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Most minds are the slaves of external circumstances, and conform to any hand that undertakes to mould them.
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
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
Many things difficult to design prove easy to performance.
Samuel Johnson
Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.
Samuel Johnson
There ambush here relentless ruffians lay, And here the fell attorney prowls for prey.
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I had done all that I could, and no Man is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.
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It is wonderful when a calculation is made, how little the mind is actually employed in the discharge of any profession.
Samuel Johnson
It is better that some should be unhappy rather than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality.
Samuel Johnson
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.
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The faults of a writer of acknowledged excellence are more dangerous, because the influence of his example is more extensive and the interest of learning requires that they should be discovered and stigmatized, before they have the sanction of antiquity conferred upon them, and become precedents of indisputable authority.
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All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise or wonder, are instances of the resistless force of perseverance.
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The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.
Samuel Johnson
Language is the dress of thought.
Samuel Johnson
There is nothing, Sir, too little for so little a creature as man. It is by studying little things that we attain the great art of having as little misery and as much happiness as possible.
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When desperate ills demand a speedy cure, Distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.
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No degree of knowledge attainable by man is able to set him above the want of hourly assistance, or to extinguish the desire of fond endearments and tender officiousness and, therefore, no one should think it unnecessary to learn those arts by which friendship may be gained.
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Cunning has effect from the credulity of others, rather than from the abilities of those who are cunning. It requires no extraordinary talents to lie and deceive.
Samuel Johnson
Large offers and sturdy rejections are among the most common topics of falsehood.
Samuel Johnson
Diffidence may check resolution and obstruct performance, but compensates its embarrassments by more important advantages it conciliates the proud, and softens the severe averts envy from excellence, and censure from miscarriage.
Samuel Johnson
Friendship, compounded of esteem and love, derives from one its tenderness and its permanence from the other.
Samuel Johnson
When once the forms of civility are violated, there remains little hope of return to kindness or decency.
Samuel Johnson
The future is purchased by the present.
Samuel Johnson
