May Quotes by Samuel Johnson

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

— Samuel Johnson

Games are good or bad as to their nature; all may be perverted.

— Samuel Johnson

People may be taken in once, who imagine that an author is greater in private life than other men.

— Samuel Johnson

Get together a hundred or two men, however sensible they may be, and you are very likely to have a mob.

— Samuel Johnson

Such is the constitution of Man that labor may be said to be its own re-ward.

— Samuel Johnson

The seeds of knowledge may be planted in solitude, but must be cultivated in public.

— Samuel Johnson

Friendship, like love, is destroyed by long absence, though it may be increased by short intermissions.

— Samuel Johnson

By forbearing to do what may innocently be done, we may add hourly new vigor to resolution.

— Samuel Johnson

You may translate books of science exactly. ... The beauties of poetry cannot be preserved in any language except that in which…

— Samuel Johnson

The animadversions of critics are commonly such as may easily provoke the sedatest writer to some quickness of resentment and asperity of…

— Samuel Johnson

There should be a stated day for commemorating the birthday of our Savior, because there is danger that what may be done…

— Samuel Johnson

Other things may be seized by might, or purchased with money, but knowledge is to be gained only by study, and study…

— Samuel Johnson

Peevishness may be considered the canker of life, that destroys its vigor and checks its improvement; that creeps on with hourly depredations,…

— Samuel Johnson

Pointed axioms and acute replies fly loose about the world, and are assigned successively to those whom it may be the fashion…

— Samuel Johnson

Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal; and he may be properly charged with evil who refused to learn how he might…

— Samuel Johnson

Every man may be observed to have a certain strain of lamentation, some peculiar theme of complaint on which he dwells in…

— Samuel Johnson

The duty of criticism is neither to depreciate nor dignify by partial representations, but to hold out the light of reason, whatever…

— Samuel Johnson

To have the management of the mind is a great art, and it may be attained in a considerable degree by experience…

— Samuel Johnson

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

No cause more frequently produces bashfulness than too high an opinion of our own importance. He that imagines an assembly filled with…

— Samuel Johnson

Every man, however hopeless his pretensions may appear, has some project by which he hopes to rise to reputation; some art by…

— Samuel Johnson

Many causes may vitiate a writer's judgement of his own works. On that which has cost him much labour he sets a…

— Samuel Johnson

No degree of knowledge attainable by man is able to set him above the want of hourly assistance, or to extinguish the…

— Samuel Johnson

The Church does not superstitiously observe days, merely as days, but as memorials of important facts. Christmas might be kept as well…

— Samuel Johnson

Truth, like beauty, varies its fashions, and is best recommended by different dresses to different minds; and he that recalls the attention…

— 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

Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. The power of invention has been conferred…

— Samuel Johnson

He that would travel for the entertainment of others, should remember that the great object of remark is human life. Every nation…

— Samuel Johnson

In order that all men may be taught to speak truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it;…

— Samuel Johnson

The student who would build his knowledge on solid foundations, and proceed by just degrees to the pinnacles of truth, is directed…

— Samuel Johnson

It may be observed in general that the future is purchased by the present. It is not possible to secure distant or…

— Samuel Johnson

Among the innumerable mortifications which waylay human arrogance on every side may well be reckoned our ignorance of the most common objects…

— Samuel Johnson

Frugality may be termed the daughter of Prudence, the sister of Temperance, and the parent of Liberty.

— Samuel Johnson

Never speak of a man in his own presence. It is always indelicate, and may be offensive .

— Samuel Johnson

Men are like stone jugs - you may lug them where you like by the ears.

— Samuel Johnson

Every other author may aspire to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach.

— Samuel Johnson

Let us be quick to repent of injuries while repentance may not be a barren anguish.

— Samuel Johnson

Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young.

— Samuel Johnson

We may take Fancy for a companion, but must follow Reason as our guide.

— Samuel Johnson

Friendship may well deserve the sacrifice of pleasure, though not of conscience.

— Samuel Johnson