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It Is A Common Error, And The Greater And More Mischievous For Being So Common, To Believe That Repentance Best Becomes And Most Concerns Dying Men. Indeed, What Is Necessary Every Hour Of Our Life Is Necessary In The Hour Of Death Too, And As Long As One Lives He Will Have Need Of Repentance, And Therefore It Is Necessary In The Hour Of Death Too; But He Who Hath Constantly Exercised Himself In It In His Health And Vigor, Will Do It With Less Pain In His Sickness And Weakness; And He Who Hath Practiced It All His Life, Will Do It With More Ease And Less Perplexity In The Hour Of His Death.

-Samuel Johnson

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It Is A Common

Samuel Johnson

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It Is A Common Error, And The Greater And More Mischievous For Being So Common, To Believe That Repentance Best Becomes And Most Concerns Dying Men. Indeed, What Is Necessary Every Hour Of Our Life Is Necessary In The Hour Of Death Too, And As Long As One Lives He Will Have Need Of Repentance, And Therefore It Is Necessary In The Hour Of Death Too; But He Who Hath Constantly Exercised Himself In It In His Health And Vigor, Will Do It With Less Pain In His Sickness And Weakness; And He Who Hath Practiced It All His Life, Will Do It With More Ease And Less Perplexity In The Hour Of His Death.

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Rain Is Good For Vegetables, And For The Animals Who Eat Those Vegetables, And For The Animals Who Eat Those Animals.

Never Mind The Use--do It!

To Expect That The Intricacies Of Science Will Be Pierced By A Careless Glance, Or The Eminences Of Fame Ascended Without Labour, Is To Expect A Peculiar Privilege, A Power Denied To The Rest Of Mankind; But To Suppose That The Maze Is Inscrutable To Diligence, Or The Heights Inaccessible To Perseverance, Is To Submit Tamely To The Tyranny Of Fancy, And Enchain The Mind In Voluntary Shackles.

There Is No Book So Poor That It Would Not Be A Prodigy If Wholly Made By A Single Man.

I Will Venture To Say There Is More Learning And Science Within The Circumference Of Ten Miles From Where We Now Sit [in London], Than In All The Rest Of The Kingdom.

It Is However, Reasonable, To Have Perfection In Our Eye; That We May Always Advance Towards It, Though We Know It Never Can Be Reached.

Leisure And Curiosity Might Soon Make Great Advances In Useful Knowledge, Were They Not Diverted By Minute Emulation And Laborious Trifles.

Men Do Not Suspect Faults Which They Do Not Commit

Applause Abates Diligence.

The Advice That Is Wanted Is Commonly Not Welcome And That Which Is Not Wanted, Evidently An Effrontery.

Those Who Attempt Nothing Themselves Think Every Thing Easily Performed, And Consider The Unsuccessful Always As Criminal.

Novelty Is Indeed Necessary To Preserve Eagerness And Alacrity; But Art And Nature Have Stores Inexhaustible By Human Intellects, And Every Moment Produces Something New To Him Who Has Quickened His Faculties By Diligent Observation.

There Is No Wisdom In Useless And Hopeless Sorrow, But There Is Something In It So Like Virtue, That He Who Is Wholly Without It Cannot Be Loved.

The Eye Of The Mind, Like That Of The Body, Can Only Extend Its View To New Objects, By Losing Sight Of Those Which Are Now Before It.

He That Is Pushing His Predecessors Into The Gulf Of Obscurity, Cannot But Sometimes Suspect, That He Must Himself Sink In Like Manner, And, As He Stands Upon The Same Precipice, Be Swept Away With The Same Violence.

Do Not Accustom Yourself To Consider Debt Only As An Inconvenience; You Will Find It A Calamity.

Avarice Is Always Poor.

There Is No Temper More Unpropitious To Interest Than Desultory Application And Unlimited Inquiry, By Which The Desires Are Held In A Perpetual Equipoise, And The Mind Fluctuates Between Different Purposes Without Determination.

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.

