Samuel Johnson Quotes

"A am a great friend of public amusements, they keep people from vice."

"A cucumber should be well sliced, and dressed with pepper and vinegar, and then thrown out, as good for nothing."

"A fly may sting a stately horse and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a horse still."

"A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of anything."

"A man of genius has been seldom ruined but by himself."

"A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good."

"A man seldom thinks with more earnestness of anything than he does of his dinner."

"A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated, has not the art of getting drunk."

"A wise man is cured of ambition by ambition itself; his aim is so exalted that riches, office, fortune and favour cannot satisfy him."

"A wise man will make haste to forgive, because he knows the true value of time, and will not suffer it to pass away in unnecessary pain."

"Adversity has ever been considered the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself."

"All the arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil show it evidently to be a great evil."

"All theory is against freedom of the will; all experience for it."

"All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it."

"Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they find?"

"Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those who we cannot resemble."

"Almost every man wastes part of his life attempting to display qualities which he does not possess."

"At seventy-seven it is time to be in earnest."

"Bachelors have consciences, married men have wives."

"Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned."

"Between falsehood and useless truth there is little difference. As gold which he cannot spend will make no man rich, so knowledge which cannot apply will make no man wise."

"Books like friends, should be few and well-chosen."

"Books that you carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are most useful after all."

"Bounty always receives part of its value from the manner in which it is bestowed."

"But if he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, Sir, when he leaves our houses, let us count our spoons."

"By taking a second wife he pays the highest compliment to the first, by showing that she made him so happy as a married man, that he wishes to be so a second time."

"Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy."

"Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world."

"Courage is the greatest of all virtues, because if you haven't courage, you may not have an opportunity to use any of the others."

"Curiosity is one of the most permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect."

"Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagreeable to him; for where there is nothing but pure misery there never is any recourse to the mention of it."

"Dictionaries are like watches, the worst is better than none and the best cannot be expected to go quite true."

"Difficult do you call it, Sir? I wish it were impossible."

"Disease generally begins that equality which death completes."

"Every man has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a right to knock him down for it. Martyrdom is the test."

"Every man is rich or poor according to the proportion between his desires and his enjoyments."

"Every man who attacks my belief, diminishes in some degree my confidence in it, and therefore makes me uneasy; and I am angry with him who makes me uneasy."

"Everything that enlarges the sphere of human powers, that shows man he can do what he thought he could not do, is valuable."

"Exercise is labor without weariness."

"Extended empires are like expanded gold, exchanging solid strength for feeble splendor."

"Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages we expect from them."

"Fraud and falsehood only dread examination. Truth invites it."

"From the middle of life onward, only he remains vitally alive who is ready to die with life."

"Getting money is not all a man's business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life."

"Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance."

"He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage."

"He that will enjoy the brightness of sunshine, must quit the coolness of the shade."

"He was dull in a new way, and that made many people think him great."

"He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else."

"He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts."

"He who praises everybody, praises nobody."

"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once will never do anything."

"Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured, and little to be enjoyed."

"I am aware that by many persons, it is considered in the nature of a joke to to become a candidate and to be elected as a member of the Legislature."

"I had done all that I could; and no man is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little."

"I have always considered it as treason against the great republic of human nature, to make any man's virtues the means of deceiving him."

"I have found men to be more kind than I expected, and less just."

"I look upon every day to be lost, in which I do not make a new acquaintance."

"I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read."

"I will be conquered; I will not capitulate."

"I would be loath to speak ill of any person who I do not know deserves it, but I am afraid he is an attorney."

"I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government other than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual."

"If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in a constant repair."

"If your determination is fixed, I do not counsel you to despair. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but perseverance."

"Ignorance, madam, pure ignorance."

"Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful."

"It generally happens that assurance keeps an even pace with ability."

"It is a most mortifying reflection for a man to consider what he has done, compared to what he might have done."

"It is better that some should be unhappy rather than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality."

"It is better to live rich than to die rich."

"It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust."

"It is dangerous for mortal beauty, or terrestrial virtue, to be examined by too strong a light. The torch of Truth shows much that we cannot, and all that we would not, see."

"It is generally agreed, that few men are made better by affluence or exaltation."

"It is more from carelessness about truth than from intentionally lying that there is so much falsehood in the world."

"It is not true that people are naturally equal for no two people can be together for even a half an hour without one acquiring an evident superiority over the other."

"It is reasonable to have perfection in our eye that we may always advance toward it, though we know it can never be reached."

"It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a time."

"Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not."

"Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it."

"Language is the dress of thought."

"Lawyers know life practically. A bookish man should always have them to converse with."

"Leisure and curiosity might soon make great advances in useful knowledge, were they not diverted by minute emulation and laborious trifles."

"Life affords no higher pleasure than that of surmounting difficulties, passing from one step of success to another, forming new wishes and seeing them gratified."

"Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions."

"Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment."

"Life is not long, and too much of it must not pass in idle deliberation how it shall be spent."

"Love is only one of many passions."

"Love is the wisdom of the fool and the folly of the wise."

"Man alone is born crying, lives complaining, and dies disappointed."

"Many things difficult to design prove easy to performance."

"Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little."

"No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money."

"No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring."

"No man was ever great by imitation."

"No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned... a man in a jail has more room, better food, and commonly better company."

"No money is better spent than what is laid out for domestic satisfaction."

"No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library."

"Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse with him."

"Nothing flatters a man as much as the happiness of his wife; he is always proud of himself as the source of it."

"Nothing is more hopeless than a scheme of merriment."

"Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome."

"Of all noises, I think music is the least disagreeable."

"Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content."

"One of the disadvantages of wine is that it makes a man mistake words for thoughts."

"Our brightest blazes of gladness are commonly kindled by unexpected sparks."

"Paradise Lost is a book that, once put down, is very hard to pick up again."

"Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel."

"Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make faces and produce laughter, like dancing dogs."

"Poetry is the art of uniting pleasure with truth."

"Praise, like gold and diamonds, owes its value only to its scarcity."

"Prepare for death, if here at night you roam, and sign your will before you sup from home."

"Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement."

"Read over your compositions, and when you meet a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."

"Reproof on her lips, but a smile in her eyes."

"Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult."

"Revenge is an act of passion; vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged."

"Secure, whate'er he gives, he gives the best."

"Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings."

"Sings. Hope in every sphere of life is a privilege that attaches to action. No action, no hope."

"Sir, a man may be so much of everything, that he is nothing of anything."

"Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both."

"So far is it from being true that men are naturally equal, that no two people can be half an hour together, but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other."

"So many objections may be made to everything, that nothing can overcome them but the necessity of doing something."

"Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion, and he whose real wants are supplied must admit those of fancy."

"Subordination tends greatly to human happiness. Were we all upon an equality, we should have no other enjoyment than mere animal pleasure."

"Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again."

"Surely a long life must be somewhat tedious, since we are forced to call in so many trifling things to help rid us of our time, which will never return."

"That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one."

"The advice that is wanted is commonly not welcome and that which is not wanted, evidently an effrontery."

"The chief glory of every people arises from its authors."

"The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading in order to write. A man will turn over half a library to make a book."

"The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered, but a general effect of pleasing impression."

"The happiest part of a man's life is what he passes lying awake in bed in the morning."

"The love of life is necessary to the vigorous prosecution of any undertaking."

"The mind is never satisfied with the objects immediately before it, but is always breaking away from the present moment, and losing itself in schemes of future felicity... The natural flights of the human mind are not from pleasure to pleasure, but from hope to hope."

"The natural flights of the human mind are not from pleasure to pleasure, but from hope to hope."

"The only end of writing is to enable readers better to enjoy life or better to endue it."

"The return of my birthday, if I remember it, fills me with thoughts which it seems to be the general care of humanity to escape."

"The true art of memory is the art of attention."

"The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good."

"The two offices of memory are collection and distribution."

"The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are."

"The usual fortune of complaint is to excite contempt more than pity."

"The vanity of being known to be trusted with a secret is generally one of the chief motives to disclose it."

"The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down."

"The world is seldom what it seems; to man, who dimly sees, realities appear as dreams, and dreams realities."

"The wretched have no compassion, they can do good only from strong principles of duty."

"Their learning is like bread in a besieged town: every man gets a little, but no man gets a full meal."

"There are charms made only for distant admiration."

"There are goods so opposed that we cannot seize both, but, by too much prudence, may pass between them at too great a distance to reach either."

"There are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits that are not good until they are rotten."

"There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern."

"They teach the morals of a whore, and the manners of a dancing master."

"Things don't go wrong and break your heart so you can become bitter and give up. They happen to break you down and build you up so you can be all that you were intended to be."

"This man [Lord Chesterfield] I thought had been a Lord among wits; but, I find, he is only a wit among Lords."

"This merriment of parsons is mighty offensive."

"Those who attain any excellence, commonly spend life in one pursuit; for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms."

"Those who attain to any excellence commonly spend life in some single pursuit, for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms."

"To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution."

"To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his utmost care to hide his poverty from others, and his idleness from himself."

"To get a name can happen but to few; it is one of the few things that cannot be brought. It is the free gift of mankind, which must be deserved before it will be granted, and is at last unwillingly bestowed."

"To keep your secret is wisdom; but to expect others to keep it is folly."

"To love one that is great, is almost to be great one's self."

"To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity."

"Treating your adversary with respect is striking soft in battle."

"Truth, Sir, is a cow, which will yield such people no more milk, and so they are gone to milk the bull."

"We are inclined to believe those whom we do not know because they have never deceived us."

"We are long before we are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it possessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself."

"We could not have had a better dinner had there been a Synod of Cooks."

"We love to expect, and when expectation is either disappointed or gratified, we want to be again expecting."

"Were it not for imagination a man would be as happy in arms of a chambermaid as of a duchess."

"What is easy is seldom excellent."

"What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure."

"What makes all doctrines plain and clear? About two hundred pounds a year. And that which was proved true before, prove false again? Two hundred more."

"What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence."

"When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."

"When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."

"When a man says he had pleasure with a woman he does not mean conversation."

"When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped."

"When men come to like a sea-life, they are not fit to live on land."

"Whoever thinks of going to bed before twelve o'clock is a scoundrel."

"Wine gives a man nothing... it only puts in motion what had been locked up in frost."

"Wine makes a man more pleased with himself; I do not say it makes him more pleasing to others."

"Without frugality none can be rich, and with it very few would be poor."

"Words are but the signs of ideas."

"You can't be in politics unless you can walk in a room and know in a minute who's for you and who's against you."

"You cannot spend money in luxury without doing good to the poor. Nay, you do more good to them by spending it in luxury, than by giving it; for by spending it in luxury, you make them exert industry, whereas by giving it, you keep them idle."

"You find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."

"You never find people laboring to convince you that you may live very happily upon a plentiful income."

"You teach your daughters the diameters of the planets and wonder when you are done that they do not delight in your company."

"Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good."