Daily Inspiration Quote by William Hazlitt

Productivity, in Hazlitt's hands, isn’t a pep slogan; it’s a provocation aimed at the genteel myth of “natural genius.” “The more we do, the more we can do” asserts that capacity is not a fixed endowment but an expandable muscle, built through friction, repetition, and risk. As a critic who made his name by taking art, politics, and public taste seriously, Hazlitt is quietly declaring allegiance to effort over mystique - and to process over pose.

The line works because it turns a moral assumption into an engine. The first clause (“The more we do”) implies action before certainty, a rebuke to the self-protective habit of waiting until we feel ready. The second (“the more we can do”) promises compounding returns: practice doesn’t just produce output; it enlarges the very self that produces. Hazlitt’s compressed symmetry gives it the snap of inevitability, like a law of motion rather than advice.

Subtextually, it’s also a political and cultural jab. Writing in a Britain anxious about class, education, and who gets to claim authority, Hazlitt suggests that power can be manufactured from below through disciplined engagement. That challenges the era’s comfort with inherited “fitness” and the romantic fetish for effortless inspiration. For a critic, it’s a credo: sharp judgment is earned by doing the work - reading, watching, revising, arguing - until perception itself gets stronger. It’s ambition without glamour, and that’s exactly why it lands.