Man Is A Transitory Being, And His Designs Must Partake Of The Imperfections Their Author.

That We Must All Die, We Always Knew, I Wish I Had Sooner Remembred It.

A Man, Sir, Should Keep His Friendship In A Constant Repair.

Unintelligible Language Is A Lantern Without A Light.

Idleness And Timidity Often Despair Without Being Overcome, And Forbear Attempts For Fear Of Being Defeated; And We May Promote The Invigoration Of Faint Endeavors, By Showing What Has Already Been Performed.

Lectures Were Once Useful; But Now When All Can Read, And Books Are So Numerous, Lectures Are Unnecessary.

Who Left Nothing Of Authorship Untouched, And Touched Nothing Which He Did Not Adorn. [lat., Qui Nullum Fere Scribendi Genus Non Tetigit; Nullum Quod Tetigit Non Ornavit.]

Plenty Is The Original Cause Of Many Of Our Needs; And Even The Poverty, Which Is So Frequent And Distressful In Civilized Nations, Proceeds Often From That Change Of Manners Which Opulence Has Produced. Nature Makes Us Poor Only When We Want Necessaries; But Custom Gives The Name Of Poverty To The Want Of Superfluities.

There Are Goods So Opposed That We Cannot Seize Both, But, By Too Much Prudence, May Pass Between Them At Too Great A Distance To Reach Either.

No Degree Of Knowledge Attainable By Man Is Able To Set Him Above The Want Of Hourly Assistance.

Every Man Is Prompted By The Love Of Himself To Imagine That He Possesses Some Qualities Superior, Either In Kind Or Degree, To Those Which He Sees Allotted To The Rest Of The World.

Too Much Nicety Of Detail Disgusts The Greatest Part Of Readers, And To Throw A Multitude Of Particulars Under General Heads, And Lay Down Rules Of Extensive Comprehension, Is To Common Understandings Of Little Use.

Governors Being Accustomed To Hear Of More Crimes Than They Can Punish, And More Wrongs Than They Can Redress, Set Themselves At Ease By Indiscriminate Negligence, And Presently Forget The Request When They Lose Sight Of The Petitioner.

Cruel With Guilt, And Daring With Despair, The Midnight Murderer Bursts The Faithless Bar; Invades The Sacred Hour Of Silent Rest And Leaves, Unseen, A Dagger In Your Breast.

It Is, Indeed, At Home That Every Man Must Be Known By Those Who Would Make A Just Estimate Either Of His Virtue Or Felicity; For Smiles And Embroidery Are Alike Occasional, And The Mind Is Often Dressed For Show In Painted Honor, And Fictitious Benevolence.

In Matters Of Business, No Woman Stops At Integrity.

Hypocrisy Is The Necessary Burden Of Villainy.

To Live Without Feeling Or Exciting Sympathy, To Be Fortunate Without Adding To The Felicity Of Others, Or Afflicted Without Tasting The Balm Of Pity, Is A State More Gloomy Than Solitude; It Is Not Retreat, But Exclusion From Mankind. Marriage Has Many Pains, But Celibacy Has No Pleasures.

All Argument Is Against It; But All Belief Is For It.

Ignorance, When It Is Voluntary, Is Criminal; And He May Be Properly Charged With Evil Who Refused To Learn How He Might Prevent It.

A Man Who Uses A Great Many Words To Express His Meaning Is Like A Bad Marksman Who, Instead Of Aiming A Single Stone At An Object, Takes Up A Handful And Throws At It In Hopes He May Hit.

He Who Expects Much Will Be Often Disappointed; Yet Disappointment Seldom Cures Us Of Expectation, Or Has Any Other Effect Than That Of Producing A Moral Sentence Or Peevish Exclamation.

Nobody Can Write The Life Of A Man But Those Who Have Eat And Drunk And Lived In Social Intercourse With Him.

Preserve Me From Unseasonable And Immoderate Sleep.

Pleasure Itself Is Not A Vice

A Man's Mind Grows Narrow In A Narrow Place.

