Samuel Johnson

“Very few live by choice. Every man is placed in his present condition by causes which acted without his foresight, and with which he did not always willingly cooperate; and therefore you wil...”

“(Adversity is) the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially free from admirers then.”

“Adversity has ever been considered as the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, being free from flatterers.”

“He knows not his own strength who hath not met adversity.”

“Adversity leads us to think properly of our state, and so is most beneficial to us.”

“A lexicographer, a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.”

“Dictionaries are like watches. The worst is better than none at all and even the best cannot be expected to run quite true.”

“A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of everything.”

“When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.”

“That is the happiest conversation where there is no competition, no vanity, but a calm quiet interchange of sentiments.”

“John Wesley's conversation is good, but he is never at leisure. He is always obliged to go at a certain hour. This is very disagreeable to a man who loves to fold his legs and have his talk...”

“Courage is the greatest of all the virtues. Because if you haven't courage, you may not have an opportunity to use any of the others.”

“Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue that it is always respected even when it is associated with vice.”

“Nothing at all will be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.”

“There is less flogging in our great schools than formerly, but then less is learned there; so that what the boys get at one end they lose at the other.”

“O, how vain and vile a passion is this fear! What base, uncomely things it makes men do.”

“A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek.”

“The knowledge that something remains yet unenjoyed impairs our enjoyment of the good before us.”

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

“Money and time are the heaviest burdens of life, and the unhappiest of all mortals are those who have more of either than they know how to use.”