2,116 Quotes by Samuel Johnson

The best part of every author is in general to be found in his book, I assure you.

It seems to be remarkable that death increases our veneration for the good, and extenuates our hatred for the bad.

Language is the dress of thought; every time you talk your mind is on parade.

He that pines with hunger, is in little care how others shall be fed. The poor man is seldom studious to make his grandson rich.

He who would have fine guests, let him have a fine wife.

If you want to be a writer, then write. Write every day!

I do not wonder that, where the monastick life is permitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabitants. Men will submit to any rule, by which they may be exempted from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to supply by external authority their own want of constancy and resolution, and court the government of others, when long experience has convinced them of their own inability to govern themselves.

When any fit of gloominess, or perversion of mind, lays hold upon you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaints.

To prevent evil is the great end of government, the end for which vigilance and severity are properly employed.