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Evil is uncertain in the same degree as good, and for the reason that we ought not to hope too securely, we ought not to fear with to much dejection.

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
Much
Uncertain
Good
Degree
Degrees
Ought
Evil
Hope
Dejection
Fear
Securely
Reason
Wickedness

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To go and see one druidical temple is only to see that it is nothing, for there is neither art nor power in it and seeing one is quite enough.
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The true effect of genuine politeness seems to be rather ease than pleasure.
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Sir, I do not call a gamester a dishonest man but I call him an unsociable man, an unprofitable man. Gaming is a mode of transferring property without producing any intermediate good.
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Whatever is formed for long duration arrives slowly to its maturity.
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Do not accustom yourself to consider debt only as an inconvenience you will find it a calamity.
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Patience and submission are very carefully to be distinguished from cowardice and indolence. We are not to repine, but we may lawfully struggle for the calamities of life, like the necessities of Nature, are calls to labor and diligence.
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Poverty has, in large cities, very different appearances it is often concealed in splendour, and often in extravagance.
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A mere literary man is a dull man a man who is solely a man of business is a selfish man but when literature and commerce are united, they make a respectable man.
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Reason elevates our thoughts as high as the stars, and leads us through the vast space of this mighty fabric yet it comes far short of the real extent of our corporeal being.
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Read over your compositions and whenever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out.
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The seeds of knowledge may be planted in solitude, but must be cultivated in public.
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...it will not always happen that the success of a poet is proportionate to his labor.
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Don't tell me of deception a lie is a lie, whether it be a lie to the eye or a lie to the ear.
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There is scarcely any writer who has not celebrated the happiness of rural privacy, and delighted himself and his reader with the melody of birds, the whisper of groves, and the murmur of rivulets.
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It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.
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There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
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What is the reason that women servants ... have much lower wages than men servants ... when in fact our female house servants work much harder than the male?
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He who endeavors to please must appear pleased.
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Getting money is not all a man's business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.
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