2,116 Quotes by Samuel Johnson

Treating your adversary with respect is giving him an advantage to which he is not entitled.

He that is warm for truth, and fearless in its defense, performs one of the duties of a good man; he strenghtens his own conviction, and guards others from delusion; but steadiness of belief, and boldness of profession, are yet only part of the form of godliness.

Religion informs us that misery and sin were produced together. The depravation of human will was followed by a disorder of the harmony of nature; and by that Providence which often places antidotes in the neighborhood of poisons, vice was checked by misery, lest it should swell to universal and unlimited dominion.

Hides from himself his state, and shuns to know That life protracted is protracted woe.

Prudence is an attitude that keeps life safe, but does not often make it happy.

Attention and respect give pleasure, however late, or however useless. But they are not useless, when they are late, it is reasonable to rejoice, as the day declines, to find that it has been spent with the approbation of mankind.

We may examine, indeed, but we never can decide, because our faculties are unequal to the subject: we see a little, and form an opinion; we see more, and change it

The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered but a general effect of pleasing impression.

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