FastSaying

If what appears little be universally despised, nothing greater can be attained; for all that is great was at first little, and rose to its present bulk by gradual accessions and accumulated labours


Samuel Johnson

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Little enemies and little wounds must not be despised.
PROVERB Wellbeing is attained by little and little, and nevertheless is no little thing itself.
CITIUM ZENO Well-being is attained little by little, and nevertheless is no little thing itself.
ZENO OF CITIUM Nothing is ever as good or as bad as it appears to be.
JEFFREY FRY It is necessary to be faithful in little things first , so that later you can be trusted with someth...
SUNDAY ADELAJA Nothing can be done except little by little.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE I know now: what is is all that matters. Not the thing you know is meant to be, not what could be, n...
AUGUSTEN BURROUGHS I just thought, 'Yeah, this gal would be great, if we can get her trained up, if we can get a little...
CLINT EASTWOOD The great Cham of literature. (Samuel Johnson)
TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT At first, one sees the person who is modelling; but little by little, all of the possible sculptures...
ALBERTO GIACOMETTI By this marriage, all little jealousies, which now seem great , and all great fears, which now impor...
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE For, verily, great love springs from great knowledge of the beloved object, and if you little know i...
LEONARDO DA VINCI For nothing is of greater importance than that a powerful, long-established, and irrational custom s...
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE What is meant here by saying that existence precedes essence? It means first of all, man exists, tur...
JEAN-PAUL SARTRE Nevertheless, this is where it begins. The first word appears only at a moment when nothing can be e...
PAUL AUSTER At present nothing is possible except to extend the area of sanity little by little. We cannot act c...
GEORGE ORWELL Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil. Our great hope lies in dev...
CALVIN COOLIDGE Arms is a profession that, if its principles are adhered to for success, requires an officer do what...
THOMAS STONEWALL JACKSON Protect your enthusiasm from the negativity and fear of others. Never decide to do nothing just beca...
STEVE MARABOLI At the present moment, with little or no detail to hand, it is difficult for me to make any comment,...
ETHEL ROSENBERG There is nothing too little for so little a creature as man. It is by studying little things that we...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Human is what he decides to be.
ZAMAN ALI If one divided all of human science into two parts - the one common to all men, the other particular...
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU It appears that you were meant to be mine only for a little while.
SAMANTHA SOTTO There is nothing, Sir, too little for so little a creature as man. It is by studying little things t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON In each little life, we can see great truth and beauty, and in each little life we glimpse the way o...
DEAN KOONTZ That night at Carnegie Hall was a great experience. When the thing was first put up to me I was a li...
BENNY GOODMAN The splendor of the rose and the whitness of the lily do not rob the little violet of it’s scent n...
THERESE OF LISIEUX We have the capacity to become a unique and special person unlike any other. Draw on your inner reso...
ANGIE KARAN I was a little worried at how we started. That is usually always ours, but Chris Johnson did a great...
CLIFFORD GARNTO Continuing a series on the person of Jesus: When Christ was in the world, He was despised by men; ...
THOMAS À KEMPIS Yes! Very funny this terrible thing is. A man that is born falls into a dream like a man who falls i...
JOSEPH CONRAD There is nothing to fear from gods, There is nothing to feel in death, Good can be attained, Evil ca...
EPICURUS I would love to be a field biologist. I would love to do what Jane Goodall did, just totally immerse...
ISABELLA ROSSELLINI Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be attained only by someone who is deta...
SIMONE WEIL Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be attained only by someone who is deta...
SIMONE WEIL The way to do a great deal is to keep on doing a little. The way to do nothing at all is to be conti...
CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON What is existence for but to be laughed at if men in their twenties have already attained the utmost...
SøREN KIERKEGAARD The splendor of the rose and the whiteness of the lily
do not rob the little violet of it’s s...
THéRèSE DE LISIEUX Be yourself, be who you can be.
LAILAH GIFTY AKITA That was by design to be together for the first half. We relied on Jackie to set the pace, and she d...
LARRY BELL It is astonishing with how little wisdom mankind can be governed, when that little wisdom is its o...
W. R. INGE It is astonishing with how little wisdom mankind can be governed, when that little wisdom is its own...
WILLIAM RALPH INGE It is astonishing with how little wisdom mankind can be governed, when that little wisdom is its own...
W. R. [WILLIAM RALPH] INGE It is astonishing with how little wisdom mankind can be governed, when that little wisdom is its own...
W. R. INGE Ah, much deluded! lay aside
Thy threats, and anger misapplied!
Art not afraid with sounds ...
JOHN MILTON Yes, I know, it's not the truth, but in a great history little truths can be altered so that the gre...
UMBERTO ECO Be nice to people... maybe it'll be unappreciated, unreciprocated, or ignored, but spread the love a...
