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If a madman were to come into this room with a stick in his hand, no doubt we should pity the state of his mind but our primary consideration would be to take care of ourselves. We should knock him down first, and pity him afterwards.

Samuel Johnson

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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
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The most useful truths are always universal, and unconnected with accidents and customs.
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Small debts are like small shot they are rattling on every side, and can scarcely be escaped without a wound: great debts are like cannon of loud noise, but little danger.
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Laws teach us to know when we commit injury and when we suffer it.
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Youth enters the world with very happy prejudices in her own favour.
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Before dinner men meet with great inequality of understanding.
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A book should teach us to enjoy life, or to endure it.
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Treating your adversary with respect is striking soft in battle.
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Age looks with anger on the temerity of youth, and youth with contempt on the scrupulosity of age.
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He that pines with hunger, is in little care how others shall be fed. The poor man is seldom studious to make his grandson rich.
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All power of fancy over reason is a degree of madness.
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We consider ourselves as defective in memory, either because we remember less than we desire, or less than we suppose others to remember.
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Credulity is the common failing of inexperienced virtue and he who is spontaneously suspicious may justly be charged with radical corruption.
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Words too familiar, or too remote, defeat the purpose of a poet.
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Ladies, stock and tend your hive, Trifle not at thirty-five For, howe'er we boast and strive, Life declines from thirty-five He that ever hopes to thrive Must begin by thirty-five.
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An infallible characteristic of meanness is cruelty.
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A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization.
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Vulgar and inactive minds confound familiarity with knowledge, and conceive themselves informed of the whole nature of things, when they are shown their form or told their use.
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Life of Ages, richly poured, Love of God unspent and free, Flowing in the Prophet's word And the People's liberty! Never was to chosen race That unstinted tide confined Thine is every time and place, Fountain sweet of heart and mind!
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Of all the griefs that harass the distress'd, Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest Fate never wounds more deep the generous heart, Than when a blockhead's insult points the dart.
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