The Coquette Has Companions, Indeed, But No Lovers,--for Love Is Respectful And Timorous; And Where Among Her Followers Will She Find A Husband?

Sir, It Is Wrong To Stir Up Law-suits; But When Once It Is Certain That A Law-suit Is To Go On, There Is Nothing Wrong In A Lawyer's Endeavouring That He Shall Have The Benefit, Rather Than Another.

Whoever Thinks Of Going To Bed Before Twelve O'clock Is A Scoundrel.

To Get A Name Can Happen But To Few. A Name, Even In The Most Commercial Nation, Is One Of The Few Things Which Cannot Be Bought . It Is The Free Gift Of Mankind, Which Must Be Deserved Before It Will Be Granted, And Is At Last Unwillingly Bestowed.

I Inherited A Vile Melancholy From My Father, Which Has Made Me Mad All My Life, At Least Not Sober.

No Man Can Enjoy Happiness Without Thinking That He Enjoys It.

Between Falsehood And Useless Truth There Is Little Difference. As Gold Which He Cannot Spend Will Make No Man Rich, So Knowledge Which Cannot Apply Will Make No Man Wise.

If The Abuse Be Enormous, Nature Will Rise Up, And Claiming Her Original Rights, Overturn A Corrupt Political System.

But Though It Cannot Be Reasonable Not To Gain Happiness For Fear Of Losing It, Yet It Must Be Confessed, That In Proportion To The Pleasure Of Possession, Will Be For Some Time Our Sorrow For The Loss.

The Heroes Of Literary History Have Been No Less Remarkable For What They Have Suffered Than For What They Have Achieved.

I Have Always Considered A Clergyman As The Father Of A Larger Family Than He Is Able To Maintain.

He That Teaches Us Anything Which We Knew Not Before Is Undoubtedly To Be Reverenced As A Master.

As I Know More Of Mankind I Expect Less Of Them, And Am Ready Now To Call A Man A Good Man Upon Easier Terms Than I Was Formerly.

The Majority Of A Society Is The True Definition Of The Public.

Among The Many Inconsistencies Which Folly Produces Or Infirmity Suffers In The Human Mind, There Has Often Been Observed A Manifest And Striking Contrariety Between The Life Of An Author And His Writings... Those Whom The Appearance Of Virtue Or The Evidence Of Genius Has Tempted To A Nearer Knowledge Of The Writer, In Whose Performances They May Be Found, Have Indeed Had Frequent Reason To Repent Their Curiosity.

As The Faculty Of Writing Has Chiefly Been A Masculine Endowment, The Reproach Of Making The World Miserable Has Always Been Thrown Upon The Women.

The Student Who Would Build His Knowledge On Solid Foundations, And Proceed By Just Degrees To The Pinnacles Of Truth, Is Directed By The Great Philosopher Of France To Begin By Doubting Of His Own Existence. In Like Manner, Whoever Would Complete Any Arduous And Intricate Enterprise, Should, As Soon As His Imagination Can Cool After The First Blaze Of Hope, Place Before His Own Eyes Every Possible Embarrassment That May Retard Or Defeat Him. He Should First Question The Probability Of Success, And Then Endeavour To Remove The Objections That He Has Raised.

It Is Very Strange, And Very Melancholy, That The Paucity Of Human Pleasures Should Persuade Us Ever To Call Hunting One Of Them.

Hope Is Necessary In Every Condition. The Miseries Of Poverty, Sickness And Captivity Would, Without This Comfort, Be Insupportable.

Pleasure Is Very Seldom Found Where It Is Sought; Our Brightest Blazes Of Gladness Are Commonly Kindled By Unexpected Sparks.

Almost All The Moral Good Which Is Left Among Us Is The Apparent Effect Of Physical Evil.

It Seems To Be Remarkable That Death Increases Our Veneration For The Good, And Extenuates Our Hatred For The Bad.

