Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson, often referred to as Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. Johnson was a devout Anglican and committed Tory, and has been described as "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". He is also the subject of "the most famous single biographical work in the whole of literature," James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionNon-Fiction Author
Date of Birth18 September 1709
Most men are more willing to indulge in easy vices than to practise laborious virtues.
Political liberty is only good insofar as it produces private liberty.
A country gentleman should bring his lady to visit London as soon as he can, that they may have agreeable topicks for conversation when they are by themselves.
We have always pretensions to fame which, in our own hearts, we know to be disputable.
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.
No man sympathizes with the sorrows of vanity.
I doubt if there ever was a man who was not gratified by being told that he was liked by the women.
The charm of London is that you are never glad or sorry for ten minutes together; in the country you are one or the other for weeks.
The resolution of the combat is seldom equal to the vehemence of the charge.
The synonyme of usury is ruin.
Never mind the use--do it!
Truth, such as is necessary to the reputation of life, is always found where it is honestly sought.
Truth has no gradations; nothing which admits of increase can be so much what it is, as truth is truth. There may be a strange thing, and a thing more strange. But if a proposition be true, there can be none more true.
Truth allows no choice.