Samuel Johnson Quotes
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A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died: Johnson said, it was the triumph of hope over experience.
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Wine gives a man nothing... it only puts in motion what had been locked up in frost.
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Of all noises, I think music is the least disagreeable.
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What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence.
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The limbs will quiver and move after the soul is gone.
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What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.
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All theory is against freedom of the will; all experience for it.
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Must helpless man, in ignorance sedate,Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?
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Was ever poet so trusted before?
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Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagreeable to him; for where there is nothing but pure misery there never is any recourse to the mention 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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Johnson said that he could repeat a complete chapter of 'The Natural History of Iceland' from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly thus: 'There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.' 62 Chap. lxxii.
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From the middle of life onward, only he remains vitally alive who is ready to die with life.
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I never take a nap after dinner but when I have had a bad night; and then the nap takes me.
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With these celestial Wisdom calms the mind,And makes the happiness she does not find.
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Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not.
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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.
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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!
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A wise man is cured of ambition by ambition itself; his aim is so exalted that riches, office, fortune and favour cannot satisfy him.
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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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There is in this world no real delight (excepting those of sensuality), but exchange of ideas in conversation.
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He is no wise man that will quit a certainty for an uncertainty.
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Merriment is always the effect of a sudden impression. The jest which is expected is already destroyed.
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Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little.