Being Married To Those Sleepy-souled Women Is Just Like Playing At Cards For Nothing: No Passion Is Excited And The Time Is Filled Up. I Do Not, However, Envy A Fellow One Of Those Honeysuckle Wives For My Part, As They Are But Creepers At Best And Commonly Destroy The Tree They So Tenderly Cling About.

Sir, You Have But Two Topics, Yourself And Me. I Am Sick Of Both.

I Have Two Very Cogent Reasons For Not Printing Any List Of Subscribers; One, That I Have Lost All The Names, The Other, That I Have Spent All The Money.

Glory, The Casual Gift Of Thoughtless Crowds! Glory, The Bribe Of Avaricious Virtue!

Virtue Is Too Often Merely Local.

The Hour Of Reformation Is Always Delayed; Every Delay Gives Vice Another Opportunity Of Fortifying Itself By Habit.

It Is So Far From Being Natural For A Man And Woman To Live In A State Of Marriage, That We Find All The Motives Which They Have For Remaining In That Connection, And The Restraints Which Civilised Society Imposes To Prevent Separation, Are Hardly Sufficient To Keep Them Together.

Even Those To Whom Providence Has Allotted Greater Strength Of Understanding Can Expect Only To Improve A Single Science.

Every Man Speaks And Writes With Intent To Be Understood; And It Can Seldom Happen But He That Understands Himself Might Convey His Notions To Another, If, Content To Be Understood, He Did Not Seek To Be Admired.

Spite And Ill-nature Are Among The Most Expensive Luxuries In Life.

Hunger Is Never Delicate.

Among The Numerous Requisites That Must Concur To Complete An Author, Few Are Of More Importance Than An Early Entrance Into The Living World. The Seed Of Knowledge May Be Planted In Solitude, But Must Be Cultivated In Public. Argumentation May Be Taught In Colleges, And Theories Formed In Retirement; But The Artifice Of Embellishment And The Powers Of Attraction Can Be Gained Only By A General Converse.

There Is Something In Obstinacy Which Differs From Every Other Passion. Whenever It Fails, It Never Recovers, But Either Breaks Like Iron, Or Crumbles Sulkily Away, Like A Fractured Arch. Most Other Passions Have Their Periods Of Fatigue And Rest, Their Sufferings And Their Cure; But Obstinacy Has No Resource, And The First Wound Is Mortal.

An Old Friend Never Can Be Found, And Nature Has Provided That He Cannot Easily Be Lost.

In Bed We Laugh, In Bed We Cry, And Born In Bed, In Bed We Die; The Near Approach A Bed May Show Of Human Bliss To Human Woe.

Power Is Not Sufficient Evidence Of Truth.

There Is Such A Difference Between The Pursuits Of Men In Great Cities That One Part Of The Inhabitants Lives To Little Other Purpose Than To Wonder At The Rest. Some Have Hopes And Fears, Wishes And Aversions, Which Never Enter Into The Thoughts Of Others, And Inquiry Is Laboriously Exerted To Gain That Which Those Who Possess It Are Ready To Throw Away.

If A Man Is In Doubt Whether It Would Be Better For Him To Expose Himself To Martyrdom Or Not, He Should Not Do It. He Must Be Convinced That He Has A Delegation From Heaven.

Paradise Lost Is A Book That, Once Put Down, Is Very Hard To Pick Up Again.

To Do Something Is In Every Man's Power.

Philips, Whose Touch Harmonious Could Remove The Pangs Of Guilty Power And Hapless Love! Rest Here, Distress'd By Poverty No More; Here Find That Calm Thou Gav'st So Oft Before; Sleep Undisturb'd Within This Peaceful Shrine, Till Angels Wake Thee With A Note Like Thine!

That What Cannot Be Repaired Is Not To Be Regretted.

A Man May Be So Much Of Everything That He Is Nothing Of Anything.

He Who Would Bring Home The Wealth Of The Indies Must Carry The Wealth Of The Indies With Him.

To Have The Management Of The Mind Is A Great Art, And It May Be Attained In A Considerable Degree By Experience And Habitual Exercise.

