Quote

I look upon this as I did upon the Dictionary: it is all work, and my inducement to it is not love or desire of fame, but the want of money, which is the only motive to writing that I know of.

Samuel Johnson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Looks
Inducement
Writing
Dictionary
Work
Motive
Love
Fame
Upon
Desire
Money
Look

More quotes by Samuel Johnson

Image
The misery of man proceeds not from any single crush of overwhelming evil, but from small vexations continually repeated.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Ignorance cannot always be inferred from inaccuracy knowledge is not always present.
Samuel Johnson
Image
No degree of knowledge attainable by man is able to set him above the want of hourly assistance.
Samuel Johnson
Image
I have already enjoyed too much give me something to desire.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Study requires solitude, and solitude is a state dangerous to those who are too much accustomed to sink into themselves
Samuel Johnson
Image
The process is the reality.
Samuel Johnson
Image
A man should be careful never to tell tales of himself to his own disadvantage. People may be amused at the time, but they will be remembered, and brought out against him upon some subsequent occasion.
Samuel Johnson
Image
We consider ourselves as defective in memory, either because we remember less than we desire, or less than we suppose others to remember.
Samuel Johnson
Image
An epithet or metaphor drawn from nature ennobles art an epithet or metaphor drawn from art degrades nature.
Samuel Johnson
Image
I inherited a vile melancholy from my father, which has made me mad all my life, at least not sober.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The mathematicians are well acquainted with the difference between pure science, which has only to do with ideas, and the application of its laws to the use of life, in which they are constrained to submit to the imperfections of matter and the influence of accidents.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The truth is that the spectators are always in their senses, and know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only a stage, and that the players are only players.
Samuel Johnson
Image
A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The pleasure of expecting enjoyment is often greater than that of obtaining it, and the completion of almost every wish is found a disappointment.
Samuel Johnson
Image
We go from anticipation to anticipation, not from satisfaction to satisfaction.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with peculiar enjoyments.
Samuel Johnson
Image
When a Man is tried of London, he is tired of life.
Samuel Johnson
Image
The business of life summons us away from useless grief, and calls us to the exercise of those virtues of which we are lamenting our deprivation.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom it is to be sure, good for nothing but put all these atoms together, and you have St. Paul's Church. So it is with human felicity, which is made up of many ingredients, each of which may be shown to be very insignificant.
Samuel Johnson
Image
Rash oaths, whether kept or broken, frequently produce guilt.
Samuel Johnson