Samuel Johnson quotes - page 10

Gloomy calm of idle vacancy. (Samuel Johnson)
The applause of a single human being is of great consequence. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Norway, too, has noble wild prospects; and Lapland is remarkable for prodigious noble wild prospects. But, Sir, let me tell you, the noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees, is the high road that leads him to England! View quote
Samuel Johnson
There is in this world no real delight (excepting those of sensuality), but exchange of ideas in conversation. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Let us take a patriot, where we can meet him; and, that we may not flatter ourselves by false appearances, distinguish those marks which are certain, from those which may deceive; for a man may have the external appearance of a patriot, without the constituent qualities; as false coins have often lustre, though they want weight. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Avarice is generally the last passion of those lives of which the first part has been squandered in pleasure, and the second devoted to ambition. View quote
Samuel Johnson
All this [wealth] excludes but one evil,-poverty. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Life admits not of delays; when pleasure can be had, it is fit to catch it. Every hour takes away part of the things that please us, and perhaps part of our disposition to be pleased. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Sherry is dull, naturally dull; but it must have taken him a great deal of pains to become what we now see him. Such an excess of stupidity, sir, is not in Nature. View quote
Samuel Johnson
I am not yet so lost in lexicography, as to forget that words are the daughters of earth, and that things are the sons of heaven. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might be permanent, like the things which they denote. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Liberty is, to the lowest rank of every nation, little more than the choice of working or starving. (Samuel Johnson)
Let me rejoice in the light which Thou hast imparted; let me serve Thee with active zeal, humbled confidence, and wait with patient expectation for the time in which the soul which Thou receivest shall be satisfied with knowledge. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Let observation with extensive view Survey mankind, from China to Peru. View quote
Samuel Johnson
The limbs will quiver and move after the soul is gone. View quote
Samuel Johnson
And sure th' Eternal Master found His single talent well employ'd. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Tom Birch is as brisk as a bee in conversation but no sooner does he take a pen in his hand than it becomes a torpedo to him, and benumbs all his faculties. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Employment, sir, and hardships prevent melancholy. View quote
Samuel Johnson
He left the name at which the world grew pale, To point a moral, or adorn a tale. View quote
Samuel Johnson
No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned. View quote
Samuel Johnson
[The poet] must write as the interpreter of nature and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of future generations, as a being superior to time and place. View quote
Samuel Johnson
It is man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age. (Samuel Johnson)
If lawyers were to undertake no causes till they were sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from a trial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined, it might be found a very just claim. View quote
Samuel Johnson
I am very fond of the company of ladies. I like their beauty, I like their delicacy, I like their vivacity, and I like their silence. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Frugality may be termed the daughter of Prudence, the sister of Temperance and the parent of Liberty. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Every state of society is as luxurious as it can be. Men always take the best they can get. View quote
Samuel Johnson