Quotes by Samuel Johnson

What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.

Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.

Great works are performed, not by strength, but by perseverance.

What cannot be repaired is not to be regretted.

Whoever thinks of going to bed before twelve oclock is a scoundrel.

I look upon every day to be lost in which I do not make a new acquaintance.

Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last.

Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.

The Church does not superstitiously observe days, merely as days, but as memorials of important facts. Christmas might be kept as well upon one day of the year as another; but there should be a stated day for commemorating the birth of our Saviour, because there is danger that what may be done on any day, will be neglected.

No weakness of the human mind has more frequently incurred animadversion, than the negligence with which men overlook their own faults, however flagrant, and the easiness with which they pardon them, however frequently repeated.

Pleasure, in itself harmless, may become mischievous, by endearing to us a state which we know to be transient and probatory, and withdrawing our thoughts from that of which every hour brings us nearer to the beginning, and of which no length of time will bring us to the end. Mortification is not virtuous in itself, nor has any other use, but that it disengages us from the allurements of sense. In the state of future perfection, to which we all aspire, there will be pleasure without danger, and security without restraint.

We are told, that the subjection of Americans may tend to the diminution of our own liberties; an event, which none but very perspicacious politicians are able to foresee. If slavery be thus fatally contagious, how is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?

Our brightest blazes of gladness are commonly kindled by unexpected sparks.

It is advantageous to an author that his book should be attacked as well as praised. Fame is a shuttlecock. If it be struck at one end of the room, it will soon fall to the ground. To keep it up, it must be struck at both ends.

Sir, I did not count your glasses of wine, why should you number up my cups of tea?

There is no matter what children should learn first, any more than what leg you should put into your breeches first. Sir, you may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the meantime your backside is bare. Sire, while you stand considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learnt em both.

Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken for realities, but because they bring realities to mind.

The composition of Shakespeare is a forest, in which oaks extend in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelting to myrtles and to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind with endless diversity.

Shakespeare opens a mine which contains gold and diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerales.

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.