Background Image

...

To Write Is, Indeed, No Unpleasing Employment, When One Sentiment Readily Produces Another, And Both Ideas And Expressions Present Themselves At The First Summons; But Such Happiness, The Greatest Genius Does Not Always Obtain; And Common Writers Know It Only To Such A Degree, As To Credit Its Possibility. Composition Is, For The Most Part, An Effort Of Slow Diligence And Steady Perseverance, To Which The Mind Is Dragged By Necessity Or Resolution, And From Which The Attention Is Every Moment Starting To More Delightful Amusements.

-Samuel Johnson

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

To Write Is, Indeed,

Samuel Johnson

...

To Write Is, Indeed, No Unpleasing Employment, When One Sentiment Readily Produces Another, And Both Ideas And Expressions Present Themselves At The First Summons; But Such Happiness, The Greatest Genius Does Not Always Obtain; And Common Writers Know It Only To Such A Degree, As To Credit Its Possibility. Composition Is, For The Most Part, An Effort Of Slow Diligence And Steady Perseverance, To Which The Mind Is Dragged By Necessity Or Resolution, And From Which The Attention Is Every Moment Starting To More Delightful Amusements.

Views: 5

Topic

More From Samuel Johnson

It Is Our First Duty To Serve Society, And After We Have Done That, We May Attend Wholly To The Salvation Of Our Own Souls.

The Greatest Human Virtue Bears No Proportion To Human Vanity. We Always Think Ourselves Better Than We Are, And Are Generally Desirous That Others Should Think Us Still Better Than We Think Ourselves. To Praise Us For Actions Or Dispositions Which Deserve Praise Is Not To Confer A Benefit, But To Pay A Tribute. We Have Always Pretensions To Fame Which, In Our Own Hearts, We Know To Be Disputable, And Which We Are Desirous To Strengthen By A New Suffrage; We Have Always Hopes Which We Suspect To Be Fallacious, And Of Which We Eagerly Snatch At Every Confirmation.

To Build Is To Be Robbed.

Power Is Not Sufficient Evidence Of Truth.

A Fishing Rod Is A Stick With A Hook At One End And A Fool At The Other.

All Envy Is Proportionate To Desire.

The Habit Of Looking On The Bright Side Of Every Event Is Worth More Than A Thousand Pounds A Year.

Positive Thinking

If One Was To Think Constantly Of Death, The Business Of Life Would Stand Still

Wickedness Is Always Easier Than Virtue; For It Takes The Short Cut To Everything.

No Man But A Blockhead Ever Wrote Except For Money.

Guilt Has Always Its Horrors And Solicitudes; And, To Make It Yet More Shameful And Detestable, It Is Doomed Often To Stand In Awe Of Those To Whom Nothing Could Give Influence Or Weight But Their Power Of Betraying.

The Greatest Part Of A Writer's Time Is Spent In Reading In Order To Write. A Man Will Turn Over Half A Library To Make A Book.

Fine Clothes Are Good Only As They Supply The Want Of Other Means Of Procuring Respect.

Deceit And Falsehood, Whatever Conveniences They May For A Time Promise Or Produce, Are, In The Sum Of Life, Obstacles To Happiness. Those Who Profit By The Cheat Distrust The Deceiver; And The Act By Which Kindness Was Sought Puts An End To Confidence.

The Difference Between Coarse And Refined Abuse Is The Difference Between Being Bruised By A Club And Wounded By A Poisoned Arrow.

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.

The Booksellers Are Generous Liberal-minded Men.

He Said That Few People Had Intellectual Resources Sufficient To Forgo The Pleasures Of Wine. They Could Not Otherwise Contrive How To Fill The Interval Between Dinner And Supper.

I Know Not Why Any One But A School Boy In His Declamation Would Whine Over The Commonwealth Of Rome, Which Grew Great Only By The Misery Of The Rest Of Mankind. The Romans, Like Others, As Soon As They Were Rich, Grew Corrupt; And In Their Corruption Sold The Lives And Freedoms Of Themselves And Of One Another.

