Quotes by Samuel Johnson

A tavern chair is the throne of human felicity.

Your levellers wish to level down as far as themselves but they cannot bear levelling up to themselves.

Example is more efficacious than precept.

He that has much to do will do something wrong.

Round numbers are always false.

O how vain and vile a passion is this fear! What base uncomely things it makes men do.

A fishing-rod was a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.

Men are like stone jugs - you may lug them where you like by the ears.

A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table than when his wife talks Greek.

None but a fool worries about things he cannot influence.

The knowledge that something remains yet unenjoyed impairs our enjoyment of the good before us.

Life is a progress from want to want not from enjoyment to enjoyment.

Money and time are the heaviest burdens of life and the unhappiest of all mortals are those who have more of either than they know how to use.

An old friend never can be found and nature has provided that he cannot easily be lost.

A man Sir should keep his friendship in constant repair.

The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef love like being enlivened with champagne.

It is foolish to make experiments upon the constancy of a friend as upon the chastity of a wife.

No man is much pleased with a companion who does not increase in some respect his fondness of himself.

If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life he will soon find himself left alone.

Always set high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you.