GERMANY KENT If they know nothing of death, it is because they know little of life, for the secrets of life and d...
OSCAR WILDE We are surrounded by the absurd excess of the universe. By meaningless bulk, vastness without size, ...
JACK GILBERT Public servants say, always with the best of intentions, "What greater service we could render if on...
RONALD REAGAN 37. It is better to be single and unhappy than unhappily married.
JAMES C. DOBSON How to be Great;The moment you realize & accept the ordinary fact that those doing great things toda...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) How to be great;Think of a gigantic & unheard of idea to birth & nurture & inside it lies your great...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) Continuing a series on the person of Jesus: When Christ was in the world, He was despised by men; ...
MALCOLM MUGGERIDGE Life should be like the precious metals, weigh much in little bulk
SENECA Simple things often make great difference
SOTONYE ANGA The great rule: If the little bit you have is nothing special in itself, at least find a way of sayi...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I’m nothing great. But I’m a rose… I’m a rose whether I’m admired or not, I’m a rose whe...
SERDAR ÖZKAN I'm not going in there to be the savior. I want to be a piece of a great hockey club. If I can be a ...
MARK RECCHI I was mad of course and still am, but harmless, I passed for harmless, that's a good one. Not of cou...
SAMUEL BECKETT By making and keeping promises to ourselves and others, little by little, our honor becomes greater ...
STEPHEN R. COVEY Mankind is made great or little by its own will.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER Mankind is made great or little by its own will.
FRIEDRICH SCHILLER Genius at first is little more than a great capacity for receiving discipline.
GEORGE ELIOT We all want to be a little glamorous, a little playful and a little mischievous at times.
JASON WU Do you think I care if Aslan dooms me to death?” said the King. “That would be nothing, nothing ...
C.S. LEWIS A key in a compromise proposal is to make some movement. There appears to be little movement in the ...
BARRETT MARSON What was the freedom to which the adult human being rose in the morning, if each act was held back o...
DELMORE SCHWARTZ It's no secret that my process is a little bit loose and can be a little bit infuriating to a st...
DOUG LIMAN A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers ...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON A tremendous amount of needless pain and suffering can be eliminated by ensuring that health insuran...
DANIEL AKAKA It?s just a lot of little things that have accumulated. I?m just too old for it. If you don?t have a...
ARTHUR BERGER Sometimes I feel like a melody doesn't have anything to do with me, but it's just something ...
AGNES OBEL At first, the chemistry wasn't quite there. That little spark was missing. But today everything was ...
CHRISTINE ALFORD Little by little, I would get snared by the world out there. This was the first step; first I say ye...
HARUKI MURAKAMI Great artists are a little too gifted to be bound by boxes and labels, and in saying that, the label...
CRISS JAMI We need to be able to convey to people who don't live here ...what Little Rock is and what the Littl...
DAN O'BYRNE This country was founded on a promise of equal rights for all, and we have always managed to move cl...
LORETTA LYNCH If I can delay that [pain] for a moment and bring a little joy. . . and help them to see things a li...
BOBBY MCFERRIN Sheep don’t need the shepherd to be what they are. The shepherd needs sheep to be what he is.
LJUPKA CVETANOVA The best that can be said for ritualistic legalism is that it improves conduct. It does little, howe...
ALDOUS HUXLEY That money you are hoarding is not meant to be inherited by your children alone,but also by the soci...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) What is meant here by saying that existence precedes essence? It means that first of all, man exists...
JEAN-PAUL SARTRE It's all a great mystery. For you, who love the little prince, too. As for me, nothing in the univer...
ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPéRY Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot at least we learned a little, and if we...
GAUTAMA BUDDHA As the pain that can be told is but half a pain, so the pity that questions has little healing in it...
EDITH WHARTON What is sacred among one people may be ridiculous in another; and what is despised or rejected by on...
HU SHIH My eyes were dazed by you for a little, and that was all.
THOMAS HARDY By concord little things grow great, by discord the greatest come to nothing.
ROGER WILLIAMS It is a truth universally acknowledged that a thirty-something woman in possession of a satisfying c...
SHANNON HALE It is a historic game. It's great to have this league become a little more open to what soccer is un...
ANTONIO CUE What I see is a system that's being implemented and every week it appears that players understand it...
BARRY ALVAREZ Its not how great a gift is that determines how great a persons love is for another,but most times i...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) I have always wished the present to resemble memory: because the present can be flat at times, and b...
LYDIA MILLET We're very concerned about the bad testimony that this will set. This is what pornography does, thou...
BILL JOHNSON If you walked by a street and as you was walking a concrete and you saw a rose growing from concrete...
TUPAC SHAKUR If one seminary should be well organized, its advantages would be found so great that others would s...
EMMA WILLARD Feast of Leo the Great, Bishop of Rome, 461 If we would put some slight stress on ourselves at th...