It Is, However, Not Necessary, That A Man Should Forbear To Write, Till He Has Discovered Some Truth Unknown Before; He May Be Sufficiently Useful, By Only Diversifying The Surface Of Knowledge, And Luring The Mind By A New Appearance To A Second View Of Those Beauties Which It Had Passed Over Inattentively Before.

It Is Not Possible To Be Regarded With Tenderness, Except By A Few. That Merit Which Gives Greatness And Renown Diffuses Its Influence To A Wide Compass, But Acts Weakly On Every Single Breast; It Is Placed At A Distance From Common Spectators, And Shines Like One Of The Remote Stars, Of Which The Light Reaches Us, But Not The Heat.

All Truth Is Valuable, And Satirical Criticism May Be Considered As Useful When It Rectifies Error And Improves Judgment; He That Refines The Public Taste Is A Public Benefactor.

Apologies Are Seldom Of Any Use.

Every Old Man Complains Of The Growing Depravity Of The World, Of The Petulance And Insolence Of The Rising Generation.

But Grant, The Virtues Of A Temp'rate Prime Bless With An Age Exempt From Scorn Or Crime; An Age That Melts With Unperceived Decay, And Glides In Modest Innocence Away

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

The Gratification Of Curiosity Rather Frees Us From Uneasiness Than Confers Pleasure; We Are More Pained By Ignorance Than Delighted By Instruction. Curiosity Is The Thirst Of The Soul; It Inflames And Torments Us, And Makes Us Taste Every Thing With Joy, However Otherwise Insipid, By Which It May Be Quenched.

There Is A Certain Degree Of Temptation Which Will Overcome Any Virtue. Now, In So Far As You Approach Temptation To A Man, You Do Him An Injury; And, If He Is Overcome, You Share His Guilt.

I Do Not Know, Sir, That The Fellow Is An Infidel; But If He Be An Infidel, He Is An Infidel As A Dog Is An Infidel; That Is To Say, He Has Never Thought Upon The Subject.

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.

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

When A Man Is Tired Of London, He Is Tired Of Life; For There Is In London All That Life Can Afford.

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.

Affectation Is To Be Always Distinguished From Hypocrisy As Being The Art Of Counterfeiting Those Qualities, Which We Might With Innocence And Safety, Be Known To Want. Hypocrisy Is The Necessary Burden Of Villainy; Affectation Part Of The Chosen Trappings Of Folly.

Bravery Has No Place Where It Can Avail Nothing.

The Use Of Travelling Is To Regulate Imagination By Reality, And Instead Of Thinking How Things May Be, To See Them As They Are.

Man Alone Is Born Crying, Lives Complaining, And Dies Disappointed.

No Money Is Better Spent Than What Is Laid Out For Domestic Satisfaction.

Patience And Submission Are Very Carefully To Be Distinguished From Cowardice And Indolence. We Are Not To Repine, But We May Lawfully Struggle; For The Calamities Of Life, Like The Necessities Of Nature, Are Calls To Labor And Diligence.

See Nations Slowly Wise, And Meanly Just, To Buried Merit Raise The Tardy Bust.

That Man Is Never Happy For The Present Is So True, That All His Relief From Unhappiness Is Only Forgetting Himself For A Little While. Life Is A Progress From Want To Want, Not From Enjoyment To Enjoyment.

[w]ith An Unquiet Mind, Neither Exercise, Nor Diet, Nor Physick Can Be Of Much Use.

Read The Book You Do Honestly Feel A Wish And Curiosity To Read.

Every Man Has Something To Do Which He Neglects, Every Man Has Faults To Conquer Which He Delays To Combat.

The Animadversions Of Critics Are Commonly Such As May Easily Provoke The Sedatest Writer To Some Quickness Of Resentment And Asperity Of Reply.

Of Riches It Is Not Necessary To Write The Praise. Let It, However, Be Remembered That He Who Has Money To Spare Has It Always In His Power To Benefit Others, And Of Such Power A Good Man Must Always Be Desirous.

You Teach Your Daughters The Diameters Of The Planets And Wonder When You Are Done That They Do Not Delight In Your Company.

