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Almost every man wastes part of his life attempting to display qualities which he does not possess.
Samuel Johnson
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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
The parallel circumstances and kindred images to which we readily conform our minds are, above all other writings, to be found in the lives of particular persons, and therefore no species of writing seems more worthy of cultivation than biography.
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.
Samuel Johnson
All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.
Samuel Johnson
Few faults of style, whether real or imaginary, excite the malignity of a more numerous class of readers, than the use of hard words.
Samuel Johnson
Men have been wise in many different modes but they have always laughed the same way.
Samuel Johnson
No man can have much kindness for him by whom he does not believe himself esteemed, and nothing so evidently proves esteem as imitation.
Samuel Johnson
It is the care of a very great part of mankind to conceal their indigence from the rest. They support themselves by temporary expedients, and every day is lost in contriving for to-morrow.
Samuel Johnson
Men become friends by a community of pleasures.
Samuel Johnson
Other things may be seized by might, or purchased with money, but knowledge is to be gained only by study, and study to be prosecuted only in retirement.
Samuel Johnson
Friendship may well deserve the sacrifice of pleasure, though not of conscience.
Samuel Johnson
Curiosity, like all other desires, produces pain as well as pleasure.
Samuel Johnson
By those who look close to the ground dirt will be seen. I hope I see things from a greater distance.
Samuel Johnson
The most useful truths are always universal, and unconnected with accidents and customs.
Samuel Johnson
The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered, but a general effect of pleasing impression.
Samuel Johnson
The end of writing is to instruct the end of poetry is to instruct by pleasing.
Samuel Johnson
Don't think of retiring from the world until the world will be sorry that you retire. I hate a fellow whom pride or cowardice or laziness drive into a corner, and who does nothing when he is there but sit and growl. Let him come out as I do, and bark.
Samuel Johnson
Of those that spin out trifles and die without a memorial, many flatter themselves with high opinions of their own importance, and imagine that they are every day adding some improvement to human life.
Samuel Johnson
Large offers and sturdy rejections are among the most common topics of falsehood.
Samuel Johnson
A soldier's time is passed in distress and danger, or in idleness and corruption.
Samuel Johnson
What is read twice is usually remembered more than what is once written.
Samuel Johnson
