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Leisure and curiosity might soon make great advances in useful knowledge, were they not diverted by minute emulation and laborious trifles.

Samuel Johnson

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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
Biographer
Bookseller
Essayist
Lexicographer
Linguist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Poet
Politician
Teacher
Translator
Writer
Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
Knowledge
Trifles
Might
Advances
Great
Leisure
Make
Useful
Minute
Curiosity
Diverted
Soon
Laborious
Minutes
Emulation

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Age is rarely despised but when it is, contemptible.
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There must always be some advantage on one side or the other, and it is better that advantage should be had by talents than by chance.
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But the distant hope of being one day useful or eminent ought not to mislead us too far from that study which is equally requisite to the great and mean, to the celebrated and obscure the art of moderating the desires, of repressing the appetites and of conciliating or retaining the favour of mankind.
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Levellers wish to level down as far as themselves but they cannot bear levelling up to themselves.
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Spring is the season of gaiety, and winter of terror in spring the heart of tranquility dances to the melody of the groves, and the eye of benevolence sparkles at the sight of happiness and plenty: in winter, compassion melts at universal calamity, and the tear of softness starts at the wailing of hunger and the cries of the creation in distress
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No man likes to live under the eye of perpetual disapprobation.
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It is so far from being natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.
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Riches, perhaps, do not so often produce crimes as incite accusers.
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Pleasure that is obtained by unreasonable and unsuitable cost must always end in pain.
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But to the particular species of excellence men are directed, not by an ascendant planet or predominating humour, but by the first book which they read, some early conversation which they heard, or some accident which excited ardour and emulation.
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In my early years I read very hard. It is a sad reflection, but a true one, that I knew almost as much at eighteen as I do now.
Samuel Johnson
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Life, however short, is made still shorter by waste of time.
Samuel Johnson
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I do not see, Sir, that it is reasonable for a man to be angry at another, whom a woman has preferred to him but angry he is, no doubt and he is loath to be angry at himself.
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The happiest part of a man's life is what he passes lying awake in bed in the morning.
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Few things are impossible to diligence and skill.
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You think I love flattery (says Dr. Johnson), and so I do but a little too much always disgusts me: that fellow Richardson, on the contrary, could not be contented to sail quietly down the stream of reputation, without longing to taste the froth from every stroke of the oar.
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Of many, imagined blessings it may be doubted whether he that wants or possesses them had more reason to be satisfied with his lot.
Samuel Johnson
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None of the projects or designs which exercise the mind of man are equally subject to obstructions and disappointments with the pursuit of fame.
Samuel Johnson
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In the bottle discontent seeks for comfort, cowardice for courage, and bashfulness for confidence.
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Few of those who fill the world with books, have any pretensions to the hope either of pleasing or instructing. They have often no other task than to lay two books before them, out of which they compile a third, without any new material of their own, and with very little application of judgment to those which former authors have supplied.
Samuel Johnson