Samuel Johnson: Trending quotes

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Samuel Johnson: 724 quotes26 likes

“I never have sought the world; the world was not to seek me.”

March 23, 1783
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“I have two very cogent reasons for not printing any list of subscribers; — one, that I have lost all the names, — the other, that I have spent all the money.”

1781, p. 477, Referring to subscribers to his edition of The Plays of William Shakespeare, with Notes (1765)
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue that it is always respected, even when it is associated with vice.”

June 1784, p. 526 http://books.google.com/books?id=FMoIAAAAQAAJ&q=&quot;Courage+is+a+quality+so+necessary+for+maintaining+virtue+that+it+is+always+respected+even+when+it+is+associated+with+vice&quot;&pg=PA319#v=onepage <br class="br">Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention, or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness had before concealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty.”

Samuel Johnson book The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

Source: The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759), Chapter 29

“How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?”

Taxation No Tyranny (1775)

“A Frenchman must be always talking, whether he knows anything of the matter or not; an Englishman is content to say nothing, when he has nothing to say.”

1780, p. 446
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“I hate a fellow whom pride or cowardice or laziness drives into a corner, and who does nothing when he is there but sit and growl. Let him come out as I do, and bark.”

Source: Anecdotes of Samuel Johnson (1786), p. 252

“Every state of society is as luxurious as it can be. Men always take the best they can get.”

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

“Philips, whose touch harmonious could remove
The pangs of guilty power and hapless love!
Rest here, distress'd by poverty no more;
Here find that calm thou gav'st so oft before;
Sleep undisturb'd within this peaceful shrine,
Till angels wake thee with a note like thine!”

Epitaph on Claudius Philips, the Musician
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is animated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external ordinances, by stated calls to worship, and the salutary influence of example.”

Life of Milton
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“I am glad that he thanks God for anything.”

1755
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)

“Sir, I have found you an argument; but I am not obliged to find you an understanding.”

June 1784, p. 545
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“But, scarce observ'd, the knowing and the bold
Fall in the gen'ral massacre of gold.”

Source: Vanity of Human Wishes (1749), Line 21

“A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected.”

Samuel Johnson book The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

Source: The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759), Chapter 12

“He is not only dull himself, but the cause of dullness in others.”

1784
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)

“Johnson said that he could repeat a complete chapter of "The Natural History of Iceland" from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly thus: "There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island." 62”

Chap. lxxii.
1778
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)

“All argument is against it; but all belief is for it.”

On the subject of ghosts, March 31, 1778, p. 373
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol III

“This world, where much is to be done and little to be known.”

Prayers and Meditations, Against Inquisitive and Perplexing Thoughts (1785)

“It is strange that there should be so little reading in the world, and so much writing. People in general do not willingly read, if they can have any thing else to amuse them.”

May 1, 1783, p. 513
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

“Sir, I think all Christians, whether Papists or Protestants, agree in the essential articles, and that their differences are trivial, and rather political than religious.”

1763
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Life of Johnson (Boswell)