XX. No truly great man ever thought himself so.
XXI. Every man, in judging of himself, is his own contemporary.
XXII. Abuse is an indirect species of homage.
XXIII. From the height from which the great look down on the world, all the rest of mankind seem equal.
XXIV. It is a bad style that requires frequent breaks and marks of admiration.
XXV. It happens in conversation as in different games. One person seems to excel, till another does better, and we then think no more of the first.
XXVI. Those who can keep secrets, have no curiosity. We only wish to gain knowledge, that we may impart it.
XXVII. Genius is native to the soil where it grows—is fed by the air, and warmed by the sun—and is not a hot-house plant or an exotic.
XXVIII. All truly great works of art are national in their character and origin.
XXIX. People are distinguished less by a genius for any particular thing, than by a peculiar tone and manner of feeling and thinking, whatever be the subject. The same qualities of mind or characteristic excellence that a man shows in one art, he would probably have displayed in any other. I have heard Mr. Northcote say, that he thought Sir Joshua Reynolds would have written excellent genteel comedies. His Discourses certainly are bland and amiable (rather than striking or original) like his pictures.