This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1897 edition. Excerpt: ...The variations are mainly verbal, but I have no space to enter more at large on this part of the matter, for the composition occupies nearly six quarto pages; nor was I aware, till I obtained from the same source the original autograph of Hazlitt's answer, occupying four folio pages, that any formal cognizance ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1897 edition. Excerpt: ...The variations are mainly verbal, but I have no space to enter more at large on this part of the matter, for the composition occupies nearly six quarto pages; nor was I aware, till I obtained from the same source the original autograph of Hazlitt's answer, occupying four folio pages, that any formal cognizance was taken by him of the matter, or that he departed from his customary practice of declining private correspondence so far and so signally as to commit to paper the longest unpaid contribution which he had ever made since his boyhood to literature and to literary history. The letter of Hazlitt to Hunt is undoubtedly by far the most vital and interesting of all the surviving correspondence of the writer. It is impossible to refrain from feeling sorry for the isolated position which such a man as Hazlitt held in every respect at this time, after having been recognised by his contemporaries as one of the foremost intellects of the age; but regarding the question judicially, we cannot shut our eyes to the natural umbrage arising from his policy of carrying his genius for portraiture when he relinquished art as a profession into another sphere, and painting his friends on paper instead of on canvas. There is something very apposite to this in the account of the Fight, where he says, ' It's the devil for anyone to tell me a secret, for it's sure to come out in print. I do not care so much to gratify a friend, but the public ear is too great a temptation to me.' It necessarily militated against Hazlitt that he carried with him into the political and literary arena that stubborn and ineradicable persistence in proclaiming at all costs his view of truth and right which proved so fatal a bar to success and fortune in his father's case; and assuredly, ...
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