Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom; it is to be sure, good for nothing; but put all… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The task of an author is, either to teach what is not known, or to recommend known truths by his manner of… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
You may abuse a tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table,… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To love their country has been considered as virtue in men, whose love could not be otherwise than blind, because their preference… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
We may have many acquaintances, but we can have but few friends; this made Aristotle say that he that hath many friends… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically, except in narrative; grow weary of preparation, and connection, and illustration,… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Many of our miseries are merely comparative: we are often made unhappy, not by the presence of any real evil, but by… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. He whom nature has made weak, and… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
As to the rout that is made about people who are ruined by extravagance, it is no matter to the nation that… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
In order that all men may be taught to speak truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it;… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To excite opposition and inflame malevolence is the unhappy privilege of courage made arrogant by consciousness of strength. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Censure is willingly indulged, because it always implies some superiority: men please themselves with imagining that they have made a deeper search,… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The chief art of learning, as Locke has observed, is to attempt but little at a time. The widest excursions of the… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
I inherited a vile melancholy from my father, which has made me mad all my life, at least not sober. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
There is no book so poor that it would not be a prodigy if wholly made by a single man. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
I believe marriages would in general be as happy, and often more so, if they were all made by the Lord Chancellor,… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
That the happiness of man may still remain imperfect, as wants in this place are easily supplied, new wants likewise are easily… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Among those whose reputation is exhausted in a short time by its own luxuriance are the writers who take advantage of present… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When once a man has made celebrity necessary to his happiness, he has put it in the power of the weakest and… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
...a common observation, that few are mended by imprisonment, and that he, whose crimes have made confinement necessary, seldom makes any other… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
There is no observation more frequently made by such as employ themselves in surveying the conduct of mankind, than that marriage, though… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
His virtues walked their narrow round, Nor made a pause, nor left a void; And sure the Eternal Master found The single… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Pension: An allowance made to anyone without an equivalent. In England it is generally understood to mean pay given to a state… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It is generally agreed, that few men are made better by affluence or exaltation. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The imaginations excited by the view of an unknown and untravelled wilderness are not such as arise in the artificial solitude of… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. The power of invention has been conferred… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Where no man thinks himself under any obligation to submit to another, and, instead of co-operating in one great scheme, every one… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
In this work are exhibited, in a very high degree, the two most engaging powers of an author. New things are made… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Waste cannot be accurately told, though we are sensible how destructive it is. Economy, on the one hand, by which a certain… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It is wonderful when a calculation is made, how little the mind is actually employed in the discharge of any profession. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
By taking a second wife he pays the highest compliment to the first, by showing that she made him so happy as… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
So many objections may be made to everything, that nothing can overcome them but the necessity of doing something. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The size of a man's understanding might always be justly measured by his mirth. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom; it is to be sure, good for nothing; but put all these atoms… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
If our aim is to praise, we should forget to criticize; if our aim is to criticize, we should remember to praise — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It is as foolish to make experiments upon the constancy of a friend, as upon the chastity of a wife. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The basis of all excellence is truth: he that professes love ought to feel its power. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
“The composition of Shakespeare is a forest, in which oaks extend in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelting… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
“The cherubim were never intended as an object of worship, because they were only the appendices to another thing. But a thing is then… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
