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
A Poet, Naturalist, and Historian, Who left scarcely any style of writing untouched, And touched nothing that he did not adorn.
A country governed by a despot is an inverted cone.
Life admits not of delays; when pleasure can be had, it is fit to catch it. Every hour takes away part of the things that please us, and perhaps part of our disposition to be pleased.
There is a certain race of men that either imagine it their duty, or make it their amusement, to hinder the reception of every work of learning or genius, who stand as sentinels in the avenues of fame, and value themselves upon giving Ignorance and Envy the first notice of a prey.
The arguments for purity of life fail of their due influence, not because they have been considered and confuted, but because they have been passed over without consideration.
In my early years I read very hard. It is a sad reflection, but a true one, that I knew almost as much at eighteen as I do now.
I remember a passage in Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield," which he was afterwards fool enough to expunge: "I do not love a man who is zealous for nothing.
The man who is asked by an author what he thinks of his work is put to the torture and is not obliged to speak the truth.
The best part of every author is in general to be found in his book, I assure you.
Let observation with extensive view, Survey mankind from China to Peru; Remark each anxious toil, each eager strife, And watch the busy scenes of crowded life.
Conjecture as to things useful, is good; but conjecture as to what it would be useless to know, is very idle.
Want of tenderness is want of parts, and is no less a proof of stupidity than depravity.
The poor and the busy have no leisure for sentimental sorrow.
Everybody knows worse of himself than he knows of other men.