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The mathematicians are well acquainted with the difference between pure science, which has only to do with ideas, and the application of its laws to the use of life, in which they are constrained to submit to the imperfections of matter and the influence of accidents.

Samuel Johnson

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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Was there ever yet anything written by mere man that was wished longer by its readers, excepting Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, and the Pilgrim's Progress?
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Since life itself is uncertain, nothing which has life for its basis can boast much stability.
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Politeness is one of those advantages which we never estimate rightly but by the inconvenience of its loss.
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Composition is for the most part an effort of slow diligence and steady perseverance, to which the mind is dragged by necessity or resolution, and from which the attention is every moment starting to more delightful amusements.
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Learn that the present hour alone is man's.
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Claret is the liquor for boys port for men but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy.
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All envy is proportionate to desire we are uneasy at the attainments of another, according as we think our own happiness would be advanced by the addition of that which he withholds from us.
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The end of writing is to instruct the end of poetry is to instruct by pleasing.
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If the man who turnips cries, Cry not when his father dies, 'Tis proof that he had rather Have a turnip than his father.
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Nature makes us poor only when we want necessaries, but custom gives the name of poverty to the want of superfluities.
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No man can perform so little as not to have reason to congratulate himself on his merits, when he beholds the multitude that live in total idleness, and have never yet endeavoured to be useful.
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Glory, the casual gift of thoughtless crowds! Glory, the bribe of avaricious virtue!
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Being reproached for giving to an unworthy person, Aristotle said, I did not give it to the man, but to humanity.
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Philosophy has often attempted to repress insolence by asserting that all conditions are leveled by death a position which, however it may defect the happy, will seldom afford much comfort to the wretched.
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Those authors who would find many readers, must endeavour to please while they instruct.
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A writer who obtains his full purpose loses himself in his own lustre.
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Love is only one of many passions.
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He that voluntarily continues in ignorance, is guilty of all the crimes which ignorance produces.
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A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected.
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Our senses, our appetite, and our passions are our lawful and faithful guides in things that relate solely to this life.
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