THOMAS À KEMPIS Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purc...
SAMUEL JOHNSON

More Samuel Johnson

He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own...
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Love is only one of many passions.
SAMUEL JOHNSON My dear friend, clear your mind of cant.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Bounty always receives part of its value from the manner in which it is bestowed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is very natural for young men to be vehement, acrimonious and severe. For as they seldom comprehe...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Among the calamities of war, may be justly numbered the diminution of the love of truth, by the fals...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who praises every body, praises nobody.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The mind is never satisfied with the objects immediately before it, but is always breaking away from...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died: Johnson ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that will enjoy the brightness of sunshine, must quit the coolness of the shade.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Gloomy calm of idle vacancy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Ignorance, madam, pure ignorance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Do not discourage your children from hoarding, if they have a taste to it; whoever lays up his penny...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Whatever you have spend less.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON What is twice read is commonly better remembered that what is transcribed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little g...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Books have always a secret influence on the understanding; we cannot at pleasure obliterate ideas: ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The habit of looking on the bright side of every event is worth more than a thousand pounds a year.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Politics are now nothing more than means of rising in the world. With this sole view do men engage i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Wickedness is always easier than virtue, for it takes a short cut to everything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON By taking a second wife he pays the highest compliment to the first, by showing that she made him so...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Marriage is the best state for man in general, and every man is a worst man in proportion to the lev...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talk...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Books that you carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are most useful after all.
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man ought to read just as his inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him littl...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that reads and grows no wiser seldom suspects his own deficiency, but complains of hard words and...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The most heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together; nature and art are ransacked for illust...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON This merriment of parsons is mighty offensive.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Never, my dear Sir, do you take it into your head that I do not love you; you may settle yourself in...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The endearing elegance of female friendship.
SAMUEL JOHNSON To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to thr...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The most fatal disease of friendship is gradual decay, or dislike hourly increased by causes too sle...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Friendship, 'the wine of life,' said Boswell, should, like a well-stocked cellar, be thus continuall...
SAMUEL JOHNSON To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his ut...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is wonderful when a calculation is made, how little the mind is actually employed in the discharg...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The next best thing to knowing something is knowing where to find it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I will be conquered; I will not capitulate.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the publi...
SAMUEL JOHNSON "He was a very good hater."
SAMUEL JOHNSON I like a good hater.
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are long before we are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it posse...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Read your own compositions, and when you meet a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Composition is, for the most part, an effort of slow diligence and steady perseverance, to which the...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I know not, Madam, that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much...
SAMUEL JOHNSON In all pointed sentences, some degree of accuracy must be sacrificed to conciseness.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading, in order to write; a man will turn over ha...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is the only instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purc...
SAMUEL JOHNSON My congratulations to you, sir. Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Pride is seldom delicate; it will please itself with very mean advantages.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Prejudice not being funded on reason cannot be removed by argument.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The applause of a single human being is of great consequence.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who praises everybody, praises nobody.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The real satisfaction which praise can afford, is when what is repeated aloud agrees with the whispe...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A continual feast of commendation is only to be obtained by merit or by wealth: many are therefore o...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Hunger is never delicate; they who are seldom gorged to the full with praise may be safely fed with ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be sile...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few things that we so unwillingly give up, even in advanced age, as the supposition that w...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Men know that women are an over-match for them, and therefore they choose the weakest or most ignora...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The true art of memory is the art of attention.
SAMUEL JOHNSON What is read twice is usually remembered more than what is once written.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The Irish are a fair people: They never speak well of one another.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees is the high road that leads him to England.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Difficult do you call it, Sir? I wish it were impossible.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is the only sensual pleasure without vice.
SAMUEL JOHNSON That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few minds to which tyranny is not delightful.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The majority have no other reason for their opinions than that they are the fashion.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Ah! Sir, a boy's being flogged is not so severe as a man's having the hiss of the world against him.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is the great privilege of poverty to be happy and yet unenvied, to be healthy with physic, secure...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nature makes us poor only when we want necessaries, but custom gives the name of poverty to the want...
SAMUEL JOHNSON This mournful truth is everywhere confessed, slow rises worth by poverty depressed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Poverty is often concealed in splendor, and often in extravagance. It is the task of many people to ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If pleasure was not followed by pain, who would forbear it?
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Many things difficult in design prove easy in performance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON If he really thinks there is no distinction between vice and virtue, when he leaves our houses let u...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The usual fortune of complaint is to excite contempt more than pity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagre...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If I have said something to hurt a man once, I shall not get the better of this by saying many thing...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but per...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
SAMUEL JOHNSON In all evils which admits a remedy, impatience should be avoided, because it wastes the time and att...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dr...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If a man could say nothing against a character but what he can prove, history could not be written.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Your manuscript is both good and original; but the parts that are good are not original, and the par...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I found you essay to be good and original. However, the part that was original was not good and the ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, he was dull in company, dull in his closet, dull everywhere. He was dull in a new way, and that...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, a man may be so much of everything, that he is nothing of anything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who has provoked the shaft of wit, cannot complain that he smarts from it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Their learning is like bread in a besieged town: every man gets a little, but no man gets a full mea...
