ere the impressions made by books or
men or pictures on such a mind; and that, as there were not
probably a dozen men in England with powers so varied, all the
rest of the world might be rejoiced to listen to the opinions of
this accomplished critic. He was of so different a caste to the
people who gave authority in his day--the pompous big-wigs and
schoolmen, who never could pardon him his familiarity of manner
so unlike their own--his popular--too popular habits--and
sympathies so much beneath their dignity; his loose, disorderly
education gathered round those bookstalls or picture galleries
where he laboured a penniless student, in lonely journeys over
Europe tramped on foot (and not made, after the fashion of the
regular critics of the day, by the side of a young nobleman in a
postchaise), in every school of knowledge from St. Peter's at
Rome to St. Giles's in London. In all his modes of life and
thought, he was so different from the established authorities,
with their degrees and white neck-cloths, that they hooted the
man down with all the power of their lungs, and disdained to
hear truth that came from such a ragged philosopher.

Some exceptions, no doubt, must be taken to this enthusiastic, and in
the main just, verdict. Hazlitt himself denied himself wit, yet if this
was mock humility, I am inclined to think that he spoke truth
unwittingly. His appreciation of humour was fitful and anything but
impartial, while, biographically speaking, the hardships of his
apprenticeship are very considerably exaggerated. It was not, for
instance, in a penniless or pedestrian manner that he visited St.
Peter's at Rome; but journeying with comforts of wine, _vetturini_, and
partridges, which his second wife's income paid for. But this does not
matter much, and, on the whole, the estimate is as just as it is
generous. Perhaps something of its inspiration may be set down to
fellow-feeling, both in politics and in the unsuccessful cultivation of
the arts of design. But as high an estimate of Hazlitt is quite
compatible with the strongest political dissent from his opinions, and
with a total freedom from the charge of wearing the willow for painting.

There is indeed no doubt that Hazlitt is one of the most absolutely
unequal writers in English, if not in any, literature, Wilson being
perhaps his only compeer. The term absolute is used with intention and
prec