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
Frugality may be termed the daughter of Prudence, the sister of Temperance, and the parent of Liberty.
The liberty of the press is a blessing when we are inclined to write against others, and a calamity when we find ourselves overborne by the multitude of our assailants.
The liberty of using harmless pleasure will not be disputed; but it is still to be examined what pleasures are harmless.
How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?
They make a rout about universal liberty, without considering that all that is to be valued, or indeed can be enjoyed by individuals, is private liberty.
They who most loudly clamour for liberty do not most liberally grant it.
Liberty is, to the lowest rank of every nation, little more than the choice of working or starving.
Slavery is now nowhere more patiently endured, than in countries once inhabited by the zealots of liberty.
Politics are now nothing more than means of rising in the world.
No people can be great who have ceased to be virtuous.
Political liberty is only good insofar as it produces private liberty.
Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty, and of ease, and the beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.
When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford
Dublin, though a place much worse than London, is not so bad as Iceland.