Samuel Johnson Quotes
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Employment, sir, and hardships prevent melancholy.
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The true art of memory is the art of attention.
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A thousand horrid Prodigies foretold it.A feeble government, eluded Laws,A factious Populace, luxurious Nobles,And all the maladies of stinking states.
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It is man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age.
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I have, all my life long, been lying till noon; yet I tell all young men, and tell them with great sincerity, that nobody who does not rise early will ever do any good.
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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.
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The endearing elegance of female friendship.
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That he delights in the misery of others no man will confess, and yet what other motive can make a father cruel?
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What makes all doctrines plain and clear? About two hundred pounds a year. And that which was proved true before, prove false again? Two hundred more.
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'I fly from pleasure,' said the prince, 'because pleasure has ceased to please; I am lonely because I am miserable, and am unwilling to cloud with my presence the happiness of others.'
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Was ever poet so trusted before?
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By Numbers here from Shame or Censure free,All Crimes are safe, but hated Poverty.This, only this, the rigid Law persues,This, only this, provokes the snarling Muse.
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He was a very good hater.
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I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically, except in narrative; grow weary of preparation, and connection, and illustration, and all those arts by which a big book is made.
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Sir, I have found you an argument; but I am not obliged to find you an understanding.
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A fellow that makes no figure in company, and has a mind as narrow as the neck of a vinegar-cruet.
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Catch then, O! catch the transient hour, Improve each moment as it flies; Life's a short Summer - man a flower, He dies - alas! how soon he dies!
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Cold approbation gave the ling'ring bays,For those who durst not censure, scarce could praise.
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Here's to the next insurrection of the negroes in the West Indies.
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While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till grief be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it.
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The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading in order to write. A man will turn over half a library to make a book.
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'Some,' answered Imlac, 'have indeed said that the soul is material, but I can scarcely believe that any man has thought it, who knew how to think; for all the conclusions of reason enforce the immateriality of mind, and all the notices of sense and investigations of science, concur to prove the unconsciousness of matter.
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But, scarce observ'd, the knowing and the boldFall in the gen'ral massacre of gold.
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Officious, innocent, sincere,Of every friendless name the friend.