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Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson Quotes

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Famous Samuel Johnson Quotes

“Among the many inconsistencies which folly produces or infirmity suffers in the human mind, there has often been observed a manifest and striking contrariety between the life of an author and his writings... Those whom the appearance of virtue or the evidence of genius has tempted to a nearer knowledge of the writer, in whose performances they may be found, have indeed had frequent reason to repent their curiosity.”

WritingMindHumansMayReasonSufferingFoundVirtueProduceGeniusEvidencePerformancesCuriosityAppearanceFollyHuman MindManifestTemptedRepentInfirmityInconsistency
Book:Selected poetry and prose
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“Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me, and far from my friends be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to be envied whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Ionia.”

ThinkingMenMayLittlesHas BeensPhilosophyPastForceGrowsVirtueMy FriendsGainsDignityBraverySensesRuinsAssociationIndifferentMarathonPietyEnviedFrigid
Author:Samuel Johnson
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“The business of the biographer is often to pass slightly over those performances and incidents which produce vulgar greatness, to lead the thoughts into domestic privacies, and display the minute details of daily life, were exterior appendages are cast aside, and men excel each other only by prudence and virtue.”

MenVirtueMinutesGreatnessProducePerformancesCastsDetailsPrivacyDaily LifeDisplayVulgarPrudenceIncidentsExteriorBiographers
Book:The Life and Writings of Samuel Johnson...
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“Marriage is the strictest tie of perpetual friendship, and there can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity; and he must expect to be wretched, who pays to beauty, riches, or politeness that regard which only virtue and piety can claim.”

PayMarriageVirtueIntegrityClaimsRegardRichesTiesPerpetualWretchedPietyPolitenessNo Confidence
Book:The works of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: with an essay on his life and genius
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“Wisdom and virtue are by no means sufficient, without the supplemental laws of good-breeding, to secure freedom from degenerating into rudeness, or self esteem from swelling into insolence. A thousand incivilities may be committed, and a thousand offices neglected. without any remorse of conscience, or reproach from reason.”

MayMeanSelfReasonLawVirtueSelf EsteemThousandOfficeConscienceCommittedEsteemSecureSufficientRemorseNeglectedPolitenessBreedingReproachRudenessSwellingInsolenceGood BreedingIncivility
Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With Murphy's Essay
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“If misery be the effect of virtue, it ought to be reverenced; if of ill-fortune, to be pitied; and if of vice, not to be insulted, because it is perhaps itself a punishment adequate to the crime by which it was produced.”

IfsVirtueEffectsCrimeOughtMiseryFortuneIllVicesPunishmentAdequateInsulted
Book:The Works of the English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper: Including the Series Edited with Prefaces, Biographical and Critical
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“The greatest human virtue bears no proportion to human vanity. We always think ourselves better than we are, and are generally desirous that others should think us still better than we think ourselves. To praise us for actions or dispositions which deserve praise is not to confer a benefit, but to pay a tribute. We have always pretensions to fame which, in our own hearts, we know to be disputable, and which we are desirous to strengthen by a new suffrage; we have always hopes which we suspect to be fallacious, and of which we eagerly snatch at every confirmation.”

ThinkingKnowsShouldHumansHeartStillsActionPayVirtueBearsFameBenefitsDeservePraiseVanityProportionSuspectsDispositionTributePretensionSuffrageConfirmation
Book:The Wisdom of the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler
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“To purchase Heaven has gold the power? Can gold remove the mortal hour? In life can love be bought with gold? Are friendship's pleasures to be sold? No--all that's worth a wish--a thought, Fair virtue gives unbribed, unbought. Cease then on trash thy hopes to bind, Let nobler views engage thy mind.”

GivingMindHeavenWishHoursWealthLove IsPleasureViewsVirtueFairsGoldCeaseMortalsRemoveTrash
Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: With an Essay on His Life and Genius /c by Arthur Murphy, Esq
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“Whosoever shall look heedfully upon those who are eminent for their riches will not think their condition such as that he should hazard his quiet, and much less his virtue, to obtain it, for all that great wealth generally gives above a moderate fortune is more room for the freaks of caprice, and more privilege for ignorance and vice, a quicker succession of flatteries, and a larger circle of voluptuousness.”

ThinkingGivingShouldLooksWealthRoomsVirtueConditionsIgnoranceQuietFortunePrivilegeVicesRichesCirclesFreakFlatteryModeratesSuccessionHazardsCaprice
Book:The Rambler: A Periodical Paper, Published in 1750, 1751, 1752
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“Among the innumerable mortifications which waylay human arrogance on every side may well be reckoned our ignorance of the most common objects and effects, a defect of which we become more sensible by every attempt to supply it. Vulgar and inactive minds confound familiarity with knowledge and conceive themselves informed of the whole nature of things when they are shown their form or told their use; but the speculatist, who is not content with superficial views, harasses himself with fruitless curiosity, and still, as he inquires more, perceives only that he knows less.”

KnowsMindHumansWellsMayStillsReasonWholeUseTruthFormPeaceSidesViewsCommonEducationKnowledgeVirtueEffectsObjectsIgnoranceCuriosityPerceiveArroganceSensibleSuperficialDefectsVulgarFamiliarityMortification
Author:Samuel Johnson
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“To love their country has been considered as virtue in men, whose love could not be otherwise than blind, because their preference was made without, a comparison; but it has never been my fortune to find, either in ancient or modern writers, any honourable mention of those, who have, with equal blindness, hated their country.”

