Dr Samuel Johnson Quotes
- “My dear friend, clear your mind of cant [excessive thought]. You may talk as other people do: you may say to a man, “Sir, I am your most humble servant.” You are not his most humble servant. You may say, “These are bad times; it is a melancholy thing to be reserved to such times.” You don’t mind the times … You may talk in this manner; it is a mode of talking in Society; but don’t think foolishly.”
- “Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they find?”
- “Distance has the same effect on the mind as on the eye.”
- “It is necessary to hope… for hope itself is happiness.”
- “To keep your secret is wisdom, but to expect others to keep it is folly.”
- “Nothing […] will ever be attempted, if all possible objections must be first overcome.”
- “Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content. No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of the spring: no man can, at the same time, fill his cup from the source and from the mouth of the Nile.”
- “You raise your voice when you should reinforce your argument.”
- “What we hope ever to do with ease, we must first learn to do with diligence.”
- “It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.”
- “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 one book.”
- “I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be silent as to his works.”
- “Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble.”
- “Hell is paved with good intentions.”
- “Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.”
- Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.”
- “Whoever thinks of going to bed before twelve o’clock is a scoundrel.”
- “There can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity.”
- “The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”
- “I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.”
- “My congratulations to you, sir. 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. ”
- “Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.”
- “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.”
- “Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.”
- “What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.”
- “A writer only begins a book. A reader finishes it.”
- “Men know that women are an overmatch for them, and therefore they choose the weakest or the most ignorant. If they did not think so, they never could be afraid of women knowing as much as themselves.”
- “He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.”
- “I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.”
- “Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last.”
- “I had done all that I could, and no Man is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.”
- “Tea’s proper use is to amuse the idle, and relax the studious, and dilute the full meals of those who cannot use exercise, and will not use abstinence.”
- “There will always be a part, and always a very large part of every community, that have no care but for themselves, and whose care for themselves reaches little further than impatience of immediate pain, and eagerness for the nearest good.”