On the Pleasure of Hating

This rather short collection contains six works by William Hazlitt. The first is "The Fight" which is rather forgettable: "We are cold to others only when we are dull in ourselves, and have neither thoughts nor feelings to impart to them". The second is "The Indian Jugglers" which is quite good: "Danger is a good teacher, and makes apt scholars. So are disgrace, defeat, exposure to immediate scorn and laughter. There is no opportunity in such cases for self-delusion, no idling time away, no being off your guard (or you must take the consequences) - neither is there any room for humour or caprice or prejudice." The third is "On the Spirit of Monarchy," which if one switches `Tories' for `Democrats' and `Whigs' for `Republicans' yields an amazingly accurate description of the current state of affairs in American politics: "The right and the wrong are of little consequence, compared to the in and the out." The fourth is "What is the People?" and is also very good: "There is but a limited earth and a limited fertility to supply the demands both of Government and people; and what the one gains in the division of the spoil, beyond its average proportion, the other must needs go without." The fifth is "On Reason and Imagination" and is a terrific account of the human condition: "Man is (so to speak) an endless and infinitely varied repetition: and if we know what one man feels, we so far know what a thousand feel in the sanctuary of their being. Our feeling of general humanity is at once an aggregate of a thousand different truths, and it is also the same truth a thousand times told." The sixth is "On the Pleasure of Hating" and is one of the best and most timeless screeds ever written. There are so many fantastic quotes I could pull from this short essay; here is just one: "We grow tired of ever thing but turning others into ridicule, and congratulating ourselves on their defects." I loved this book and highly recommend it. Some contemporary books that contain many of the same elements and same flavor are: Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle, Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free, You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto, Denialism: How Irrational Thinking Hinders Scientific Progress, Harms the Planet, and Threatens Our Lives and Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.

This little book of essays punctured my reluctance to tackle anything written more than a hundred years ago. What a foolish prejudice! From the essay "Indian Jugglers": "No man is truly great, who is great only in his lifetime." Which brought to mind modern celebrity and the petty inflations of the media, with whom Hazlitt was familar in his own time, dissecting the great and ungreat personages, and commenting on the qualities that made them so or not. From "On the Spirit of Monarchy": "The right and the wrong are of little consequence, compared to the in and the out," Hazlitt says, amidst this acerbic essay on courts and kings, relevant as well to contemporary life, if not the enduring state of social affairs in whatever age. From "Reason and Imagination," a biting commentary on detached reasoning versus "natural feeling," with examples that brought to mind "enhanced interrogation," about which Hazlitt writes (while discussing slavery): "Practices, the mention of which make the flesh creep, and that affront the light of day, ought to be put down the instant they are known, without inquiry and without repeal." And the remarkable title essay, "On the Pleasure of Hating," which is so consistent and high-flying throughout that every phrase could be quoted and ruminated upon for its insight and application." I Think, Therefore Who Am I?

This little book of essays left me eager to read more of Hazlitt, and punctured my reluctance to tackle anything written more than a hundred years ago. What a foolish prejudice! Reading this collection, it's clear I've been indulging in what today might be called, and fairly put down, as chronologism. From the "Indian Jugglers": "No man is truly great, who is great only in his lifetime." Consider modern celebrity and the petty inflations of the media, as Hazlitt discusses and dissects the great and ungreat personages of his time, and the qualities that make them so, and not. From "On the Spirit of Monarchy": "The right and the wrong are of little consequence, compared to the in and the out." About courts and kings, but who can't see the contemporary (if not the enduring state of social affirs in whatever age) in this acerbic essay? From "Reason and Imagination": A biting commentary on detached reasoning versus "natural feeling," with examples that bring to mind the ongoing excrescence of "enhanced interrogation"/torture, about which Hazlitt writes (while discussing slavery): "Practices, the mention of which make the flesh creep, and that affront the light of day, ought to be put down the instant they are known, without inquiry and without repeal." And the remarkable title essay, "On the Pleasure of Hating," which is so consistent and high-flying throughout that every phrase could be quoted and ruminated upon for its insight and application. I Think, Therefore Who Am I?