Such Is The Pleasure Of Projecting That Many Content Themselves With A Succession Of Visionary Schemes, And Wear Out Their Allotted Time In The Calm Amusement Of Contriving What They Never Attempt Or Hope To Execute.

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

Falsehood Always Endeavors To Copy The Mien And Attitude Of Truth.

Of The Blessings Set Before You Make Your Choice, And Be Content.

He Who Would Have Fine Guests, Let Him Have A Fine Wife.

Bias And Impartiality Is In The Eye Of The Beholder.

Wasting A Fortune Is Evaporation By A Thousand Imperceptible Means.

Great Abilities Are Not Requisite For An Historian; For In Historical Composition, All The Greatest Powers Of The Human Mind Are Quiescent. He Has Facts Ready To His Hand; So There Is No Exercise Of Invention. Imagination Is Not Required In Any Degree; Only About As Much As Is Used In The Lowest Kinds Of Poetry. Some Penetration, Accuracy, And Coloring, Will Fit A Man For The Task, If He Can Give The Application Which Is Necessary.

The Hopes Of Zeal Are Not Wholly Groundless.

Every Man, However Hopeless His Pretensions May Appear, Has Some Project By Which He Hopes To Rise To Reputation; Some Art By Which He Imagines That The Attention Of The World Will Be Attracted; Some Quality, Good Or Bad, Which Discriminates Him From The Common Herd Of Mortals, And By Which Others May Be Persuaded To Love, Or Compelled To Fear Him.

Life Cannot Subsist In Society But By Reciprocal Concessions.

Age Is Rarely Despised But When It Is, Contemptible.

No Man Is A Hypocrite In His Pleasures.

Every Man Who Attacks My Belief, Diminishes In Some Degree My Confidence In It, And Therefore Makes Me Uneasy; And I Am Angry With Him Who Makes Me Uneasy.

Every Man Is Rich Or Poor According To The Proportion Between His Desires And His Enjoyments.

He That Resigns His Peace To Little Casualties, And Suffers The Course Of His Life To Be Interrupted For Fortuitous Inadvertencies Or Offences, Delivers Up Himself To The Direction Of The Wind, And Loses All That Constancy And Equanimity Which Constitutes The Chief Praise Of A Wise Man.

Fears Of The Brave And Follies Of The Wise.

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

A Man Who Both Spends And Saves Money Is The Happiest Man, Because He Has Both Enjoyments.

No Cause More Frequently Produces Bashfulness Than Too High An Opinion Of Our Own Importance. He That Imagines An Assembly Filled With His Merit, Panting With Expectation, And Hushed With Attention, Easily Terrifies Himself With The Dread Of Disappointing Them, And Strains His Imagination In Pursuit Of Something That May Vindicate The Veracity Of Fame, And Show That His Reputation Was Not Gained By Chance.

Whoever Rises Above Those Who Once Pleased Themselves With Equality, Will Have Many Malevolent Gazers At His Eminence.

It Was Said Of Euripides, That Every Verse Was A Precept; And It May Be Said Of Shakespeare, That From His Works May Be Collected A System Of Civil And Economical Prudence.

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

The Rules That I Shall Propose Concerning Secrecy, And From Which I Think It Not Safe To Deviate Without Long And Exact Deliberation, Are, Never To Solicit The Knowledge Of A Secret,--not Willingly, Nor Without Many Limitations, To Accept Such Confidence When It Is Offered; When A Secret Is Once Admitted, To Consider The Trust As Of A Very High Nature, Important As Society And Sacred As Truth, And Therefore Not To Be Violated For Any Incidental Convenience, Or Slight Appearance Of Contrary Fitness.

Reproof Should Not Exhaust Its Power Upon Petty Failings.

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

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

This Is My History; Like All Other Histories, A Narrative Of Misery.

A Scotchman Must Be A Very Sturdy Moralist Who Does Not Love Scotland Better Than Truth.

There Are Some Works Which The Authors Must Consign Unpublished To Posterity, However Uncertain Be The Event, However Hopeless Be The Trust. He That Writes The History Of His Own Times, If He Adhere Steadily To Truth, Will Write That Which His Own Times Will Not Easily Endure. He Must Be Content To Reposite His Book Till All Private Passions Shall Cease, And Love And Hatred Give Way To Curiosity.

