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Quotes from George Henry Lewes

Speak for yourself and from yourself, or be silent.
~ George Henry Lewes
No man ever made a great discovery without the exercise of the imagination.
~ George Henry Lewes
The public can only be really moved by what is genuine.
~ George Henry Lewes
Character is built out of circumstances. From exactly the same materials, one man builds palaces, while another builds hovels.
~ George Henry Lewes
Imagination is not the exclusive appanage of artists, but belongs in varying degrees to all men.
~ George Henry Lewes
To some men popularity is always suspicious. Enjoying none themselves, they are prone to suspect the validity of those attainments which command it.
~ George Henry Lewes
No man was ever eloquent by trying to be eloquent, but only by being so.
~ George Henry Lewes
A man may be variously accomplished, and yet be a feeble poet.
~ George Henry Lewes
The object of Literature is to instruct, to animate, or to amuse.
~ George Henry Lewes
If you feel yourself to be above the mass, speak so as to raise the mass to the height of your argument.
~ George Henry Lewes
No deeply rooted tendency was ever extirpated by adverse judgment. Not having originally been founded on argument, it cannot be destroyed by logic.
~ George Henry Lewes
It is unhappily true that much insincere Literature and Art, executed solely with a view to effect, does succeed by deceiving the public.
~ George Henry Lewes
As all Art depends on Vision, so the different kinds of Art depend on the different ways in which minds look at things.
~ George Henry Lewes
It is always understood as an expression of condemnation when anything in Literature or Art is said to be done for effect; and yet to produce an effect is the aim and end of both.
~ George Henry Lewes
Language, after all, is only the use of symbols, and Art also can only affect us through symbols.
~ George Henry Lewes
The artist is called a creator.
~ George Henry Lewes
Endeavour to be faithful, and if there is any beauty in your thought, your style will be beautiful; if there is any real emotion to express, the expression will be moving.
~ George Henry Lewes
When a man fails to see the truth of certain generally accepted views, there is no law compelling him to provoke animosity by announcing his dissent.
~ George Henry Lewes
Individual experiences being limited and individual spontaneity feeble, we are strengthened and enriched by assimilating the experience of others.
~ George Henry Lewes
Whatever lies beyond the limits of experience, and claims another origin than that of induction and deduction from established data, is illegitimate.
~ George Henry Lewes