Quote

The whole power of cunning is privative to say nothing, and to do nothing , is the utmost of its reach. Yet men, thus narrow by nature and mean by art, are sometimes able to rise by the miscarriages of bravery and the openness of integrity, and, watching failures and snatching opportunities, obtain advantages which belong to higher characters.

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
Power
Watching
Failures
Miscarriages
Character
Reach
Bravery
Snatching
Able
Advantage
Narrow
Miscarriage
Nothing
Characters
Belong
Utmost
Whole
Higher
Opportunities
Advantages
Sometimes
Opportunity
Rise
Obtain
Mean
Art
Thus
Cunning
Men
Nature
Integrity
Openness

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An exotic and irrational entertainment.
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Authors and lovers always suffer some infatuation, from which only absence can set them free.
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The dependant who cultivates delicacy in himself very little consults his own tranquillity.
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He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts.
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Profuseness is a cruel and crafty demon, that gradually involves her followers in dependence and debt that is, fetters them with irons that enter into their souls.
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How few of his friends' houses would a man choose to be at when he is sick.
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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.
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Care that is once enter'd into the breast Will have the whole possession ere it rest.
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It is commonly observed, that when two Englishmen meet, their first talk is of the weather they are in haste to tell each other, what each must already know, that it is hot or cold, bright or cloudy, windy or calm.
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Few of those who fill the world with books, have any pretensions to the hope either of pleasing or instructing. They have often no other task than to lay two books before them, out of which they compile a third, without any new material of their own, and with very little application of judgment to those which former authors have supplied.
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Sir, as a man advances in life, he gets what is better than admiration, - judgement, to estimate things at their true value.
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No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it.... There is a remedy in human nature against tyranny, that will keep us safe under every form of government.
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He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else.
Samuel Johnson
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The inevitable consequence of poverty is dependence.
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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.
Samuel Johnson
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Rags will always make their appearance where they have a right to do it.
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People have now a-days got a strange opinion that every thing should be taught by lectures. Now, I cannot see that lectures can do as much good as reading the books from which the lectures are taken.
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There are certain topicks which are never exhausted. Of some images and sentiments the mind of man may be said to be enamoured it meets them, however often they occur, with the same ardour which a lover feels at the sight of his mistress, and parts from them with the same regret when they can no longer be enjoyed.
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If in an actor there appears an utter vacancy of meaning, a frigid equality, a stupid languor, a torpid apathy, the greatest kindness that can be shown him is a speedy sentence of expulsion.
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In general those parents have the most reverence who most deserve it for he that lives well cannot be despised.
Samuel Johnson