Samuel Johnson: Trending quotes

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Samuel Johnson: 724 quotes26 likes

“Johnson observed, that "he did not care to speak ill of any man behind his back, but he believed the gentleman was an attorney."”

1770, p. 181
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol II

“[The poet] must write as the interpreter of nature and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of future generations, as a being superior to time and place.”

Samuel Johnson book The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

Source: The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759), Chapter 10

“It is man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age.”

April 9, 1778
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol III

“The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation, that those whom he injures are always in his sight.”

Samuel Johnson The Rambler

No. 148 (17 August 1751)
The Rambler (1750–1752)

“A country governed by a despot is an inverted cone.”

April 14, 1778
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol III

“From Thee, great God: we spring, to Thee we tend,
Path, motive, guide, original, and end.”

Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 257

“If the man who turnips cries,
Cry not when his father dies,
'Tis a proof that he had rather
Have a turnip than his father.”

Source: Anecdotes of Samuel Johnson (1786), p. 67

“[Imlac continues] "It was never supposed that cogitation is inherent in matter, or that every particle is a thinking being. Yet, if any part of matter be devoid of thought, what part can we suppose to think? Matter can differ from matter only in form, density, bulk, motion, and direction of motion: to which of these, however varied or combined, can consciousness be annexed? To be round or square, to be solid or fluid, to be great or little, to be moved slowly or swiftly one way or another, are modes of material existence, all equally alien from the nature of cogitation. If matter be once without thought, it can only be made to think by some new modification, but all the modifications which it can admit are equally unconnected with cogitative powers."”

Samuel Johnson book The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

Source: The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759), Chapter 48

“He that thinks himself capable of astonishing may write blank verse: but those that hope only to please must condescend to rhyme.”

The Life of Milton
Lives of the English Poets (1779–81)

“If lawyers were to undertake no causes till they were sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from a trial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined, it might be found a very just claim.”

August 15, 1773
The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides (1785)

“I am very fond of the company of ladies. I like their beauty, I like their delicacy, I like their vivacity, and I like their silence.”

Seward, 617
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Johnsoniana

“A Poet, Naturalist, and Historian,
Who left scarcely any style of writing untouched,
And touched nothing that he did not adorn.”

Epitaph on Goldsmith
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“I remember a passage in Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield," which he was afterwards fool enough to expunge: "I do not love a man who is zealous for nothing."… There was another fine passage too which he struck out: "When I was a young man, being anxious to distinguish myself, I was perpetually starting new propositions. But I soon gave this over; for I found that generally what was new was false."”

1779
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)

“Frugality may be termed the daughter of Prudence, the sister of Temperance and the parent of Liberty.”

Samuel Johnson The Rambler

No. 57 (2 October 1750)
The Rambler (1750–1752)

“Cold approbation gave the ling'ring bays,
For those who durst not censure, scarce could praise.”

Prologue at the Opening of Drury Lane Theatre (1747)

“Melancholy, indeed, should be diverted by every means but drinking.”

1776 http://books.google.com/books?id=fcIIAAAAQAAJ&q=%22Melancholy+indeed+should+be+diverted+by+every+means+but+drinking%22&pg=PA6#v=onepage <br class="br">Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)

“A fellow that makes no figure in company, and has a mind as narrow as the neck of a vinegar-cruet.”

Tour to the Hebrides, Sept. 30, 1773
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“The richest author that ever grazed the common of literature.”

Of John Campbell, as quoted by Joseph Wharton; reported in "John Campbell", Encyclopedia Britannica (1911)

“We are inclined to believe those whom we do not know, because they have never deceived us.”

Samuel Johnson The Idler

No. 80 (October 27, 1759)
The Idler (1758–1760)

“No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library.”

Samuel Johnson The Rambler

No. 106 (23 March 1751)
The Rambler (1750–1752)