Character Quotes by Samuel Johnson

“A man must assume the moral burden of his own boredom.”

— Samuel Johnson

Virtue is too often merely local.

— Samuel Johnson

If a man could say nothing against a character but what he can prove, history could not be written.

— Samuel Johnson

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

— Samuel Johnson

He who would govern his actions by the laws of virtue must regulate his thoughts by those of reason.

— Samuel Johnson

..to write and to live are very different. Many who praise virtue, do no more than praise it.

— Samuel Johnson

Be not too hasty to trust or to admire the teachers of morality; they discourse like angels, but they live like men.

— Samuel Johnson

Almost all the moral good which is left among us is the apparent effect of physical evil.

— Samuel Johnson

Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it is associated with vice.

— Samuel Johnson

Most men are more willing to indulge in easy vices than to practise laborious virtues.

— Samuel Johnson

I believe marriages would in general be as happy, and often more so, if they were all made by the Lord Chancellor,…

— Samuel Johnson

Solitude is dangerous to reason, without being favorable to virtue. Remember that the solitary mortal is certainly luxurious, probably superstitious, and possibly…

— Samuel Johnson

The business of life summons us away from useless grief, and calls us to the exercise of those virtues of which we…

— Samuel Johnson

In youth, it is common to measure right and wrong by the opinion of the world, and in age, to act without…

— Samuel Johnson

Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty,…

— Samuel Johnson

On Sir Joshua Reynolds's observing that the real character of a man was found out by his amusements. Yes, Sir, no man…

— Samuel Johnson

Words become low by the occasions to which they are applied, or the general character of them who use them; and the…

— Samuel Johnson

Never believe extraordinary characters which you hear of people. Depend upon it, they are exaggerated. You do not see one man shoot…

— Samuel Johnson

To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity; the next is, to strive, and deserve to conquer:…

— Samuel Johnson

That eminence of learning is not to be gained without labour, at least equal to that which any other kind of greatness…

— Samuel Johnson

Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present,…

— Samuel Johnson

Without good humour, learning and bravery can only confer that superiority which swells the heart of the lion in the desert, where…

— Samuel Johnson

The art of the writer, like that of the player, is attained by slow degrees. The power of distinguishing and discriminating comick…

— Samuel Johnson

A successful author is equally in danger of the diminution of his fame, whether he continues or ceases to write. The regard…

— Samuel Johnson

The whole power of cunning is privative; to say nothing, and to do nothing , is the utmost of its reach. Yet…

— Samuel Johnson

In writing, as in life, faults are endured without disgust when they are associated with transcendent merit, and may be sometimes recommended…

— Samuel Johnson

The greatest human virtue bears no proportion to human vanity. We always think ourselves better than we are, and are generally desirous…

— Samuel Johnson

To dread no eye and to suspect no tongue is the great prerogative of innocence--an exemption granted only to invariable virtue.

— Samuel Johnson

Wickedness is always easier than virtue; for it takes the short cut to everything.

— Samuel Johnson

Glory, the casual gift of thoughtless crowds! Glory, the bribe of avaricious virtue!

— Samuel Johnson

Go into the street, and give one man a lecture on morality, and another a shilling, and see which will respect you…

— Samuel Johnson

Marriage is the best state for man in general, and every man is a worst man in proportion to the level he…

— Samuel Johnson

Courage is reckoned the greatest of all virtues; because, unless a man has that virtue, he has no security for preserving any…

— Samuel Johnson

Contempt is a kind of gangrene which, if it seizes one part of a character, corrupts all the rest by degrees.

— Samuel Johnson

It is to be steadily inculcated, that virtue is the highest proof of understanding, and the only solid basis of greatness.

— Samuel Johnson

Every man prefers virtue, when there is not some strong incitement to transgress its precepts.

— Samuel Johnson

To set the mind above the appetites is the end of abstinence, which if not a virtue, is the groundwork of a…

— Samuel Johnson

[C]ourage is reckoned the greatest of all virtues; because, unless a man has that virtue, he has no security for preserving any…

— Samuel Johnson

Among the numerous stratagems by which pride endeavors to recommend folly to regard, there is scarcely one that meets with less success…

— Samuel Johnson

Moral sentences appear ostentatious and tumid, when they have no greater occasions than the journey of a wit to his home town:…

— Samuel Johnson