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Those who attain any excellence, commonly spend life in one pursuit for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms.

Samuel Johnson

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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
Biographer
Bookseller
Essayist
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Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Poet
Politician
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
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Attain
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Commonly

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You are much surer that you are doing good when you pay money to those who work, as the recompense of their labor, than when you give money merely in charity.
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Was there ever yet anything written by mere man that was wished longer by its readers, excepting Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, and the Pilgrim's Progress?
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Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty, and of ease, and the beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.
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I wish you would add an index rerum, that when the reader recollects any incident he may easily find it.
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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.
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Love is only one of many passions.
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Every man naturally persuades himself that he can keep his resolutions, nor is he convinced of his imbecility but by length of time and frequency of experiment.
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We all live upon the hope of pleasing somebody, and the pleasure of pleasing ought to be greatest, and at last always will be greatest, when our endeavours are exerted in consequence of our duty.
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A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected.
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In lapidary inscriptions a man is not upon oath.
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Expectation improperly indulged in must end in disappointment.
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There is, indeed, nothing that so much seduces reason from vigilance, as the thought of passing life with an amiable woman.
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About things on which the public thinks long it commonly attains to think right.
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No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it.
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A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him.
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Apologies are seldom of any use.
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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 honor, and fictitious benevolence.
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There is nothing against which an old man should be so much upon his guard as putting himself to nurse.
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Slavery is now nowhere more patiently endured, than in countries once inhabited by the zealots of liberty.
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A voyage to the moon, however romantick and absurd the scheme may now appear, since the properties of air have been better understood, seemed highly probable to many of the aspiring wits in the last century
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