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An infallible characteristic of meanness is cruelty.
Samuel Johnson
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Samuel Johnson
Age: 75 †
Born: 1709
Born: September 18
Died: 1784
Died: December 13
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Literary Critic
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
Cruelty
Meanness
Infallible
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More quotes by Samuel Johnson
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.
Samuel Johnson
There is no book so poor that it would not be a prodigy if wholly made by a single man.
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Life affords no higher pleasure than that of surmounting difficulties.
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They make a rout about universal liberty, without considering that all that is to be valued, or indeed can be enjoyed by individuals, is private liberty.
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The safe and general antidote against sorrow is employment.
Samuel Johnson
Our minds should not be empty because if they are not preoccupied by good, evil will break in upon them.
Samuel Johnson
Who drives fat oxen should himself be fat.
Samuel Johnson
When there is no hope, there can be no endeavor.
Samuel Johnson
You are much surer that you are doing good when you pay money to those who work, as the recompense of their labor, than when you give money merely in charity.
Samuel Johnson
Pope had been flattered till he thought himself one of the moving powers of the system of life. When he talked of laying down his pen, those who sat round him intreated and implored and self-love did not suffer him to suspect that they went away and laughed.
Samuel Johnson
Those who suppress freedom always do so in the name of law and order. - John V. Lindsay No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it.
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Power is gradually stealing away from the many to the few, because the few are more vigilant and consistent.
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Men more frequently require to be reminded than informed.
Samuel Johnson
I inherited a vile melancholy from my father, which has made me mad all my life, at least not sober.
Samuel Johnson
So different are the colors of life, as we look forward to the future, or backward to the past and so different the opinions and sentiments which this contrariety of appearance naturally produces, that the conversation of the old and young ends generally with contempt or pity on either side.
Samuel Johnson
You may translate books of science exactly. ... The beauties of poetry cannot be preserved in any language except that in which it was originally written.
Samuel Johnson
There is ... scarcely any species of writing of which we can tell what is its essence, and what are its constituents every new genius produces some innovation, which, when invented and approved, subverts the rules which the practice of foregoing authors had established.
Samuel Johnson
If useless thoughts could be expelled from the mind, all the valuable parts of our knowledge would more frequently recur.
Samuel Johnson
Unless a woman has an amorous heart, she is a dull companion.
Samuel Johnson
The excellence of aphorisms consists not so much in the expression of some rare or abstruse sentiment, as in the comprehension of some useful truth in a few words.
Samuel Johnson
