Thursday, September 2, 2010

Quote of the Day (Charles Lamb, on the Desire for Excellence)


“I gain nothing by being with such as myself—we encourage one another in mediocrity—I am always longing to be with men more excellent than myself.”—English essayist Charles Lamb, letter to his friend Samuel Taylor Coleridge, January 10, 1797, The Best Letters of Charles Lamb

One of these men “more excellent than myself” might well have been William Hazlitt, who, had he not decided to give himself entirely to his brilliant essays, might have done equally well with brilliant portraits such as this one of Lamb.

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