SAMUEL JOHNSON As peace is the end of war, so to be idle is the ultimate purpose of the busy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Perhaps man is the only being that can properly be called idle.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Turn on the prudent ant thy heedful eyes. Observe her labors, sluggard, and be wise.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Lawyers know life practically. A bookish man should always have them to converse with.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would be loath to speak ill of any person who I do not know deserves it, but I am afraid he is an ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON What provokes your risibility, Sir? Have I said anything that you understand? Then I ask pardon of t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The next best thing to knowing something is knowing where to find it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON More knowledge may be gained of a man's real character by a short conversation with one of his serva...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Man is not weak; knowledge is more than equivalent to force.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge always demands increase; it is like fire, which must first be kindled by some external age...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge is more than equivalent to force.
SAMUEL JOHNSON All wonder is the effect of novelty on ignorance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, they are a race of convicts, and ought to be thankful for anything we allow them short of hangi...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated, has not the art of getting drunk.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits that are not good unti...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, I have no objection to a man's drinking wine, if he can do it in moderation. I found myself apt...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The advice that is wanted is commonly not welcome and that which is not wanted, evidently an effront...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Disease generally begins that equality which death completes.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The trade of advertising is now so near perfection that it is not easy to propose any improvement. B...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Adversity is the state in which man mostly easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make fa...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Disappointment, when it involves neither shame nor loss, is as good as success; for it supplies as m...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Every man who attacks my belief, diminishes in some degree my confidence in it, and therefore makes ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON When speculation has done its worst, two and two still make four.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, I have found you an argument. I am not obliged to find you an understanding.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No member of society has the right to teach any doctrine contrary to what society holds to be true.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It seems not more reasonable to leave the right of printing unrestrained, because writers may be aft...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Censure is willingly indulged, because it always implies some superiority: men please themselves wit...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There is nothing so much seduces reason from vigilance as the thought of passing life with an amiabl...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Bravery has no place where it can avail nothing.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that would be superior to external influences must first become superior to his own passions.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Surely a long life must be somewhat tedious, since we are forced to call in so many trifling things ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It generally happens that assurance keeps an even pace with ability.
SAMUEL JOHNSON When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Extended empires are like expanded gold, exchanging solid strength for feeble splendor.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Those who attain to any excellence commonly spend life in some single pursuit, for excellence is not...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Prepare for death, if here at night you roam, and sign your will before you sup from home.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered but a general effect of ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Christianity is the highest perfection of humanity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who waits to do a great deal of good at once, will never do anything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON You are much surer that you are doing good when you pay money to those who work, as the recompense o...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I am sorry I have not learnt to play at cards. It is very useful in life: it generates kindness, and...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Self-love is often rather arrogant than blind; it does not hide our faults from ourselves, but persu...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Were it not for imagination a man would be as happy in arms of a chambermaid as of a duchess.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, an...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Patron: One who countenances, supports or protects. Commonly a wretch who supports with insolence, a...
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.
SAMUEL JOHNSON To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and la...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Truth, Sir, is a cow which will yield such people no more milk, and so they are gone to milk the bul...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly beco...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Suspicion is most often useless pain.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion, and he whose real wants are supplied must admit tho...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I have always considered it as treason against the great republic of human nature, to make any man's...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are inclined to believe those whom we don not know because they have never deceived us.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Small debts are like small gun shot; they are rattling around us on all sides and one can scarcely e...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous mind.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. He whom natur...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was meant as a standard of judging well.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be sile...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that pursues fame with just claims, trusts his happiness to the winds; but he that endeavors afte...
SAMUEL JOHNSON To get a name can happen but to few; it is one of the few things that cannot be brought. It is the f...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We love to expect, and when expectation is either disappointed or gratified, we want to be again exp...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I know not any thing more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is generally known, that he who expects much will be often disappointed; yet disappointment seldo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Hope is itself a species of happiness, and, perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords: b...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No two men can be half an hour together but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nothing is more common than mutual dislike, where mutual approbation is particularly expected.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The chains of habit are generally too week to be felt, until they are too strong to be broken.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The habit of looking on the best side of every event is worth more than a thousand pounds a years.
SAMUEL JOHNSON While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till grief be digested, ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Where grief is fresh, any attempt to divert it only irritates.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The superiority of some men is merely local. They are great because their associates are little.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He was dull in a new way, and that made many think him great.
SAMUEL JOHNSON