brooded over the condition of mankind , and his mind began to develop itself through the hazy twilight of unrisen power ? This reflection , combined with a knowledge of his works , —even though we are speaking of his childhood , —forces upon us the recollection of his fine and fact-like description of ' Blind Orion hungering for the dawn / in the sublime picture of Nicolas Poussin .
The early years of his childhood were passed in America , where his father had taken his whole family . Here , as well as in former places of residence , William Hazlitt , then in his fifth year only , attracted the admiration and affection of everybody by the extreme beauty of his person , the amiability and sweetness of his disposition , and the vivid comprehension of his mind . The
expression of his face is said to have borne a close resemblance to the beatified look of intelligence in the children of some of the paintings of Raphael and Corregio . His personal beauty was palpable to all ; but his peculiar quality of intellect , even at the dawn , was not of course considered in the light of a presage of future greatness . We can seldom accuse relations and family friends of backwardness in conferring , with prophetic pride , all manner of future honours upon the precocity of their little favourites ; but it is an amusing fact that the infant prodigies , thus singled out for posterity , never come to anything worth mentioning : the reality only remains undiscovered until fully
developed . It is hardly just , nevertheless , and certainly unreasonable , to accuse individuals of dulness because they do not see the germ of great genius where it actually exists . To expect that they should do so , is almost the same as expecting them to be possessed of a similar genius themselves ; since tne powers in question must be seen and understood in their elemental forms . Looking , however , as we now do , to the application of high qualities , it may be recollected by some who knew William Hazlitt in his childhood that he gave unequivocal indications of that strong sensibility and comprehension which are certainly the visible ,
Disquisition On The Genius, Whitings, And Character Of William Hazlitt. By The Author Of The * Exposition Of The False Medium Stye*
DISQUISITION ON THE GENIUS , WHITINGS , AND CHARACTER OF WILLIAM HAZLITT . By the Author of the * Exposition of the False Medium Stye *
Untitled Article
629
Untitled Article
No . 106 . 2 Y
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1835, page 629, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2650/page/1/
-