Poetry Is The Art Of Uniting Pleasure With Truth.

I Wish You Would Add An Index Rerum, That When The Reader Recollects Any Incident He May Easily Find It.

From All Our Observations We May Collect With Certainty, That Misery Is The Lot Of Man, But Cannot Discover In What Particular Condition It Will Find Most Alleviations.

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.

The Blaze Of Reputation Cannot Be Blown Out, But It Often Dies In The Socket; A Very Few Names May Be Considered As Perpetual Lamps That Shine Unconsumed.

Men Who Have Flattered Themselves Into This Opinion Of Their Own Abilities, Look Down On All Who Waste Their Lives Over Books, As A Race Of Inferior Beings Condemned By Nature To Perpetual Pupilage, And Fruitlessly Endeavouring To Remedy Their Barrenness By Incessant Cultivation, Or Succour Their Feebleness By Subsidiary Strength. They Presume That None Would Be More Industrious Than They, If They Were Not More Sensible Of Deficiences; And Readily Conclude, That He Who Places No Confidence In His Own Powers Owes His Modesty Only To His Weakness.

Life Is Surely Given Us For Higher Purposes Than To Gather What Our Ancestors Have Wisely Thrown Away, And To Learn What Is Of No Value But Because It Has Been Forgotten.

Ignorance Is Mere Privation By Which Nothing Can Be Produced: It Is A Vacuity In Which The Soul Sits Motionless And Torpid For Want Of Attraction: And, Without Knowing Why, We Always Rejoice When We Learn, And Grieve When We Forget.

Distance Has The Same Effect On The Mind As On The Eye.

We May Have Uneasy Feelings For Seeing A Creature In Distress Without Pity; For We Have Not Pity Unless We Wish To Relieve Them.

While An Author Is Yet Living, We Estimate His Powers By His Worst Performance; And When He Is Dead, We Rate Him By His Best.

Truth Allows No Choice.

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

Mankind Have A Great Aversion To Intellectual Labor; But Even Supposing Knowledge To Be Easily Attainable, More People Would Be Content To Be Ignorant Than Would Take Even A Little Trouble To Acquire It.

To Be Prejudiced Is Always To Be Weak

No One Is Much Pleased With A Companion Who Does Not Increase, In Some Respect, Their Fondness For Themselves.

There Are, Indeed, Few Kinds Of Composition From Which An Author, However Learned Or Ingenious, Can Hope A Long Continuance Of Fame.

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

Since Life Itself Is Uncertain, Nothing Which Has Life For Its Basis Can Boast Much Stability.

Misery Is Caused For The Most Part, Not By A Heavy Crush Of Disaster, But By The Corrosion Of Less Visible Evils, Which Canker Enjoyment, And Undermine Security. The Visit Of An Invader Is Necessarily Rare, But Domestic Animosities Allow No Cessation.

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.

Luxury, So Far As It Reaches The People, Will Do Good To The Race Of People; It Will Strengthen And Multiply Them. Sir, No Nation Was Ever Hurt By Luxury; For, As I Said Before; It Can Reach But A Very Few.

Preserve Me From Unseasonable And Immoderate Sleep.

No Man Tells His Opinion So Freely As When He Imagines It Received With Implicit Veneration.

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.

When A Language Begins To Teem With Books, It Is Tending To Refinement; As Those Who Undertake To Teach Others Must Have Undergone Some Labour In Improving Themselves, They Set A Proportionate Value On Their Own Thoughts, And Wish To Enforce Them By Efficacious Expressions; Speech Becomes Embodied And Permanent; Different Modes And Phrases Are Compared, And The Best Obtains An Establishment. By Degrees One Age Improves Upon Another.

No Evil Is Insupportable But That Which Is Accompanied With Consciousness Of Wrong.

Advice Is Seldom Welcome. Those Who Need It Most, Like It Least.

The Triumph Of Hope Over Experience.

