Samuel Johnson quotes - page 30

Smoking is a shocking thing blowing smoke out of our mouths into other people's mouths, eyes and noses, and having the same thing done to us. (Samuel Johnson)
No, Sir, you will have much more influence by giving or lending money where it is wanted, than by hospitality.
Samuel Johnson
Such is the constitution of man that labor may be styled its own reward nor will any external incitements be requisite, if it be considered how much happiness is gained, and how much misery escaped, by frequent and violent agitation of the body.
Samuel Johnson
The Irish are a fair people - they never speak well of one another.
Samuel Johnson
Life has no pleasure higher or nobler than that of friendship.
Samuel Johnson
Self-love is often rather arrogant than blind it does not hide our faults from ourselves, but persuades us that they escape the notice of others.
Samuel Johnson
Players, Sir I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make faces and produce laughter, like dancing dogs.
Samuel Johnson
Happiness is nothing if it is not known, And very little if it is not envied.
Samuel Johnson
Men seldom give pleasure where they are not pleased themselves.
Samuel Johnson
Friends are often chosen for similitude of manners, and therefore each palliate the other's failings because they are his own.
Samuel Johnson
The arguments for purity of life fail of their due influence, not because they have been considered and confuted, but because they have been passed over without consideration. (Samuel Johnson)
Cruel with guilt, and daring with despair, The midnight murderer bursts the faithless bar Invades the sacred hour of silent rest And leaves, unseen, a dagger in your breast.
Samuel Johnson
What provokes your risibility, Sir Have I said anything that you understand Then I ask pardon of the rest of the company.
Samuel Johnson
He that hopes to look back hereafter with satisfaction upon past years must learn to know the present value of single minutes, and endeavour to let no particle of time fall useless to the ground.
Samuel Johnson
Never, my dear Sir, do you take it into your head that I do not love you you may settle yourself in full confidence both of my love and my esteem I love you as a kind man, I value you as a worthy man, and hope in time to reverence you as a man of exemplary piety.
Samuel Johnson
It is generally known, that he who expects much will be often disappointed yet disappointment seldom cures us of expectation, or has any effect other than that of producing a moral sentence or peevish exclamation.
Samuel Johnson
A successful author is equally in danger of diminution of his fame, whether he continues or ceases to write.
Samuel Johnson
If a madman were to come into this room with a stick in his hand, no doubt we should pity the state of his mind but our primary consideration would be to take care of ourselves. We should knock him down first, and pity him afterwards.
Samuel Johnson
To do nothing is in every man's power.
Samuel Johnson
Of literary criticism You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your trade to make tables.
Samuel Johnson
He that pursues fame with just claims, trusts his happiness to the winds but he that endeavors after it by false merit, has to fear, not only the violence of the storm, but the leaks of his vessel. (Samuel Johnson)
I believe it will be found that those who marry late Are best pleased with their children, and those who marry early with their partners.
Samuel Johnson
Time quickly puts an end to artificial and accidental fame.
Samuel Johnson
Sir, I do not call a gamester a dishonest man but I call him an unsocial man, an unprofitable man. Gaming is a mode of transferring property without producing any intermediate good.
Samuel Johnson
What ever the motive for the insult, it is always best to overlook it for folly doesn't deserve resentment, and malice is punished by neglect.
Samuel Johnson