Quote

Too much vigor in the beginning of an undertaking often intercepts and prevents the steadiness and perseverance always necessary in the conduct of a complicated scheme.

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
Perseverance
Steadiness
Complicated
Undertaking
Necessary
Undertakings
Beginning
Prevents
Often
Vigor
Much
Scheme
Always
Schemes
Conduct

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He that would be superior to external influences must first become superior to his own passions.
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There are occasions on which all apology is rudeness.
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Still we love The evil we do, until we suffer it.
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Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.
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Other things may be seized by might, or purchased with money, but knowledge is to be gained only by study, and study to be prosecuted only in retirement.
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The care of the critic should be to distinguish error from inability, faults of inexperience from defects of nature.
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The true art of memory is the art of attention.
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You cannot give me an instance of any man who is permitted to lay out his own time contriving not to have tedious hours.
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To be of no Church is dangerous.
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There is no book so poor that it would not be a prodigy if wholly made by a single man.
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Most minds are the slaves of external circumstances, and conform to any hand that undertakes to mould them.
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There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
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Is not a patron one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, encumbers him with help?
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You think I love flattery (says Dr. Johnson), and so I do but a little too much always disgusts me: that fellow Richardson, on the contrary, could not be contented to sail quietly down the stream of reputation, without longing to taste the froth from every stroke of the oar.
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Attack is the reaction. I never think I have hit hard unless it rebounds.
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Whatever enlarges hope will also exalt courage.
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