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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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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
Right
Appear
Many
Requires
Much
Prove
Always
Reading
Wrong
Words
Cannot
Suspected
Without
Labour

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Pain is less subject than pleasure to careless expression.
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..to write and to live are very different. Many who praise virtue, do no more than praise it.
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Your aspirations are your possibilities.
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Sir, I think all Christians, whether Papists or Protestants, agree in the essential articles, and that their differences are trivial, and rather political than religious.
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The botanist looks upon the astronomer as a being unworthy of his regard and he that is glowing great and happy by electrifying a bottle wonders how the world can be engaged by trifling prattle about war and peace.
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I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government rather than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual.
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Those who are in the power of evil habits must conquer them as they can and conquered they must be, or neither wisdom nor happiness can be attained: but those who are not yet subject to their influence may, by timely caution, preserve their freedom.
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People in general do not willingly read if they have anything else to amuse them.
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Those who attain any excellence, commonly spend life in one pursuit for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms.
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I live in the crowd of jollity, not so much to enjoy company as to shun myself.
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Such is the constitution of man that labour may be styled its own reward nor will any external incitements be requisite, if it be considered how much happiness is gained, and how much misery escaped, by frequent and violent agitation of the body.
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Justice is indispensably and universally necessary, and what is necessary must always be limited, uniform, and distinct
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Sorrow is a kind of rust of the soul, which every new idea contributes in its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life, and is remedied by exercise and motion.
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There are occasions on which all apology is rudeness.
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There are, indeed, few kinds of composition from which an author, however learned or ingenious, can hope a long continuance of fame.
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Memory is like all other human powers, with which no man can be satisfied who measures them by what he can conceive, or by what he can desire.
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Consider what importance to society the chastity of women is. Upon that all the property in the world depends. We hang a thief for stealing a sheep but the unchastity of a woman transfers sheep and farm and all from the right owner.
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An exotic and irrational entertainment.
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Sir, it is wrong to stir up law-suits but when once it is certain that a law-suit is to go on, there is nothing wrong in a lawyer's endeavouring that he shall have the benefit, rather than another.
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