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Samuel Johnson

83 quotes

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) was an English writer and literary critic who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, playwright, essayist, and the creator of *A Dictionary of the English Language*. Known as "Dr. Johnson," his wit, wisdom, and larger-than-life personality made him one of the most quoted Englishmen of all time.

“To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.”

— Samuel Johnson

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All Quotes by Samuel Johnson

“All theory is against freedom of the will all experience for it.”

— Samuel Johnson

Experience

“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.”

— Samuel Johnson

Alone

“I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government other than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual.”

— Samuel Johnson

Government

“He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.”

— Samuel Johnson

Courage

“You can't be in politics unless you can walk in a room and know in a minute who's for you and who's against you.”

— Samuel Johnson

Politics

“The natural flights of the human mind are not from pleasure to pleasure, but from hope to hope.”

— Samuel Johnson

Hope

“The world is seldom what it seems to man, who dimly sees, realities appear as dreams, and dreams realities.”

— Samuel Johnson

Dreams

“Getting money is not all a man's business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.”

— Samuel Johnson

Business

“No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned... a man in a jail has more room, better food, and commonly better company.”

— Samuel Johnson

Food

“A am a great friend of public amusements, they keep people from vice.”

— Samuel Johnson

Great

“Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.”

— Samuel Johnson

Knowledge

“If your determination is fixed, I do not counsel you to despair. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but perseverance.”

— Samuel Johnson

Great

“There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern.”

— Samuel Johnson

Happiness

“To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.”

— Samuel Johnson

Home

“He who waits to do a great deal of good at once will never do anything.”

— Samuel Johnson

Great

“All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.”

— Samuel Johnson

Travel

“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.”

— Samuel Johnson

Change

“The true art of memory is the art of attention.”

— Samuel Johnson

Art

“It is dangerous for mortal beauty, or terrestrial virtue, to be examined by too strong a light. The torch of Truth shows much that we cannot, and all that we would not, see.”

— Samuel Johnson

Beauty

“The future is purchased by the present.”

— Samuel Johnson

Future