Samuel Johnson

In a man’s letters you know, Madam, his soul lies naked, his letters are only the mirror of his breast, whatever passes within him is shown undisguised in its natural process. Nothing is inverted, nothing distorted, you see systems in their elements, you discover actions in their motives.

All wonder is the effect of novelty on ignorance.

Disappointment, when it involves neither shame nor loss, is as good as success; for it supplies as many images to the mind, and as many topics to the tongue.

Nothing is more hopeless than a scheme of merriment.

Getting money is not all a man’s business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.

Some people wave their dogmatic thinking until their own reason is entangled.

I never knew a writer yet who took the smallest pains with his style and was at the same time readable.

Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

I have to live for others and not for myself: that’s middle-class morality.

Conversation is an art in which a man has all mankind for competitors.

Love is only one of many passions.

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, This was their finest hour.

Nature has given us two ears, two eyes, and but one tongue-to the end that we should hear and see more than we speak.

Never learn to do anything. If you don’t learn, you will always find someone else to do it for you.

Kings in this should imitate God, their mercy should be above their works.

Ice-cream is exquisite – what a pity it isn’t illegal.

The faith that stands on authority is not faith.

Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.

Fame must have enemies, as light must have gnats.

Youth is wasted on the young.

Self-preservation is the first law of nature.