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Too much nicety of detail disgusts the greatest part of readers, and to throw a multitude of particulars under general heads, and lay down rules of extensive comprehension, is to common understandings of little use.
Samuel Johnson
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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty, and of ease, and the beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.
Samuel Johnson
Those that have done nothing in life, are not qualified to judge of those that have done little
Samuel Johnson
Terrestrial happiness is of short duration. The brightness of the flame is wasting its fuel the fragrant flower is passing away in its own odors.
Samuel Johnson
The mere power of saving what is already in our hands must be of easy acquisition to every mind and as the example of Lord Bacon may show that the highest intellect cannot safely neglect it, a thousand instances every day prove that the humblest may practise it with success.
Samuel Johnson
I have always said the first Whig was the Devil.
Samuel Johnson
No one will persist long in helping someone who will not help themselves.
Samuel Johnson
We must consider how very little history there is--I mean real, authentic history. That certain kings reigned and certain battles were fought, we can depend upon as true but all the coloring, all the philosophy, of history is conjecture.
Samuel Johnson
Books that you may carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are the most useful after all.
Samuel Johnson
If misery be the effect of virtue, it ought to be reverenced if of ill-fortune, to be pitied and if of vice, not to be insulted, because it is perhaps itself a punishment adequate to the crime by which it was produced.
Samuel Johnson
It was said of Euripides, that every verse was a precept and it may be said of Shakespeare, that from his works may be collected a system of civil and economical prudence.
Samuel Johnson
Those writers who lie on the watch for novelty can have little hope of greatness for great things cannot have escaped former observation.
Samuel Johnson
They who have already enjoyed the crowds and noise of the great city, know their desire to return is little more than the restlessness of a vacant mind, that they are not so much led by hope as driven by disgust, and wish rather to leave the country than to see the town.
Samuel Johnson
Every man may be observed to have a certain strain of lamentation, some peculiar theme of complaint on which he dwells in his moments of dejection.
Samuel Johnson
Nature never gives everything at once.
Samuel Johnson
Whatever advantage we snatch beyond a certain portion allotted us by at nature, is like money spent before it is due, which, at the time of regular payment, will be missed and regretted.
Samuel Johnson
Nothing flatters a man as much as the happiness of his wife he is always proud of himself as the source of it.
Samuel Johnson
There is nothing against which an old man should be so much upon his guard as putting himself to nurse.
Samuel Johnson
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
Sir, he throws away his money without thought and without merit. I do not call a tree generous that sheds its fruit at every breeze.
Samuel Johnson
There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
Samuel Johnson