But To The Particular Species Of Excellence Men Are Directed, Not By An Ascendant Planet Or Predominating Humour, But By The First Book Which They Read, Some Early Conversation Which They Heard, Or Some Accident Which Excited Ardour And Emulation.

Adversity Leads Us To Think Properly Of Our State, And So Is Most Beneficial To Us.

Politeness Is Fictitious Benevolence. Depend Upon It, The Want Of It Never Fails To Produce Something Disagreeable To One Or Other.

Never Believe Extraordinary Characters Which You Hear Of People. Depend Upon It, They Are Exaggerated. You Do Not See One Man Shoot A Great Deal Higher Than Another.

The Certainty That Life Cannot Be Long, And The Probability That It Will Be Much Shorter Than Nature Allows, Ought To Awaken Every Man To The Active Prosecution Of Whatever He Is Desirous To Perform. It Is True, That No Diligence Can Ascertain Success; Death May Intercept The Swiftest Career; But He Who Is Cut Off In The Execution Of An Honest Undertaking Has At Least The Honour Of Falling In His Rank, And Has Fought The Battle, Though He Missed The Victory.

Procrastination

When People Find A Man Of The Most Distinguished Abilities As A Writer Their Inferior While He Is With Them, It Must Be Highly Gratifying To Them.

The Mischief Of Flattery Is, Not That It Persuades Any Man That He Is What He Is Not, But That It Suppresses The Influence Of Honest Ambition, By Raising An Opinion That Honour May Be Gained Without The Toil Of Merit.

Invention Is Almost The Only Literary Labour Which Blindness Cannot Obstruct.

I Have Often Thought That There Has Rarely Passed A Life Of Which A Judicious And Faithful Narrative Would Not Be Useful; For Not Only Every Man Has, In The Mighty Mass Of The World, Great Numbers In The Same Condition With Himself, To Whom His Mistakes And Miscarriages, Escapes And Expedients, Would Be Of Immediate And Apparent Use; But There Is Such A Uniformity In The State Of Man, Considered Apart From Adventitious And Separable Decorations And Disguises, That There Is Scarce Any Possibility Of Good Or Ill But Is Common To Human Kind.

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

Nothing Is Little To Him That Feels It With Great Sensibility.

Much Mischief Is Done In The World With Very Little Interest Or Design.

He Who Writes Much Will Not Easily Escape A Manner, Such A Recurrence Of Particular Modes As May Be Easily Noted.

Advertisements Are Now So Numerous That They Are Very Negligently Perused, And It Is Therefore Become Necessary To Gain Attention By Magnificence Of Promises, And By Eloquence Sometimes Sublime And Sometimes Pathetic.

The Liberty Of Using Harmless Pleasure Will Not Be Disputed; But It Is Still To Be Examined What Pleasures Are Harmless.

Small Debts Are Like Small Shot; They Are Rattling On Every Side, And Can Scarcely Be Escaped Without A Wound: Great Debts Are Like Cannon; Of Loud Noise, But Little Danger.

Fear Is Implanted In Us As A Preservative From Evil But Its Duty, Like That Of Other Passions, Is Not To Overbear Reason, But To Assist It. It Should Not Be Suffered To Tyrannize In The Imagination, To Raise Phantoms Of Horror, Or To Beset Life With Supernumerary Distresses.

Example Is Always More Efficacious Than Precept.

Our Aspirations Are Our Possibilities.

The End Of Writing Is To Instruct; The End Of Poetry Is To Instruct By Pleasing.

Men Have Been Wise In Many Different Modes; But They Have Always Laughed The Same Way.

Tomorrow Is An Old Deceiver, And His Cheat Never Grows Stale.

Even Those To Whom Providence Has Allotted Greater Strength Of Understanding, Can Expect Only To Improve A Single Science. In Every Other Part Of Learning, They Must Be Content To Follow Opinions, Which They Are Not Able To Examine; And, Even In That Which They Claim As Peculiarly Their Own, Can Seldom Add More Than Some Small Particle Of Knowledge, To The Hereditary Stock Devolved To Them From Ancient Times, The Collective Labour Of A Thousand Intellects.

