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The future is purchased by the present.

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
Purchased
Present
Future
Truth

More quotes by Samuel Johnson

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All is not gold that glitters, as we have often been told and the adage is verified in your place and my favour but if what happens does not make us richer, we must bid it welcome, if it makes us wiser.
Samuel Johnson
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Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison.
Samuel Johnson
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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
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Since life itself is uncertain, nothing which has life for its basis can boast much stability.
Samuel Johnson
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Such is the constitution of Man that labor may be said to be its own re-ward.
Samuel Johnson
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Thought is always troublesome to him who lives without his own approbation.
Samuel Johnson
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When desperate ills demand a speedy cure, Distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.
Samuel Johnson
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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.
Samuel Johnson
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Bravery has no place where it can avail nothing.
Samuel Johnson
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To purchase Heaven has gold the power? Can gold remove the mortal hour? In life can love be bought with gold? Are friendship's pleasures to be sold? No--all that's worth a wish--a thought, Fair virtue gives unbribed, unbought. Cease then on trash thy hopes to bind, Let nobler views engage thy mind.
Samuel Johnson
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He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.
Samuel Johnson
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The maxim of Cleobulus, Mediocrity is best, has been long considered a universal principle, extending through the whole compass of life and nature. The experience of every age seems to have given it new confirmation, and to show that nothing, however specious or alluring, is pursued with propriety or enjoyed with safety beyond certain limits.
Samuel Johnson
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Pride is a vice, which pride itself inclines every man to find in others, and to overlook in himself
Samuel Johnson
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A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him.
Samuel Johnson
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While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till it be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it.
Samuel Johnson
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I would advise you, Sir, to study algebra, if you are not an adept already in it: your head would get less muddy, and you will leave off tormenting your neighbours about paper and packthread, while we all live together in a world that is bursting with sin and sorrow.
Samuel Johnson
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Lawyers know life practically. A bookish man should always have them to converse with.
Samuel Johnson
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Few things are so liberally bestowed, or squandered with so little effect, as good advice.
Samuel Johnson
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I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.
Samuel Johnson
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Some people wave their dogmatic thinking until their own reason is entangled.
Samuel Johnson