All men feel something of an honorable bigotry for the objects which have long continued to please them.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- People develop a strong, sometimes unreasonable attachment to things they have enjoyed for a long time.
- In plain terms
- People stick with things they like because they have liked them for a while.
- What can you take from it?
- Be aware of attachment to old preferences.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What do you keep just because it is old?
- Why do you like what you like?
Another view
Not all long-standing preferences are due to bigotry; some are genuinely superior.
More from William Wordsworth
I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility.
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Permalink to quote #90 What is a Poet?...He is a man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater knowl…
Permalink to quote #87
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