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When desperate ills demand a speedy cure, Distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.
Samuel Johnson
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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Literary Critic
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
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Folly
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Speedy
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
Words are but the signs of ideas.
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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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I will venture to say there is more learning and science within the circumference of ten miles from where we now sit [in London], than in all the rest of the kingdom.
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I soon found that wit, like every other power, has its boundaries that its success depends upon the aptitude of others to receive impressions and that as some bodies, indissoluble by heat, can set the furnace and crucible at defiance, there are min
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I have protracted my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise.
Samuel Johnson
There is, indeed, nothing that so much seduces reason from vigilance, as the thought of passing life with an amiable woman.
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The trappings of a monarchy would set up an ordinary commonwealth.
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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.
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An epithet or metaphor drawn from nature ennobles art an epithet or metaphor drawn from art degrades nature.
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Idleness and timidity often despair without being overcome, and forbear attempts for fear of being defeated and we may promote the invigoration of faint endeavors, by showing what has already been performed.
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That observation which is called knowledge of the world will be found much more frequently to make men cunning than good.
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Self-love is a busy prompter.
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Treating your adversary with respect is giving him an advantage to which he is not entitled.
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He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.
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The animadversions of critics are commonly such as may easily provoke the sedatest writer to some quickness of resentment and asperity of reply.
Samuel Johnson
Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy, affectation part of the chosen trappings of folly the one completes a villain, the other only finishes a fop.
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Happiness consists in the multiplicity of agreeable consciousness.
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Reflect that life, like every other blessing, Derives its value from its use alone.
Samuel Johnson
The coquette has companions, indeed, but no lovers,--for love is respectful and timorous and where among her followers will she find a husband?
Samuel Johnson
Quotation is the highest compliment you can pay an author.
Samuel Johnson
