To have the management of the mind is a great art, and it may be attained in a considerable degree by experience… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The prosperity of a people is proportionate to the number of hands and minds usefully employed. To the community, sedition is a… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When any fit of gloominess, or perversion of mind, lays hold upon you, make it a rule not to publish it by… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Distance either of time or place is sufficient to reconcile weak minds to wonderful relations. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Composition is for the most part an effort of slow diligence and steady perseverance, to which the mind is dragged by necessity… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
No mind is much employed upon the present; recollection and anticipation fill up almost all our moments. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It has long been observed, that an atheist has no just reason for endeavouring conversions; and yet none harass those minds which… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
The mental disease of the present generation is impatience of study, contempt of the great masters of ancient wisdom, and a disposition… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To understand the works of celebrated authors, to comprehend their systems, and retain their reasonings, is a task more than equal to… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Whatever professes to benefit by pleasing must please at once. The pleasures of the mind imply something sudden and unexpected; that which… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
A person loves to review his own mind. That is the use of a diary, or journal. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
“Nothing has more retarded the advancement of learning than the disposition of vulgar minds to ridicule and vilify what they cannot comprehend.” — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When any anxiety or gloom of the mind takes hold of you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaining;… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When a friend is carried to his grave, we at once find excuses for every weakness, and palliation of every fault. We… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To fix the thoughts by writing, and subject them to frequent examinations and reviews, is the best method of enabling the mind… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Forgetfulness is necessary to remembrance. Ideas are retained by renovation of that impression which time is always wearing away,and which new images… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Great abilities are not requisite for an Historian; for in historical composition, all the greatest powers of the human mind are quiescent. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To fix the thoughts by writing, and subject them to frequent examinations and reviews, is the best method of enabling the mind… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Consultation and compliance can conduce little to the perfection of any literary performance; for whoever is so doubtful of his own abilities… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When any fit of gloominess, or perversion of mind, lays hold upon you, make it a rule not to publish it by… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
They who have already enjoyed the crowds and noise of the great city, know their desire to return is little more than… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
More is learned in a public than in a private school, from emulation. There is the collision of mind with mind, or… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To set the mind above the appetites is the end of abstinence, which if not a virtue, is the groundwork of a… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
To write is, indeed, no unpleasing employment, when one sentiment readily produces another, and both ideas and expressions present themselves at the… — 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
