Quote

All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise or wonder, are instances of the resistless force of perseverance.

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
Wonder
Force
Art
Resistless
Look
Instances
Human
Perseverance
Humans
Instance
Looks
Performances
Praise

More quotes by Samuel Johnson

Image
I do not see, Sir, that it is reasonable for a man to be angry at another, whom a woman has preferred to him but angry he is, no doubt and he is loath to be angry at himself.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Be not too hasty to trust or to admire the teachers of morality they discourse like angels, but they live like men.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Never believe extraordinary characters which you hear of people. Depend upon it, they are exaggerated. You do not see one man shoot a great deal higher than another.
Samuel Johnson
Image
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
Image
All intellectual improvement arises from leisure.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The process is the reality.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both.
Samuel Johnson
Image
If lawyers were to undertake no causes till they were sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from a trial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined, it might be found a very just claim.
Samuel Johnson
Image
I never take a nap after dinner but when I have had a bad night, and then the nap takes me.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Year chases year, decay pursues decay, Still drops some joy from with'ring life away New forms arise, and diff'rent views engage
Samuel Johnson
Image
Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.
Samuel Johnson
Image
All unnecessary vows are folly, because they suppose a prescience of the future, which has not been given us.
Samuel Johnson
Image
He was dull in a new way, and that made many think him great.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Whoever commits a fraud is guilty not only of the particular injury to him who he deceives, but of the diminution of that confidence which constitutes not only the ease but the existence of society.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was meant as a standard of judging well.
Samuel Johnson
Image
By writing, you learn to write.
Samuel Johnson
Image
No man can enjoy happiness without thinking that he enjoys it.
Samuel Johnson
Image
How small of all that human hearts endure/That part which laws or kings can cause or cure.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Every state of society is as luxurious as it can be. Men always take the best they can get.
Samuel Johnson
Image
I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
Samuel Johnson