These Are The Men Who, Without Virtue, Labour, Or Hazard, Are Growing Rich, As Their Country Is Impoverished; They Rejoice, When Obstinacy Or Ambition Adds Another Year To Slaughter And Devastation; And Laugh, From Their Desks, At Bravery And Science, While They Are Adding Figure To Figure, And Cipher To Cipher, Hoping For A New Contract From A New Armament, And Computing The Profits Of A Siege Or Tempest.

Friendship, Like Love, Is Destroyed By Long Absence, Though It May Be Increased By Short Intermissions.

Each Change Of Many-colour'd Life He Drew, Exhausted Worlds, And Then Imagin'd New.

What Provokes Your Risibility, Sir? Have I Said Anything That You Understand? Then I Ask Pardon Of The Rest Of The Company.

Sir, There Is No End Of Negative Criticism.

Negative Criticism

I Have Always Suspected That The Reading Is Right, Which Requires Many Words To Prove It Wrong; And The Emendation Wrong, That Cannot Without So Much Labour Appear To He Right.

Actions Are Visible, Though Motives Are Secret.

They Whose Activity Of Imagination Is Often Shifting The Scenes Of Expectation, Are Frequently Subject To Such Sallies Of Caprice As Make All Their Actions Fortuitous, Destroy The Value Of Their Friendship, Obstruct The Efficacy Of Their Virtues, And Set Them Below The Meanest Of Those Who Persist In Their Resolutions, Execute What They Design, And Perform What They Have Promised.

Integrity Without Knowledge Is Weak And Useless, And Knowledge Without Integrity Is Dangerous And Dreadful.

We Seldom Require More To The Happiness Of The Present Hour Than To Surpass Him That Stands Next Before Us.

Many Need No Other Provocation To Enmity Than That They Find Themselves Excelled.

Love Has No Great Influences Upon The Sum Of Life.

The Worst Evils Are Those That Never Arrive.

Those Who Attain Any Excellence, Commonly Spend Life In One Pursuit; For Excellence Is Not Often Gained Upon Easier Terms.

I Am Sorry I Have Not Learnt To Play At Cards. It Is Very Useful In Life: It Generates Kindness, And Consolidates Society.

All Unnecessary Vows Are Folly, Because They Suppose A Prescience Of The Future, Which Has Not Been Given Us.

No, Sir, You Will Have Much More Influence By Giving Or Lending Money Where It Is Wanted, Than By Hospitality.

The Applause Of A Single Human Being Is Of Great Consequence.

The Common People Do Not Accurately Adapt Their Thoughts To Objects; Nor, Secondly, Do They Accurately Adapt Their Words To Their Thoughts; They Do Not Mean To Lie; But, Taking No Pains To Be Exact, They Give You Very False Accounts. A Great Part Of Their Language Is Proverbial; If Anything Rocks At All, They Say It Rocks Like A Cradle; And In This Way They Go On.

The Round Of A Passionate Man's Life Is In Contracting Debts In His Passion, Which His Virtue Obliges Him To Pay. He Spends His Time In Outrage And Acknowledgment, Injury And Reparation.

Nothing Has So Exposed Men Of Learning To Contempt And Ridicule As Their Ignorance Of Things Which Are Known To All But Themselves. Those Who Have Been Taught To Consider The Institutions Of The Schools As Giving The Last Perfection To Human Abilities Are Surprised To See Men Wrinkled With Study, Yet Wanting To Be Instructed In The Minute Circumstances Of Propriety, Or The Necessary Form Of Daily Transaction; And Quickly Shake Off Their Reverence For Modes Of Education Which They Find To Produce No Ability Above The Rest Of Mankind.

To A People Warlike And Indigent, An Incursion Into A Rich Country Is Never Hurtful.

In The Condition Of Men, It Frequently Happens That Grief And Anxiety Lie Hid Under The Golden Robes Of Prosperity; And The Gloom Of Calamity Is Cheered By Secret Radiations Of Hope And Comfort; As In The Works Of Nature, The Bog Is Sometimes Covered With Flowers, And The Mine Concealed In The Barren Crags.

