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Foppery is never cured it is the bad stamina of the mind, which, like those of the body, are never rectified once a coxcomb always a coxcomb.

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
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Writer
Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
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Rectified
Coxcomb
Stamina
Cured
Body
Mind
Always
Never

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There is, indeed, nothing that so much seduces reason from vigilance, as the thought of passing life with an amiable woman.
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Those who have any intention of deviating from the beaten roads of life, and acquiring a reputation superior to names hourly swept away by time among the refuse of fame, should add to their reason and their spirit the power of persisting in their pur
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Men go to sea, before they know the unhappiness of that way of life and when they have come to know it, they cannot escape from it, because it is then too late to choose another profession as indeed is generally the case with men, when they have once engaged in any particular way of life.
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Of riches it is not necessary to write the praise. Let it, however, be remembered that he who has money to spare has it always in his power to benefit others, and of such power a good man must always be desirous.
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It is so far from being natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.
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Exercise cannot secure us from that dissolution to which we are decreed but while the soul and body continue united, it can make the association pleasing, and give probable hopes that they shall be disciplined by an easy separation...to die is the fate of man but to die with lingering anguish is generally his folly.
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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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A country governed by a despot is an inverted cone.
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Consider what importance to society the chastity of women is. Upon that all the property in the world depends. We hang a thief for stealing a sheep but the unchastity of a woman transfers sheep and farm and all from the right owner.
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And panting Time toil'd after him in vain.
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Pleasure that is obtained by unreasonable and unsuitable cost must always end in pain.
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Nothing is more idle than to inquire after happiness, which nature has kindly placed within our reach.
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There is a certain degree of temptation which will overcome any virtue. Now, in so far as you approach temptation to a man, you do him an injury and, if he is overcome, you share his guilt.
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The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.
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A man is not obliged honestly to answer a question which should not properly be put.
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But to the particular species of excellence men are directed, not by an ascendant planet or predominating humour, but by the first book which they read, some early conversation which they heard, or some accident which excited ardour and emulation.
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Sir, what is poetry? Why, Sir, it is much easier to say what it is not. We all know what light is but it is not easy to tell what it is.
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We never do anything consciously for the last time without sadness of heart.
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To go and see one druidical temple is only to see that it is nothing, for there is neither art nor power in it and seeing one is quite enough.
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Turn on the prudent Ant, thy heedful eyes, Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise.
Samuel Johnson