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| Samuel Johnson born 1709 died 1784 was an English author, poet, and satirist |
Quotes by Samuel Johnson
The world will never be long without some good reason to hate the unhappy; their real faults are immediately detected; and if those are not sufficient to sink them into infamy, an individual weight of calumny will be super-added.
Happiness is enjoyed only in proportion as it is known; and such is the state or folly of man, that it is known only by experience of its contrary.
It is better that some should be unhappy than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality.
The fiction of happiness is propagated by every tongue and confirmed by every look till at last all profess the joy which they do not feel and consent to yield to the general delusion.
We may have uneasy sensations for seeing a creature in distress without pity; for we have not pity unless we wish to relieve them.
The true genius is a mind of large general powers, accidentally determined to some particular direction.
He that would be superior to external influences must first become superior to his own passions.
It generally happens that assurance keeps an even pace with ability.
High people, sir, are the best; take a hundred ladies of quality, you'll find them better wives, better mothers, more willing to sacrifice their own pleasures to their children, than a hundred other woman.
As I know of mankind I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good man upon easier terms than I was formerly.
In order that all men may be taught to speak the truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it.
A man may be very sincere in good principles, without having good practice.
I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.
Subordination tends greatly to human happiness. Were all upon an equality, we should have no other enjoyment than mere animal pleasure.
Advertisements are now so numerous that they are very negligently perused, and it is therefore become necessary to gain attention by magnificence of promises, and by eloquence sometimes sublime and sometimes pathetic.
A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization.
Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.
Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement.
Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion; he whose real wants are supplied, must admit those of fancy.
Be not too hasty to trust or to admire the teachers of morality; they discourse like angels, but they live like men.
Flattery pleases very generally. In the first place, the flatterer may think what he says to be true; but, in the second place, whether he thinks so or not, he certainly thinks those whom he flatters of consequence enough to be flattered.
It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.
I would advise no man to marry who is not likely to propagate understanding.
Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.
Pity is not natural to man, children always are cruel, and savages are always cruel.
Life is surely given us for higher purposes than to gather what our ancestors have wisely thrown away, and to learn what is of no value but because it has been forgotten.
It is necessary to the success of flattery, that it be accommodated to particular circumstances or characters, and enters the heart on that side where the passions are ready to receive it.
Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures.
The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public.
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.
Poverty is the great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable and others extremely difficult.
The most Heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together.
The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public.
When female minds are embittered by age or solitude, their malignity is generally exerted in a rigorous and spiteful superintendence of domestic trifles.
As any action or posture, long continued, will distort and disfigure the limbs, so the mind likewise is crippled and contracted by perpetual application to the same set of ideas.
Men are generally idle, and ready to satisfy themselves, and intimidate the industry of others, by calling that impossible which is only difficult.
It is the just doom of laziness and gluttony to be inactive without ease and drowsy without tranquility.
It is necessary to hope, though hope should always be deluded; for hope itself is happiness, and its frustrations, however frequent, are yet less dreadful than its extinction.
If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be not idle.
There is no kind of idleness by which we are as easily seduced as that which dignifies itself by the appearance of business.
That friendship may be at once fond and lasting, there must not only be equal virtue on each part, but virtue of the same kind; not only the same end must be proposed, but the same means must be approved by both.
It is not uncommon to charge the difference between promise and performance, between profession and reality, upon deep design and studied deceit; but the truth is, that there is very little hypocrisy in the world.
Leisure and curiosity might soon make great advances in useful knowledge, were they not diverted by minute emulation and laborious trifles.
A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek.
Of all the grief’s that harass the distressed; sure the most bitter is a scornful jest.
It is the function of vice to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.
Half the vices which the world condemns most loudly have seeds of good in them and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.
The extremes of vice and virtue are alike detestable, and absolute virtue is as sure to kill a man as absolute vice is.
Where there is no hope there can be no endeavor.
There is certainly no greater happiness than to be able to look back on a life usefully and virtuously employed, to trace our own progress in existence, by such tokens as excite neither shame nor sorrow.
The true art of memory is the art of attention.
Knowledge is of two kinds; we know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.
A desire of knowledge is the natural feeling of mankind, and every human being whose mind is not debauched will be willing to give all that he has to get knowledge.
Whatever enlarges hope will exalt courage.
Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy, affectation part of the chosen trappings of folly; the one completes a villain, the other only finishes a fop.
No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures.
It is necessary to hope, though hope should always be deluded; for hope itself is happiness, and its frustrations, however frequent, are yet less dreadful than its extinction.
All envy is proportionate to desire; we are uneasy at the attainments of another, according as we think our own happiness would be advanced by the addition of that which he withholds from us.
Very few live by choice. Every man is placed in his present condition by causes which acted without his foresight, and with which he did not always willingly cooperate; and therefore you will rarely meet one who does not think the lot of his neighbor better than his own.
A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him.
It is unjust to claim the privileges of age, and retain the playthings of childhood.
Every old man complains of the growing depravity of the world, of the petulance and insolence of the rising generation.
Age looks with anger on the temerity of youth, and youth with contempt on the scrupulosity of age.
It seems to be the fate of man to seek all his consolations in futurity. The time present is seldom able to fill desire or imagination with immediate enjoyment, and we are forced to supply its deficiencies by recollection or anticipation.
A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of anything.
Books without the knowledge of life are useless.
Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero; must drink brandy.
I am very fond of the company of ladies. I like their beauty, I like their delicacy, I like their vivacity, and I like their silence.
I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.
It is better to live rich than to die rich.
Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little.
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
People in general do not willingly read if they have anything else to amuse them.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.
When speculation has done its worst, two plus two still equals four.
Happiness is enjoyed only in proportion as it is known; and such is the state or folly of man, that it is known only by experience of its contrary.
It is better that some should be unhappy than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality.
The fiction of happiness is propagated by every tongue and confirmed by every look till at last all profess the joy which they do not feel and consent to yield to the general delusion.
We may have uneasy sensations for seeing a creature in distress without pity; for we have not pity unless we wish to relieve them.
The true genius is a mind of large general powers, accidentally determined to some particular direction.
He that would be superior to external influences must first become superior to his own passions.
It generally happens that assurance keeps an even pace with ability.
High people, sir, are the best; take a hundred ladies of quality, you'll find them better wives, better mothers, more willing to sacrifice their own pleasures to their children, than a hundred other woman.
As I know of mankind I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good man upon easier terms than I was formerly.
In order that all men may be taught to speak the truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it.
A man may be very sincere in good principles, without having good practice.
I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.
Subordination tends greatly to human happiness. Were all upon an equality, we should have no other enjoyment than mere animal pleasure.
Advertisements are now so numerous that they are very negligently perused, and it is therefore become necessary to gain attention by magnificence of promises, and by eloquence sometimes sublime and sometimes pathetic.
A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization.
Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.
Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement.
Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion; he whose real wants are supplied, must admit those of fancy.
Be not too hasty to trust or to admire the teachers of morality; they discourse like angels, but they live like men.
Flattery pleases very generally. In the first place, the flatterer may think what he says to be true; but, in the second place, whether he thinks so or not, he certainly thinks those whom he flatters of consequence enough to be flattered.
It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.
I would advise no man to marry who is not likely to propagate understanding.
Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.
Pity is not natural to man, children always are cruel, and savages are always cruel.
Life is surely given us for higher purposes than to gather what our ancestors have wisely thrown away, and to learn what is of no value but because it has been forgotten.
It is necessary to the success of flattery, that it be accommodated to particular circumstances or characters, and enters the heart on that side where the passions are ready to receive it.
Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures.
The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public.
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.
Poverty is the great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable and others extremely difficult.
The most Heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together.
The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public.
When female minds are embittered by age or solitude, their malignity is generally exerted in a rigorous and spiteful superintendence of domestic trifles.
As any action or posture, long continued, will distort and disfigure the limbs, so the mind likewise is crippled and contracted by perpetual application to the same set of ideas.
Men are generally idle, and ready to satisfy themselves, and intimidate the industry of others, by calling that impossible which is only difficult.
It is the just doom of laziness and gluttony to be inactive without ease and drowsy without tranquility.
It is necessary to hope, though hope should always be deluded; for hope itself is happiness, and its frustrations, however frequent, are yet less dreadful than its extinction.
If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be not idle.
There is no kind of idleness by which we are as easily seduced as that which dignifies itself by the appearance of business.
That friendship may be at once fond and lasting, there must not only be equal virtue on each part, but virtue of the same kind; not only the same end must be proposed, but the same means must be approved by both.
It is not uncommon to charge the difference between promise and performance, between profession and reality, upon deep design and studied deceit; but the truth is, that there is very little hypocrisy in the world.
Leisure and curiosity might soon make great advances in useful knowledge, were they not diverted by minute emulation and laborious trifles.
A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek.
Of all the grief’s that harass the distressed; sure the most bitter is a scornful jest.
It is the function of vice to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.
Half the vices which the world condemns most loudly have seeds of good in them and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.
The extremes of vice and virtue are alike detestable, and absolute virtue is as sure to kill a man as absolute vice is.
Where there is no hope there can be no endeavor.
There is certainly no greater happiness than to be able to look back on a life usefully and virtuously employed, to trace our own progress in existence, by such tokens as excite neither shame nor sorrow.
The true art of memory is the art of attention.
Knowledge is of two kinds; we know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.
A desire of knowledge is the natural feeling of mankind, and every human being whose mind is not debauched will be willing to give all that he has to get knowledge.
Whatever enlarges hope will exalt courage.
Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy, affectation part of the chosen trappings of folly; the one completes a villain, the other only finishes a fop.
No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures.
It is necessary to hope, though hope should always be deluded; for hope itself is happiness, and its frustrations, however frequent, are yet less dreadful than its extinction.
All envy is proportionate to desire; we are uneasy at the attainments of another, according as we think our own happiness would be advanced by the addition of that which he withholds from us.
Very few live by choice. Every man is placed in his present condition by causes which acted without his foresight, and with which he did not always willingly cooperate; and therefore you will rarely meet one who does not think the lot of his neighbor better than his own.
A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him.
It is unjust to claim the privileges of age, and retain the playthings of childhood.
Every old man complains of the growing depravity of the world, of the petulance and insolence of the rising generation.
Age looks with anger on the temerity of youth, and youth with contempt on the scrupulosity of age.
It seems to be the fate of man to seek all his consolations in futurity. The time present is seldom able to fill desire or imagination with immediate enjoyment, and we are forced to supply its deficiencies by recollection or anticipation.
A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of anything.
Books without the knowledge of life are useless.
Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero; must drink brandy.
I am very fond of the company of ladies. I like their beauty, I like their delicacy, I like their vivacity, and I like their silence.
I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.
It is better to live rich than to die rich.
Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little.
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
People in general do not willingly read if they have anything else to amuse them.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.
When speculation has done its worst, two plus two still equals four.