We Are Inclined To Believe Those Whom We Do Not Know Because They Have Never Deceived Us.

Of All Noises, I Think Music Is The Least Disagreeable.

Celestial Wisdom Calms The Mind.

Social Sorrow Loses Half Its Pain.

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.

The Care Of The Critic Should Be To Distinguish Error From Inability, Faults Of Inexperience From Defects Of Nature.

Catch, Then, Oh! Catch The Transient Hour, Improve Each Moment As It Flies; Life's A Short Summer-man A Flower; He Dies-alas! How Soon He Dies!

Hope Is Itself A Species Of Happiness.

More Is Learned In A Public Than In A Private School, From Emulation. There Is The Collision Of Mind With Mind, Or The Radiation Of Many Minds Pointing To One Center.

No Man Can Taste The Fruits Of Autumn While He Is Delighting His Scent With The Flowers Of Spring.

Wine Gives A Man Nothing... It Only Puts In Motion What Had Been Locked Up In Frost.

The Man Who Feels Himself Ignorant Should, At Least, Be Modest.

Time Quickly Puts An End To Artificial And Accidental Fame

The Prospect Of Penury In Age Is So Gloomy And Terrifying That Every Man Who Looks Before Him Must Resolve To Avoid It; And It Must Be Avoided Generally By The Science Of Sparing.

The Present Is Never A Happy State To Any Human Being.

Exercise Is Labor Without Weariness.

Consider What Importance To Society The Chastity Of Women Is. Upon That All The Property In The World Depends. We Hang A Thief For Stealing A Sheep; But The Unchastity Of A Woman Transfers Sheep And Farm And All From The Right Owner.

If, Sir, Men Were All Virtuous, I Should With Great Alacrity Teach Them All To Fly. But What Would Be The Security Of The Good If The Bad Could At Pleasure Invade Them From The Sky? Against An Army Sailing Through The Clouds Neither Wall, Nor Mountains, Nor Seas Could Afford Any Security.

Though The Discoveries Or Acquisitions Of Man Are Not Always Adequate To The Expectations Of His Pride, They Are At Least Sufficient To Animate His Industry.

Surely, It Is Much Easier To Respect A Man Who Has Always Had Respect, Than To Respect A Man Who We Know Was Last Year No Better Than Ourselves, And Will Be No Better Next Year.

With What Hope Can We Endeavor To Persuade The Ladies That The Time Spent At The Toilet Is Lost In Vanity.

The Really Happy Woman Is The One Who Can Enjoy The Scenery When She Has To Take A Detour. Happiness Is Not A State To Arrive At, But Rather A Manner Of Traveling.

Men Have Solicitude About Fame; And The Greater Share They Have Of It, The More Afraid They Are Of Losing It.

No Man But A Blockhead Ever Wrote Except For Money.

What I Gained By Being In France Was Learning To Be Better Satisfied With My Own Country.

Deign On The Passing World To Turn Thine Eyes, And Pause A While From Learning To Be Wise. There Mark What Ills The Scholar's Life Assail,- Toil, Envy, Want, The Patron, And The Jail.

Vanity Is So Frequently The Apparent Motive Of Advice That We, For The Most Part, Summon Our Powers To Oppose It Without Very Accurate Inquiry Whether It Is Right. It Is Sufficient That Another Is Growing Great In His Own Eyes At Our Expense, And Assumes Authority Over Us Without Our Permission; For Many Would Contentedly Suffer The Consequences Of Their Own Mistakes, Rather Than The Insolence Of Him Who Triumphs As Their Deliverer.

In All Evils Which Admit A Remedy, Impatience Is To Be Avoided, Because It Wastes That Time And Attention In Complaints, That, If Properly Applied Might Remove The Cause.

Truth Has No Gradations; Nothing Which Admits Of Increase Can Be So Much What It Is, As Truth Is Truth. There May Be A Strange Thing, And A Thing More Strange. But If A Proposition Be True, There Can Be None More True.

