Quote

Criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was meant as a standard of judging well.

Samuel Johnson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Meant
Standards
Judging
Wells
Instituted
Firsts
Aristotle
Well
Standard
First
Critics
Criticism

More quotes by Samuel Johnson

Image
Read the book you do honestly feel a wish and curiosity to read.
Samuel Johnson
Image
When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life for there is in London all that life can afford.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Our aspirations are our possibilities.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The true genius is a mind of large general powers, accidentally determined to some particular direction.
Samuel Johnson
Image
No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned... a man in a jail has more room, better food, and commonly better company.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Rash oaths, whether kept or broken, frequently produce guilt.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Flattery pleases very generally. In the first place, the flatterer may think what he says to be true but, in the second place, whether he thinks so or not, he certainly thinks those whom he flatters of consequence enough to be flattered.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Power is not sufficient evidence of truth.
Samuel Johnson
Image
We owe to memory not only the increase of our knowledge, and our progress in rational inquiries, but many other intellectual pleasures
Samuel Johnson
Image
How can children credit the assertions of parents, which their own eyes show them to be false? Few parents act in such a manner as much to enforce their maxims by the credit of their lives
Samuel Johnson
Image
There are few minds to which tyranny is not delightful.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Shakespeare never had six lines together without a fault. Perhaps you may find seven, but this does not refute my general assertion.
Samuel Johnson
Image
What I gained by being in France was learning to be better satisfied with my own country.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Glory, the casual gift of thoughtless crowds! Glory, the bribe of avaricious virtue!
Samuel Johnson
Image
It is no matter what you teach them first, any more than what leg you shall put into your breeches first. You may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the mean time your breech is bare. Sir, while you are considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learned them both.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The animadversions of critics are commonly such as may easily provoke the sedatest writer to some quickness of resentment and asperity of reply.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal.
Samuel Johnson
Image
We have now learned that rashness and imprudence will not be deterred from taking credit let us try whether fraud and avarice may be more easily restrained from giving it.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Expectation improperly indulged in must end in disappointment.
Samuel Johnson