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
Faction seldom leaves a man honest, however it might find him.
Profuseness is a cruel and crafty demon, that gradually involves her followers in dependence and debt; that is, fetters them with irons that enter into their souls.
He who is extravagant will quickly become poor; and poverty will enforce dependence, and invite corruption.
Such is the constitution of Man that labor may be said to be its own re-ward.
Never believe extraordinary characters which you hear of people. Depend upon it, they are exaggerated. You do not see one man shoot a great deal higher than another.
To revenge reasonable incredulity by refusing evidence, is a degree of insolence with which the world is not yet acquainted; and stubborn audacity is the last refuge of guilt.
No man can have much kindness for him by whom he does not believe himself esteemed, and nothing so evidently proves esteem as imitation.
As all error is meanness, it is incumbent on every man who consults his own dignity, to retract it as soon as he discovers it.
You cannot give me an instance of any man who is permitted to lay out his own time contriving not to have tedious hours.
The gloomy and the resentful are always found among those who have nothing to do or who do nothing.
Providence has fixed the limits of human enjoyment by immovable boundaries, and has set different gratifications at such a distance from each other, that no art or power can bring them together. This great law it is the business of every rational being to understand, that life may not pass away in an attempt to make contradictions consistent, to combine opposite qualities, and to unite things which the nature of their being must always keep asunder.
Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom; it is to be sure, good for nothing; but put all these atoms together, and you have St. Paul's Church. So it is with human felicity, which is made up of many ingredients, each of which may be shown to be very insignificant.
The relief of enemies has a tendency to unite mankind in fraternal affection.
I have adopted the Roman sentiment, that it is more honorable to save a citizen than to kill an enemy.