The Chief Art Of Learning, As Locke Has Observed, Is To Attempt But Little At A Time. The Widest Excursions Of The Mind Are Made By Short Flights Frequently Repeated; The Most Lofty Fabrics Of Science Are Formed By The Continued Accumulation Of Single Propositions.

Those Whose Abilities Or Knowledge Incline Them Most To Deviate From The General Round Of Life Are Recalled From Eccentricity By The Laws Of Their Existence.

Every Man Is Of Importance To Himself, And, Therefore, In His Own Opinion, To Others; And, Supposing The World Already Acquainted With His Pleasures And His Pains, Is Perhaps The First To Publish Injuries Or Misfortunes Which Had Never Been Known Unless Related By Himself, And At Which Those That Hear Them Will Only Laugh, For No Man Sympathises With The Sorrows Of Vanity.

It Is Justly Considered As The Greatest Excellency Of Art To Imitate Nature; But It Is Necessary To Distinguish Those Parts Of Nature Which Are Most Proper For Imitation: Greater Care Is Still Required In Representing Life, Which Is So Often Discoloured By Passion Or Deformed By Wickedness. If The World Be Promiscuously Described, I Cannot See Of What Use It Can Be To Read The Account; Or Why It May Not Be As Safe To Turn The Eye Immediately Upon Mankind, As Upon A Mirror Which Shows All That Presents Itself Without Discrimination.

Words Too Familiar, Or Too Remote, Defeat The Purpose Of A Poet. From Those Sounds Which We Hear On Small Or On Coarse Occasions, We Do Not Easily Receive Strong Impressions, Or Delightful Images; And Words To Which We Are Nearly Strangers, Whenever They Occur, Draw That Attention On Themselves Which They Should Transmit To Other Things.

Some Have Little Power To Do Good, And Have Likewise Little Strength To Resist Evil.

Applause Abates Diligence.

We Are Easily Shocked By Crimes Which Appear At Once In Their Full Magnitude, But The Gradual Growth Of Our Own Wickedness, Endeared By Interest, And Palliated By All The Artifices Of Self-deceit, Gives Us Time To Form Distinctions In Our Own Favor

All Industry Must Be Excited By Hope.

The Joy Of Life Is Variety; The Tenderest Love Requires To Be Rekindled By Intervals Of Absence.

Reason Will By Degrees Submit To Absurdity, As The Eye Is In Time Accommodated To Darkness.

All Censure Of A Man's Self Is Oblique Praise. It Is In Order To Show How Much He Can Spare.

All Discourse Of Which Others Cannot Partake Is Not Only An Irksome Usurpation Of The Time Devoted To Pleasure And Entertainment, But, What Never Fails To Excite Resentment, An Insolent Assertion Of Superiority, And A Triumph Over Less Enlightened Understandings. The Pedant Is, Therefore, Not Only Heard With Weariness But Malignity; And Those Who Conceive Themselves Insulted By His Knowledge Never Fail To Tell With Acrimony How Injudiciously It Was Exerted.

The Finest Landscape In The World Is Improved By A Good Inn In The Foreground.

Friendship Is Not Always The Sequel Of Obligation.

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.

To Use Two Languages Familiarly And Without Contaminating One By The Other, Is Very Difficult; And To Use More Than Two Is Hardly To Be Hoped. The Prizes Which Some Have Received For Their Multiplicity Of Languages May Be Sufficient To Excite Industry, But Can Hardly Generate Confidence.

I Would Rather Be Attacked Than Unnoticed. For The Worst Thing You Can Do To An Author Is To Be Silent As To His Works.

Want Of Tenderness Is Want Of Parts, And Is No Less A Proof Of Stupidity Than Depravity.

You Are Much Surer That You Are Doing Good When You Pay Money To Those Who Work, As The Recompense Of Their Labor, Than When You Give Money Merely In Charity.

We Consider Ourselves As Defective In Memory, Either Because We Remember Less Than We Desire, Or Less Than We Suppose Others To Remember.

It Is To Be Steadily Inculcated, That Virtue Is The Highest Proof Of Understanding, And The Only Solid Basis Of Greatness.

