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It is better that some should be unhappy rather than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality.
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
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
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Egalitarianism
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
Pleasure that is obtained by unreasonable and unsuitable cost must always end in pain.
Samuel Johnson
It is one of the maxims of the civil law, that definitions are hazardous.
Samuel Johnson
Misfortunes should always be expected.
Samuel Johnson
That friendship may be at once fond and lasting, there must not only be equal virtue on each part, but virtue of the same kind not only the same end must be proposed, but the same means must be approved by both.
Samuel Johnson
Words too familiar, or too remote, defeat the purpose of a poet. From those sounds which we hear on small or on coarse occasions, we do not easily receive strong impressions, or delightful images and words to which we are nearly strangers, whenever they occur, draw that attention on themselves which they should transmit to other things.
Samuel Johnson
I am always for getting a boy forward in his learning, for that is sure good. I would let him at first read any English book which happens to engage his attention because you have done a great deal when you have brought him to have entertainment from a book. He'll get better books afterwards.
Samuel Johnson
Lichfield, England. Swallows certainly sleep all winter. A number of them conglobulate together, by flying round and round, and then all in a heap throw themselves under water, and lye in the bed of a river.
Samuel Johnson
The equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with peculiar enjoyments.
Samuel Johnson
Books without the knowledge of life are useless.
Samuel Johnson
This was a good dinner enough, to be sure, but it was not a dinner to ask a man to.
Samuel Johnson
Sorrow is the mere rust of the soul. Activity will cleanse and brighten it.
Samuel Johnson
I will venture to say there is more learning and science within the circumference of ten miles from where we now sit [in London], than in all the rest of the kingdom.
Samuel Johnson
Wise married women don't trouble themselves about infidelity in their husbands.
Samuel Johnson
Learn the leading precognita of all things-no need to turn over leaf by leaf, but grasp the trunk hard and you will shake all the branches. Advice cherished by Samuel Johnson that that, if one is to master any subject, one must first discover its general principles.
Samuel Johnson
Long customs are not easily broken he that attempts to change the course of his own life very often labors in vain and how shall we do that for others, which we are seldom able to do for ourselves.
Samuel Johnson
He who sees different ways to the same end, will, unless he watches carefully over his own conduct, lay out too much of his attention upon the comparison of probabilities and the adjustment of expedients, and pause in the choice of his road, till some accident intercepts his journey.
Samuel Johnson
It is not possible to be regarded with tenderness, except by a few. That merit which gives greatness and renown diffuses its influence to a wide compass, but acts weakly on every single breast it is placed at a distance from common spectators, and shines like one of the remote stars, of which the light reaches us, but not the heat.
Samuel Johnson
The dependant who cultivates delicacy in himself very little consults his own tranquillity.
Samuel Johnson
How small of all that human hearts endure/That part which laws or kings can cause or cure.
Samuel Johnson
It is man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age.
Samuel Johnson