We Are Long Before We Are Convinced That Happiness Is Never To Be Found, And Each Believes It Possessed By Others, To Keep Alive The Hope Of Obtaining It For Himself.

There Is A Frightful Interval Between The Seed And The Timber.

Men Know That Women Are An Overmatch For Them, And Therefore They Choose The Weakest Or The Most Ignorant. If They Did Not Think So, They Never Could Be Afraid Of Women Knowing As Much As Themselves.

Let Us Take A Patriot, Where We Can Meet Him; And, That We May Not Flatter Ourselves By False Appearances, Distinguish Those Marks Which Are Certain, From Those Which May Deceive; For A Man May Have The External Appearance Of A Patriot, Without The Constituent Qualities; As False Coins Have Often Lustre, Though They Want Weight.

Criticism, As It Was First Instituted By Aristotle, Was Meant As A Standard Of Judging Well.

Hope Is An Amusement Rather Than A Good, And Adapted To None But Very Tranquil Minds.

We Love To Expect, And When Expectation Is Either Disappointed Or Gratified, We Want To Be Again Expecting.

To A Poet Nothing Can Be Useless.

Those Who Are In The Power Of Evil Habits Must Conquer Them As They Can; And Conquered They Must Be, Or Neither Wisdom Nor Happiness Can Be Attained: But Those Who Are Not Yet Subject To Their Influence May, By Timely Caution, Preserve Their Freedom.

Curiosity Is One Of The Most Permanent And Certain Characteristics Of A Vigorous Intellect.

Bachelors Have Consciences, Married Men Have Wives.

If I Had No Duties, And No Reference To Futurity, I Would Spend My Life In Driving Briskly In A Post-chaise With A Pretty Woman.

Men Hate More Steadily Than They Love.

There Is ... Scarcely Any Species Of Writing Of Which We Can Tell What Is Its Essence, And What Are Its Constituents; Every New Genius Produces Some Innovation, Which, When Invented And Approved, Subverts The Rules Which The Practice Of Foregoing Authors Had Established.

No Man Was More Foolish When He Had Not A Pen In His Hand, Or More Wise When He Had

A Lexicographer, A Writer Of Dictionaries, A Harmless Drudge.

Ease, A Neutral State Between Pain And Pleasure ... If It Is Not Rising Into Pleasure Will Be Falling Towards Pain.

We Suffer Equal Pain From The Pertinacious Adhesion Of Unwelcome Images, As From The Evanescence Of Those Which Are Pleasing And Useful.

No One Ever Became Great By Imitation.

Life Will Not Bear Refinement. You Must Do As Other People Do.

The Superiority Of Some Men Is Merely Local. They Are Great Because Their Associates Are Little.

Revenge Is An Act Of Passion; Vengeance Of Justice. Injuries Are Revenged; Crimes Are Avenged.

Cucumber Should Be Well Sliced, Dressed With Pepper And Vinegar, And Then Thrown Out.

Philosophers There Are Who Try To Make Themselves Believe That This Life Is Happy; But They Believe It Only While They Are Saying It, And Never Yet Produced Conviction In A Single Mind.

Whatever Enlarges Hope Will Also Exalt Courage.

Misery And Shame Are Nearly Allied.

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.

Wine Makes A Man Better Pleased With Himself. I Do Not Say That It Makes Him More Pleasing To Others.

Nothing Is More Common Than To Find Men, Whose Works Are Now Totally Neglected, Mentioned With Praises By Their Contemporaries As The Oracles Of Their Age, And The Legislators Of Science.

I Look Upon This As I Did Upon The Dictionary: It Is All Work, And My Inducement To It Is Not Love Or Desire Of Fame, But The Want Of Money, Which Is The Only Motive To Writing That I Know Of.

Every Other Author May Aspire To Praise; The Lexicographer Can Only Hope To Escape Reproach.