Political Liberty Is Only Good Insofar As It Produces Private Liberty.

Before Dinner Men Meet With Great Inequality Of Understanding; And Those Who Are Conscious Of Their Inferiority Have The Modesty Not To Talk; When They Have Drunk Wine, Every Man Feels Himself Happy, And Loses That Modesty, And Grows Impudent And Vociferous; But He Is Not Improved; He Is Only Not Sensible Of His Defects.

What Ever The Motive For The Insult, It Is Always Best To Overlook It; For Folly Doesn't Deserve Resentment, And Malice Is Punished By Neglect.

Learn That The Present Hour Alone Is Man's.

In Civilized Society We All Depend Upon Each Other, And Our Happiness Is Very Much Owing To The Good Opinion Of Mankind.

You Think I Love Flattery (says Dr. Johnson), And So I Do; But A Little Too Much Always Disgusts Me: That Fellow Richardson, On The Contrary, Could Not Be Contented To Sail Quietly Down The Stream Of Reputation, Without Longing To Taste The Froth From Every Stroke Of The Oar.

Men Become Friends By A Community Of Pleasures.

The Future Is Purchased By The Present.

Authors And Lovers Always Suffer Some Infatuation, From Which Only Absence Can Set Them Free.

Men More Frequently Require To Be Reminded Than Informed.

It Is The Just Doom Of Laziness And Gluttony To Be Inactive Without Ease And Drowsy Without Tranquility.

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.

The Usual Fortune Of Complaint Is To Excite Contempt More Than Pity.

It Is Common To Overlook What Is Near By Keeping The Eye Fixed On Something Remote.

Truth, Such As Is Necessary To The Reputation Of Life, Is Always Found Where It Is Honestly Sought.

Such Is The Constitution Of Man That Labour May Be Styled Its Own Reward; Nor Will Any External Incitements Be Requisite, If It Be Considered How Much Happiness Is Gained, And How Much Misery Escaped, By Frequent And Violent Agitation Of The Body.

Every Other Enjoyment Malice May Destroy; Every Other Panegyric Envy May Withhold; But No Human Power Can Deprive The Boaster Of His Own Encomiums.

To Write Is, Indeed, No Unpleasing Employment, When One Sentiment Readily Produces Another, And Both Ideas And Expressions Present Themselves At The First Summons; But Such Happiness, The Greatest Genius Does Not Always Obtain; And Common Writers Know It Only To Such A Degree, As To Credit Its Possibility. Composition Is, For The Most Part, An Effort Of Slow Diligence And Steady Perseverance, To Which The Mind Is Dragged By Necessity Or Resolution, And From Which The Attention Is Every Moment Starting To More Delightful Amusements.

The Mental Disease Of The Present Generation Is Impatience Of Study, Contempt Of The Great Masters Of Ancient Wisdom, And A Disposition To Rely Wholly Upon Unassisted Genius And Natural Sagacity.

The Pleasure Of Expecting Enjoyment Is Often Greater Than That Of Obtaining It, And The Completion Of Almost Every Wish Is Found A Disappointment.

Sir, I Do Not Call A Gamester A Dishonest Man; But I Call Him An Unsociable Man, An Unprofitable Man. Gaming Is A Mode Of Transferring Property Without Producing Any Intermediate Good.

Surely Nothing Is More Reproachful To A Being Endowed With Reason, Than To Resign Its Powers To The Influence Of The Air, And Live In Dependence On The Weather And The Wind, For The Only Blessings Which Nature Has Put Into Our Power, Tranquillity And Benevolence. To Look Up To The Sky For The Nutriment Of Our Bodies, Is The Condition Of Nature; To Call Upon The Sun For Peace And Gaiety, Or Deprecate The Clouds Lest Sorrow Should Overwhelm Us, Is The Cowardice Of Idleness, And The Idolatry Of Folly.

Dictionaries Are Like Watches, The Worst Is Better Than None And The Best Cannot Be Expected To Go Quite True.

