Quotes By Samuel Johnson

Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again.

The usual fortune of complaint is to excite contempt more than pity.

There are few things that we so unwillingly give up, even in advanced age, as the supposition that we still have the power of ingratiating ourselves with the fair sex.

That we must all die, we always knew; I wish I had remembered it sooner.

What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence.

My dear friend, clear your mind of can't.

It is reasonable to have perfection in our eye that we may always advance toward it, though we know it can never be reached.

You find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.

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

What makes all doctrines plain and clear? About two hundred pounds a year. And that which was proved true before, prove false again? Two hundred more.

To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity.

Nothing flatters a man as much as the happiness of his wife; he is always proud of himself as the source of it.

Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.

He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts.

Wine makes a man more pleased with himself; I do not say it makes him more pleasing to others.

The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.

If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in a constant repair.

Paradise Lost is a book that, once put down, is very hard to pick up again.

There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.

He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else.

Nature has given women so much power that the law has very wisely given them little.

The wretched have no compassion, they can do good only from strong principles of duty.

A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good.

No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring.

It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a time.

The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.

A man of genius has been seldom ruined but by himself.

Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world.

The happiest part of a man's life is what he passes lying awake in bed in the morning.

The true art of memory is the art of attention.