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None can be pleased without praise, and few can be praised without 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
Praised
Pleased
Falsehood
Praise
None
Without

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To a poet nothing can be useless.
Samuel Johnson
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A blade of grass is always a blade of grass, whether in one country or another.
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Spring is the season of gaiety, and winter of terror in spring the heart of tranquility dances to the melody of the groves, and the eye of benevolence sparkles at the sight of happiness and plenty: in winter, compassion melts at universal calamity, and the tear of softness starts at the wailing of hunger and the cries of the creation in distress
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Attack is the reaction. I never think I have hit hard unless it rebounds.
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I have always suspected that the reading is right, which requires many words to prove it wrong and the emendation wrong, that cannot without so much labour appear to he right.
Samuel Johnson
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Love is only one of many passions.
Samuel Johnson
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Each change of many-colour'd life he drew, Exhausted worlds, and then imagin'd new.
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That eminence of learning is not to be gained without labour, at least equal to that which any other kind of greatness can require, will be allowed by those who wish to elevate the character of a scholar since they cannot but know that every human acquisition is valuable in proportion to the difficulty of its attainment.
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Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions.
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The expense is damnable, the position is ridiculous, and the pleasure fleeting.
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It is a hopeless endeavour to unite the contrarieties of spring and winter it is unjust to claim the privileges of age, and retain the play-things of childhood.
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A successful author is equally in danger of the diminution of his fame, whether he continues or ceases to write.
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I am not yet so lost in lexicography, as to forget that words are the daughters of the earth, and that things are the sons of heaven. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might be permanent, like the things which they denote.
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The lust of gold succeeds the rage of conquest The lust of gold, unfeeling and remorseless! The last corruption of degenerate man.
Samuel Johnson
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Yet reason frowns in war's unequal game, Where wasted nations raise a single name And mortgag'd states their grandsire's wreaths regret, From age to age in everlasting debt Wreaths which at last the dear-bought right convey To rust on medals, or on stones decay.
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While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till it be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it.
Samuel Johnson
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We go from anticipation to anticipation, not from satisfaction to satisfaction.
Samuel Johnson
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What is twice read is commonly better remembered that what is transcribed.
Samuel Johnson
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A person loves to review his own mind. That is the use of a diary, or journal.
Samuel Johnson
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The insolence of wealth will creep out.
Samuel Johnson