No Member Of A Society Has A Right To Teach Any Doctrine Contrary To What The Society Holds To Be True.

Sir, I Have Found You An Argument; But I Am Not Obliged To Find You An Understanding.

Yet It Is Necessary To Hope, Though Hope Should Always Be Deluded, For Hope Itself Is Happiness, And Its Frustrations, However Frequent, Are Yet Less Dreadful Than Its Extinction.

He That Will Enjoy The Brightness Of Sunshine, Must Quit The Coolness Of The Shade.

A Man With A Good Coat Upon His Back Meets With A Better Reception Than He Who Has A Bad One.

Do Not Discourage Your Children From Hoarding, If They Have A Taste To It; Whoever Lays Up His Penny Rather Than Part With It For A Cake, At Least Is Not The Slave Of Gross Appetite; And Shows Besides A Preference Always To Be Esteemed, Of The Future To The Present Moment.

I Have Already Enjoyed Too Much; Give Me Something To Desire.

Forgetfulness Is Necessary To Remembrance. Ideas Are Retained By Renovation Of That Impression Which Time Is Always Wearing Away,and Which New Images Are Striving To Obliterate. If Useless Thoughts Could Be Expelled From The Mind, All The Valuable Parts Of Our Knowledge Would More Frequently Recur, And Every Recurrence Would Reinstate Them In Their Former Place.

There May Be Other Reasons For A Man's Not Speaking In Publick Than Want Of Resolution: He May Have Nothing To Say.

It Is True That Of Far The Greater Part Of Things, We Must Content Ourselves With Such Knowledge As Description May Exhibit, Or Analogy Supply; But It Is True Likewise, That These Ideas Are Always Incomplete, And That At Least, Till We Have Compared Them With Realities, We Do Not Know Them To Be Just. As We See More, We Become Possessed Of More Certainties, And Consequently Gain More Principles Of Reasoning, And Found A Wider Base Of Analogy.

He Who Is Extravagant Will Quickly Become Poor; And Poverty Will Enforce Dependence, And Invite Corruption.

His Virtues Walked Their Narrow Round, Nor Made A Pause, Nor Left A Void; And Sure The Eternal Master Found The Single Talent Well Employed.

No Man Will Be Found In Whose Mind Airy Notions Do Not Sometimes Tyrannize, And Force Him To Hope Or Fear Beyond The Limits Of Sober Probability.

Remember That Nothing Will Supply The Want Of Prudence, And That Negligence And Irregularity Long Continued Will Make Knowledge Useless, Wit Ridiculous, And Genius Contemptible.

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.

For Gold The Hireling Judge Distorts The Laws.

Foppery Is Never Cured; It Is The Bad Stamina Of The Mind, Which, Like Those Of The Body, Are Never Rectified; Once A Coxcomb Always A Coxcomb.

A Woman Of Fortune Being Used The Handling Of Money, Spends It Judiciously; But A Woman Who Gets The Command Of Money For The First Time Upon Her Marriage, Has Such A Gust In Spending It, That She Throws It Away With Great Profusion.

The Love Of Life Is Necessary To The Vigorous Prosecution Of Any Undertaking

Words Are Daughters Of Earth But Ideas Are Sons Of Heaven.

Prepare For Death, If Here At Night You Roam, And Sign Your Will Before You Sup From Home.

The Love Of Retirement Has In All Ages Adhered Closely To Those Minds Which Have Been Most Enlarged By Knowledge, Or Elevated By Genius. Those Who Enjoyed Everything Generally Supposed To Confer Happiness Have Been Forced To Seek It In The Shades Of Privacy.

He That Shall Peruse The Political Pamphlets Of Any Past Reign Will Wonder Why They Were So Eagerly Read, Or So Loudly Praised.

Ah! Sir, A Boy's Being Flogged Is Not So Severe As A Man's Having The Hiss Of The World Against Him.

You Cannot Give Me An Instance Of Any Man Who Is Permitted To Lay Out His Own Time Contriving Not To Have Tedious Hours.

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