"What abortions are these Essays!" William Hazlitt laments in 'The Indian Jugglers' - the second essay in this lovely little tome. "What errors, whats ill-pieced transitions, what crooked reasons, what lame conclusions! How little is made out, and that little how ill! Yet they are the best I can do." Hazlitt is, of course, selling himself very short. I had never heard of Hazlitt (1778 - 1830) until I saw the Penguin Great Ideas series. The title of this sleak paperback intrigued me, since I am a true misanthrope at heart. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that Hazlitt was more than just another intellectual grump. Instead he proves himself a champion of liberality and the common man, even if he is more than a little sick of humanity at large. The brunt of his anger is directed at hereditary monarchy, loyalist Torys, and the idea of 'Legitimacy.' But don't think that dates or couches his speech firmly on England's shores. His speeches on those subjects could just as easily be applied to the power structure of modern economy and government: "He who has the greatest power put into his hands, will only become impatient of any restraint in the use of it. To have the welfare and the lives of millions placed at our disposal, is a sort of warrant, a challenge to squander them without mercy." And another favorite, "Wherever the Government does not emanate...from the people, the principle of the Government, the esprit de corps, the point of honour, in all those connected with it, and raised by it to privileges above the law and above humanity, will be hatred to the people." But of course the shining star is the title essay. When writing down quotes from 'On The Pleasure of Hating' I found myself taking down whole pages. I will not quote that much, but only this extended passage from the cover: "Pure good soon grows insipid, wants variety and spirit. Pain is a bitter-sweet, which never surfeits. Love turns, with a little indulgence, to indifference or disgust: hatred alone is immortal." In this collection you will see passioned arguments against slavery 40 years before the end of the civil war. You will see bitter rationalism applied to hell and religion at large. But most of all you will see essays from a man whom was voted one of the best literary essayists England ever produced. I wasn't fond of 'The Fight', and so I gave this a 4 of 5. But I would recommend it to anyone with a mind.

"Hatred alone is immortal," Hazlitt observes in his title essay. Children kill flies for sport. Men assemble in crowds with eager enthusiasm to witness a tragedy. Cannibals eat their enemies. Christians cast those who differ from them into hell-fire for the glory of God. Hatred turns religion into bigotry, patriotism into war, and others' defects into ridicule. "Seeing all of this as I do, and unravelling the web of human life into its various threads of meanness, spite, cowardice, want of feeling, and want of understanding, of indifference towards others and ignorance of ourselves--seeing custom prevail over excellence, itself giving way to to infamy-mistaken as I have been in my public and private hopes, calculating others from myself, and calculating wrong, always disappointed where I placed most reliance; the dupe of friendship, and the fool of love; have I not reason to hate and to despise myself? Indeed I do; and chiefly for not having hated and despised the world enough" (p. 119). Praised for his eloquent writing style, and reviled by conservatives for his radical politics, I encountered essayist and literary critic, William Hazlitt (1778-1830), for the first time while reading my way through the Penguin Great Ideas series. Although Hazlitt is best known work for THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE, a collection of portraits of his contemporaries, Lamb, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Jeremy Bentham, and Sir Walter Scott, this edition includes several of Hazlitt's best-known essays, "The Fight," "The Indian Jugglers," "On the Spirit of Monarchy," "What is the People?" "On Reason and Imagination," and "The Pleasure of Hating." His engaging insights into art, culture, politics, and philosophy, together with his superb prose, make him a pleasure to read. It is perhaps impossible to imagine a contemporary writer with Hazlitt's talent and keen intellect. I'm eager to return to Hazlitt by adding the Oxford World Classics SELECTED WRITINGS OF WILLIAM HAZLITT (1999) and METROPOLITAN WRITINGS (2005) to my reading list. G. Merritt