Samuel Johnson quotes - page 29

The lustre of diamonds is invigorated by the interposition of darker bodies the lights of a picture are created by the shades the highest pleasure which nature has indulged to sensitive perception is that of rest after fatigue. (Samuel Johnson)
He that is pushing his predecessors into the gulf of obscurity, cannot but sometimes suspect, that he must himself sink in like manner, and, as he stands upon the same precipice, be swept away with the same violence. View quote
Samuel Johnson
The world will never be long without some good reason to hate the unhappy their real faults are immediately detected, and if those are not sufficient to sink them into infamy, an additional weight of calumny will be superadded. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Excellence, in any department, can only be attained by the labor of a lifetime. It is not purchased at a lesser price. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Where there is no hope there can be no endeavor. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Go into the street and give one man a lecture on morality and another a shilling, and see which one will respect you most. View quote
Samuel Johnson
On Sir Joshua Reynoldss observing that the real character of a man was found out by his amusements. Yes, Sir, no man is a hypocrite in his pleasures. View quote
Samuel Johnson
No member of society has the right to teach any doctrine contrary to what society holds to be true. View quote
Samuel Johnson
He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind than the strokes of the oar and many fold in their passage while they lie waiting for the gale.'' View quote
Samuel Johnson
The appearance and retirement of actors are the great events of the theatrical world and their first performances fill the pit with conjecture and prognostication, as the first actions of a new monarch agitate nations with hope and fear. View quote
Samuel Johnson
The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give, For we that live to please, must please to live. (Samuel Johnson)
It is, indeed, at home that every man must be known by those who would make a just estimate either of his virtue or felicity for smiles and embroidery are alike occasional, and the mind is often dressed for show in painted honour. . . View quote
Samuel Johnson
In all evils which admit a remedy, impatience should be avoided, because it wastes that time and attention in complaints which, if properly applied, might remove the cause. View quote
Samuel Johnson
When any anxiety or gloom of the mind takes hold of you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaining; but exert yourselves to hide it, and by endeavoring to hide it you drive it away. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Riches exclude only one inconvenience, And that is poverty. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Pity is not natural to man. Children and savages are always cruel. Pity is acquired and improved by the cultivation of reason. We may have uneasy sensations from seeing a creature in distress, without pity but we have not pity unless we wish to relieve him. View quote
Samuel Johnson
God Himself, sir, does not propose to judge a man until his life is over. Why should you and I. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Keeping accounts, Sir, is of no use when a man is spending his own money, and has nobody to whom he is to account. You won't eat less beef today, because you have written down what it cost yesterday. View quote
Samuel Johnson
I know not anything more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation, or to register from time to time the difference between idea and reality. It is by this kind of observation that we grow daily. . . View quote
Samuel Johnson
To embarrass justice by a multiplicity of laws, or to hazard it by confidence in judges, are the opposite rocks on which all civil institutions have been wrecked, and between which legislative wisdom has never yet found an open passage. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Advertisements are now so numerous that they are very negligently perused, and it is therefore become necessary to gain attention by magnificence of promises and by eloquence sometimes sublime and sometimes pathetic. (Samuel Johnson)
The wise man applauds he who he thinks most virtuous the rest of the world applauds the wealthy. View quote
Samuel Johnson
He that never thinks never can be wise. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Prudence keeps life safe, but it does not often make it happy. View quote
Samuel Johnson
Critics, like the rest of mankind, are very frequently misled by interest. View quote
Samuel Johnson