In Civilized Society External Advantages Make Us More Respected. A Man With A Good Coat Upon His Back Meets With A Better Reception Than He Who Has A Bad One. You May Analyze This And Say, What Is There In It? But That Will Avail You Nothing, For It Is A Part Of A General System.

I Hate Mankind, For I Think Myself One Of The Best Of Them, And I Know How Bad I Am.

None But A Fool Worries About Things He Cannot Influence.

A Country Governed By A Despot Is An Inverted Cone.

There Are Few Ways In Which A Man Can Be More Innocently Employed Than In Getting Money.

Knowledge Is Of Two Kinds. We Know A Subject Ourselves, Or We Know Where We Can Find Information Upon It.

It Is Man's Own Fault, It Is From Want Of Use, If His Mind Grows Torpid In Old Age.

No Mind Is Much Employed Upon The Present; Recollection And Anticipation Fill Up Almost All Our Moments.

The Mind Is Never Satisfied With The Objects Immediately Before It, But Is Always Breaking Away From The Present Moment, And Losing Itself In Schemes Of Future Felicity... The Natural Flights Of The Human Mind Are Not From Pleasure To Pleasure, But From Hope To Hope.

How Small Of All That Human Hearts Endure/that Part Which Laws Or Kings Can Cause Or Cure.

Sorrow Is Properly That State Of The Mind In Which Our Desires Are Fixed Upon The Past Without Looking Forward To The Future.

Of The Present State, Whatever It Be, We Feel And Are Forced To Confess The Misery; Yet When The Same State Is Again At A Distance, Imagination Paints It As Desirable.

Silence Propagates Itself, And The Longer Talk Has Been Suspended, The More Difficult It Is To Find Anything To Say.

Every Class Of Society Has Its Cant Of Lamentation, Which Is Understood Or Regarded By None But Themselves; And Every Part Of Life Has Its Uneasiness, Which Those Who Do Not Feel Them Will Not Commiserate. An Event Which Spreads Distraction Over Half The Commercial World, Assembles The Trading Companies In Councils And Committees, And Shakes The Nerves Of A Thousand Stockjobbers, Is Read By The Landlord And The Farmer With Frigid Indifference.

The Lust Of Gold Succeeds The Rage Of Conquest; The Lust Of Gold, Unfeeling And Remorseless! The Last Corruption Of Degenerate Man.

The Truly Strong And Sound Mind Is The Mind That Can Embrace Equally Great Things And Small.

The Whole Power Of Cunning Is Privative; To Say Nothing, And To Do Nothing , Is The Utmost Of Its Reach. Yet Men, Thus Narrow By Nature And Mean By Art, Are Sometimes Able To Rise By The Miscarriages Of Bravery And The Openness Of Integrity, And, Watching Failures And Snatching Opportunities, Obtain Advantages Which Belong To Higher Characters.

It Is Not True That People Are Naturally Equal For No Two People Can Be Together For Even A Half An Hour Without One Acquiring An Evident Superiority Over The Other.

The Civilities Of The Great Are Never Thrown Away.

It Is A Hopeless Endeavour To Unite The Contrarieties Of Spring And Winter; It Is Unjust To Claim The Privileges Of Age, And Retain The Play-things Of Childhood.

The Traveler That Resolutely Follows A Rough And Winding Path Will Sooner Reach The End Of His Journey Than He That Is Always Changing His Direction, And Wastes The Hour Of Daylight In Looking For Smoother Ground And Shorter Passages.

To Set The Mind Above The Appetites Is The End Of Abstinence, Which One Of The Fathers Observes To Be Not A Virtue, But The Groundwork Of Virtue.

So Willing Is Every Man To Flatter Himself, That The Difference Between Approving Laws, And Obeying Them, Is Frequently Forgotten; He That Acknowledges The Obligations Of Morality And Pleases His Vanity With Enforcing Them To Others, Concludes Himself Zealous In The Cause Of Virtue.

This World, Where Much Is To Be Done And Little To Be Known.

A Generous And Elevated Mind Is Distinguished By Nothing More Certainly Than An Eminent Degree Of Curiosity.

It Generally Happens That Assurance Keeps An Even Pace With Ability.

Trending Author

Shirley Chisholm

Category