Quote#Books & Reading
I never read a book before reviewing it: it prejudices a man so
Quote bySydney Smith · 1771–1845
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Reported in Bon-Mots of Sydney Smith and R. Brinsley Sheridan, edited by Walter Jerrold with grotesques by Aubrey Beardsley (London: J. M. Dent and Company, 1893), p. 24.
English (original)
I never read a book before reviewing it: it prejudices a man so.
— Sydney Smith
More from Sydney Smith
It is true that every increase of knowledge may possibly render depravity more depraved, as well as it may increase the strength of virtue. It is in itself only power; and its value depends on its application.
But now persecution is good, because it exists; every law which originated in ignorance and malice, and gratifies the passions from whence it sprang, we call the wisdom of our ancestors: when such laws are repealed, they will be cruelty …
Manners are the shadows of virtues; the momentary display of those qualities which our fellow creatures love, and respect.
In fact, when a nation has become free, it is extremely difficult to persuade them that their freedom is only to be preserved by perpetual and minute jealousy. They do not observe that there is a constant, perhaps an unconscious, effort on …
When I hear any man talk of an unalterable law, the only effect it produces upon me is to convince me that he is an unalterable fool.
In the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American book? Or goes to an American play? or looks at an American picture or statue?