Quote

To be flattered is grateful, even when we know that our praises are not believed by those who pronounce them for they prove, at least, our power, and show that our favour is valued, since it is purchased by the meanness of falsehood.

Samuel Johnson

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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
Even
Praise
Praises
Grateful
Flattered
Prove
Meanness
Least
Valued
Since
Favour
Show
Flattery
Shows
Falsehood
Purchased
Power
Believed
Pronounce

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A man should be careful never to tell tales of himself to his own disadvantage. People may be amused at the time, but they will be remembered, and brought out against him upon some subsequent occasion.
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Such are the vicissitudes of the world, through all its parts, that day and night, labor and rest, hurry and retirement, endear each other such are the changes that keep the mind in action: we desire, we pursue, we obtain, we are satiated we desire something else and begin a new pursuit.
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Knock the 't' off the 'can't.'
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Sorrow is the mere rust of the soul. Activity will cleanse and brighten it.
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Books without the knowledge of life are useless.
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At seventy-seven it is time to be in earnest.
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In my early years I read very hard. It is a sad reflection, but a true one, that I knew almost as much at eighteen as I do now.
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I look upon every day to be lost, in which I do not make a new acquaintance.
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There is no wisdom in useless and hopeless sorrow.
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Frugality may be termed the daughter of Prudence, the sister of Temperance, and the parent of Liberty.
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Every man who attacks my belief, diminishes in some degree my confidence in it, and therefore makes me uneasy and I am angry with him who makes me uneasy.
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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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The mental disease of the present generation is impatience of study, contempt of the great masters of ancient wisdom, and a disposition to rely wholly upon unassisted genius and natural sagacity.
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The misery of man proceeds not from any single crush of overwhelming evil, but from small vexations continually repeated.
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No man likes to live under the eye of perpetual disapprobation.
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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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Whatever professes to benefit by pleasing must please at once. The pleasures of the mind imply something sudden and unexpected that which elevates must always surprise.
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The truly strong and sound mind is the mind that can embrace equally great things and small.
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When we see our enemies and friends gliding away before us, let us not forget that we are subject to the general law of mortality, and shall soon be where our doom will be fixed forever.
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The gloomy and the resentful are always found among those who have nothing to do or who do nothing.
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