Every man is prompted by the love of himself to imagine that he possesses some qualities, superior, either in kind or degree,… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Our minds, like our bodies, are in continual flux; something is hourly lost, and something acquired.... Do not suffer life to stagnate;… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
No man, however enslaved to his appetites, or hurried by his passions, can, while he preserves his intellects unimpaired, please himself with… — 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
The equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with peculiar enjoyments. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
He that resigns his peace to little casualties, and suffers the course of his life to be interrupted for fortuitous inadvertencies or… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Pope had been flattered till he thought himself one of the moving powers of the system of life. When he talked of… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
He that condemns himself to compose on a stated day will often bring to his task attention dissipated, a memory embarrassed, an… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
We suffer equal pain from the pertinacious adhesion of unwelcome images, as from the evanescence of those which are pleasing and useful. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
When any calamity is suffered, the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
I know not, Madam, that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It was the peculiar artifice of Habit not to suffer her power to be felt at first. Those whom she led, she… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Among the many inconsistencies which folly produces or infirmity suffers in the human mind, there has often been observed a manifest and… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
In misery's darkest cavern known, His useful care was ever nigh Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan, And lonely want retir'd to… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
If an author be supposed to involve his thoughts in voluntary obscurity, and to obstruct, by unnecessary difficulties, a mind eager in… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
It is not indeed certain, that the most refined caution will find a proper time for bringing a man to the knowledge… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Vanity is so frequently the apparent motive of advice that we, for the most part, summon our powers to oppose it without… — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Let us be quick to repent of injuries while repentance may not be a barren anguish. — Samuel Johnson Copy Share Image
Authors and lovers always suffer some infatuation, from which only absence can set them free. — 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
