Quote

It is no matter what you teach them first, any more than what leg you shall put into your breeches first. You may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the mean time your breech is bare. Sir, while you are considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learned them both.

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
Children
Child
Considering
Mean
Another
Legs
Things
Two
Boys
Time
May
Learned
Best
Stand
Firsts
Shall
Breeches
Matter
Education
Disputing
First
Teach
Bare

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Pension: An allowance made to anyone without an equivalent. In England it is generally understood to mean pay given to a state hireling for treason to his country.
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If he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, sir, when he leaves our houses let us count our spoons.
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Why, sir, Sherry is dull, naturally dull but it must have taken him a great deal of pains to become what we now see him. Such an excess of stupidity, Sir, is not in Nature.
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Those who will not take the trouble to think for themselves, have always somebody that thinks for them and the difficulty in writing is to please those from whom others learn to be pleased.
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I never take a nap after dinner but when I have had a bad night, and then the nap takes me.
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To purchase Heaven has gold the power? Can gold remove the mortal hour? In life can love be bought with gold? Are friendship's pleasures to be sold? No--all that's worth a wish--a thought, Fair virtue gives unbribed, unbought. Cease then on trash thy hopes to bind, Let nobler views engage thy mind.
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I do not see, Sir, that it is reasonable for a man to be angry at another, whom a woman has preferred to him but angry he is, no doubt and he is loath to be angry at himself.
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In life's last scene what prodigies surprise, Fears of the brave, and follies of the wise! From Marlborough's eyes the streams of dotage flow, And Swift expires a driveller and a show.
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Every man is of importance to himself.
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Truth has no gradations nothing which admits of increase can be so much what it is, as truth is truth. There may be a strange thing, and a thing more strange. But if a proposition be true, there can be none more true.
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Every desire is a viper in the bosom, who while he was chill was harmless but when warmth gave him strength, exerted it in poison.
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The Church does not superstitiously observe days, merely as days, but as memorials of important facts. Christmas might be kept as well upon one day of the year as another but there should be a stated day for commemorating the birth of our Saviour, because there is danger that what may be done on any day, will be neglected.
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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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Revenge is an act of passion vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged crimes are avenged.
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No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring.
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Words too familiar, or too remote, defeat the purpose of a poet. From those sounds which we hear on small or on coarse occasions, we do not easily receive strong impressions, or delightful images and words to which we are nearly strangers, whenever they occur, draw that attention on themselves which they should transmit to other things.
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Where there is emulation, there will be vanity where there is vanity, there will be folly.
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To have the management of the mind is a great art, and it may be attained in a considerable degree by experience and habitual exercise.
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Slander is the revenge of a coward, and dissimulation of his defense.
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The civilities of the great are never thrown away.
Samuel Johnson