MenHas BeensMadeCountryVirtueModernEqualBlindFortuneAncientHatedComparisonBlindnessPreference
Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: Lives of the poets
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“It is certain that success naturally confirms in us a favourable opinion of our own abilities. Scarce any man is willing to allot to accident, friendship, and a thousand causes, which concur in every event without human contrivance or interposition, the part which they may justly claim in his advancement. We rate ourselves by our fortune rather than our virtues, and exorbitant claims are quickly produced by imaginary merit.”

MenHumansMayCertainCausesAbilityOpinionVirtueEventsWillingThousandClaimsFortuneRateAccidentsMeritImaginaryAdvancementScarceConcur
Book:The Rambler: In Four Volumes..
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“[C]ourage is reckoned the greatest of all virtues; because, unless a man has that virtue, he has no security for preserving any other.”

MenCourageVirtueSecurityBraveryMeaningfulBe BraveHave CourageBrave ManFear And CourageFear CourageBravery And CourageBravery And Fear
Book:Dr. Johnson's Table Talk: Containing Aphorisms on Literature, Life, and Manners; with Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons, Selected and Arranged from Dr. Boswell's Life of Johnson
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“These are the men who, without virtue, labour, or hazard, are growing rich, as their country is impoverished; they rejoice, when obstinacy or ambition adds another year to slaughter and devastation; and laugh, from their desks, at bravery and science, while they are adding figure to figure, and cipher to cipher, hoping for a new contract from a new armament, and computing the profits of a siege or tempest.”

MenYearsCountryCharacterLaughingVirtueRichGrowingHonestyFiguresHe ManIntegrityAmbitionBraveryAddProfitLabourContractsRejoiceDesksSlaughterHazardsTempestComputingDevastationArmamentSiegeObstinacyAnother YearCiphers
Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, L. L. D.: In Twelve Volumes
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“Without good humour, learning and bravery can only confer that superiority which swells the heart of the lion in the desert, where he roars without reply, and ravages without resistance. Without good humour virtue may awe by its dignity and amaze by its brightness, but must always be viewed at a distance, and will scarcely gain a friend or attract an imitator.”

HeartMayVirtueHumourGainsDignityBraveryDistanceResistanceDesertArroganceAweLionsSuperiorityBrightnessImitatorGood Humour
Book:The Rambler: In Four Volumes..
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“There are occasions on which it is noble to dare to stand alone. To be pious among infidels, to be disinterested in a time of general venality, to lead a life of virtue and reason in the midst of sensualists, is a proof of a mind intent on nobler things than the praise or blame of men, of a soul fixed in the contemplation of the highest good, and superiour to the tyranny of custom and example.”

MenMindSoulReasonVirtueExampleHighestPraiseBlameIndividualityDareNobleProofTyrannyOccasionsFixedContemplationMidstCustomsPiousStand AloneInfidelDisinterested
Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With An Essay on His Life and Genius
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“They whose activity of imagination is often shifting the scenes of expectation, are frequently subject to such sallies of caprice as make all their actions fortuitous, destroy the value of their friendship, obstruct the efficacy of their virtues, and set them below the meanest of those who persist in their resolutions, execute what they design, and perform what they have promised.”

ActionValuesImaginationVirtueFocusSubjectsDesignSceneActivityExpectationsResolutionPersistShiftingEfficacyCapriceFortuitous
Book:The Rambler: A Periodical Paper, Published in 1750, 1751, 1752
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“Among those whose reputation is exhausted in a short time by its own luxuriance are the writers who take advantage of present incidents or characters which strongly interest the passions, and engage universal attention. It is not difficult to obtain readers, when we discuss a question which every one is desirous to understand, which is debated in every assembly, and has divided the nation into parties; or when we display the faults or virtues of him whose public conduct has made almost every man his enemy or his friend.”

MenMadeCharacterPassionReadingNationsDifficultInterestPartyAttentionEnemyVirtueReaderAdvantageUniversalFaultsEvery ManReputationDividedDisplayExhaustedIncidentsAssemblyShort Time
Book:The Wisdom of the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler
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“Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a present. The acknowledgment of those virtues on which conscience congratulates us is a tribute that we can at any tine exact with confidence; but the celebration of those which we only feign, or desire without any vigorous endeavours to attain them, is received as a confession of sovereignty over regions never conquered, as a favourable decision of disputable claims, and is more welcome as more gratuitous.”

DesireDecisionVirtueConscienceClaimsPraiseDebtWelcomeRegionsCelebrationConfessionSovereigntyFlatteryTributeVigorousEndeavourAcknowledgment
Book:The Rambler
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“No man, however enslaved to his appetites, or hurried by his passions, can, while he preserves his intellects unimpaired, please himself with promoting the corruption of others. He whose merit has enlarged his influence would surely wish to exert it for the benefit of mankind. Yet such will be the effect of his reputation, while he suffers himself to indulge in any favourite fault, that they who have no hope to reach his excellence will catch at his failings, and his virtues will be cited to justify the copiers of his vices.”

MenSufferingPassionWishVirtueFailingInfluenceMankindEffectsPleaseBenefitsFaultsExcellenceVicesCorruptionIntellectReputationPreservesMeritJustifyAppetiteFavouritePromotingIndulgeNo HopeIndulge InCopiers
Book:The Rambler: A Periodical Paper, Published in 1750, 1751, 1752
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