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It is so far from being natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.

Samuel Johnson

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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Excise: A hateful tax levied upon commodities, and adjudged not by the common judges of property, but wretches hired by those to whom excise is paid.
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People seldom read a book which is given to them and few are given. The way to spread a work is to sell it at a low price. No man will send to buy a thing that costs even sixpence without an intention to read it.
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Corneille is to Shakespeare as a clipped hedge is to a forest.
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He who endeavors to please must appear pleased.
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A woman of fortune being used the handling of money, spends it judiciously but a woman who gets the command of money for the first time upon her marriage, has such a gust in spending it, that she throws it away with great profusion.
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You may abuse a tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your trade to make tables.
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He that pursues fame with just claims, trusts his happiness to the winds but he that endeavors after it by false merit, has to fear, not only the violence of the storm, but the leaks of his vessel.
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Never speak of a man in his own presence. It is always indelicate, and may be offensive .
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A lawyer has no business with the justice or injustice of the cause which he undertakes, unless his client asks his opinion, and then he is bound to give it honestly. The justice or injustice of the cause is to be decided by the judge.
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It is unpleasing to represent our affairs to our own disadvantage yet it is necessary to shew the evils which we desire to be removed.
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The world will never be long without some good reason to hate the unhappy their real faults are immediately detected and if those are not sufficient to sink them into infamy, an individual weight of calumny will be super-added.
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Happiness, said he, must be something solid and permanent, without fear and without uncertainty.
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Rash oaths, whether kept or broken, frequently produce guilt.
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Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. He whom nature has made weak, and idleness keeps ignorant, may yet support his vanity by the name of a critic.
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Combinations of wickedness would overwhelm the world, by the advantage which licentious principles afford, did not those who have long practised perfidy grow faithless to each other.
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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.
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We have always pretensions to fame which, in our own hearts, we know to be disputable.
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Life will not bear refinement. You must do as other people do.
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Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty, and of ease, and the beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.
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If the guardian or the mother Tell the woes of willful waste, Scorn their counsel and their pother, You can hang or drown at last.
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