Quote

Life is but short no time can be afforded but for the indulgence of real sorry, or contests upon questions seriously momentous. Let us not throw away any of our days upon useless resentment, or contend who shall hold out longest in stubborn malignity. It is best not to be angry and best, in the next place, to be quickly reconciled.

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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Translator
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Lichfield
Staffordshire
Dr Johnson
Dr. Johnson
Great Moralist
Away
Sorry
Indulgence
Next
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Stubborn
Malignity
Place
Angry
Resentment
Momentous
Best
Short
Useless
Afforded
Real
Hold
Seriously
Reconciled
Time
Shall
Quickly
Contend
Life
Days
Throw
Longest
Upon
Anger
Contests

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Many leave the labours of half their life to their executors and to chance, because they will not send them abroad unfinished, and are unable to finish them, having prescribed to themselves such a degree of exactness as human diligence can scarcely ontain.
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Critics, like the rest of mankind, are very frequently misled by interest.
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A contempt of the monuments and the wisdom of the past, may be justly reckoned one of the reigning follies of these days, to which pride and idleness have equally contributed.
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As the faculty of writing has chiefly been a masculine endowment, the reproach of making the world miserable has always been thrown upon the women.
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We go from anticipation to anticipation, not from satisfaction to satisfaction.
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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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The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.
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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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Our aspirations are our possibilities.
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Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy.
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A lexicographer, a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.
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Advice is offensive, it shows us that we are known to others as well as to ourselves.
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Had I learned to fiddle, I should have done nothing else.
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I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
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Wretched un-idea'd girls.
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The animadversions of critics are commonly such as may easily provoke the sedatest writer to some quickness of resentment and asperity of reply.
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Truth has no gradations nothing which admits of increase can be so much what it is, as truth is truth. There may be a strange thing, and a thing more strange. But if a proposition be true, there can be none more true.
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We are easily shocked by crimes which appear at once in their full magnitude, but the gradual growth of our own wickedness, endeared by interest, and palliated by all the artifices of self-deceit, gives us time to form distinctions in our own favor
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Wickedness is always easier than virtue for it takes the short cut to everything.
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I will be conquered I will not capitulate.
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