Samuel Johnson

The trade of advertising is now so near perfection that it is not easy to propose any improvement. But as every art ought to be exercised in due subordination to the public good, I cannot but propose it as a moral question to these masters of the public ear, whether they do not sometimes play too wantonly with our passions.

Do not accustom yourself to consider debt only as an inconvenience. You will find it a calamity.

Nay, Madam, when you are declaiming, declaim; and when you are calculating, calculate.

Wickedness is always easier than virtue, for it takes a short cut to everything.

One cause, which is not always observed, of the insufficiency of riches, is that they very seldom make their owner rich.

Paradise Lost is a book that, once put down, is very hard to pick up again.

That which we call sin in others, is experiment for us.

Only trust thyself, and another shall not betray thee.

Logic is a poor guide compared with custom.

He who is only a traveler learns things at second-hand and by the halves, and is poor authority. We are most interested when science reports what those men already know practically or instinctively, for that alone is a true humanity, or account of human experience.

The self divides into ten billion distinct illuminating spirits. Distinguish these without falling into names and classifications.

Men over forty are no judges of a book written in a new spirit.

Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both.

Some men are born to own, and can animate all their possessions. Others cannot: their owning is not graceful; seems to be a compromise of their character: they seem to steal their own dividends.

You cannot kill time without injuring eternity.

Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself.

Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring.

Books are delightful society. If you go into a room and find it full of books – even without taking them from the shelves they seem to speak to you, to bid you welcome.

No facts are to me sacred; none are profane; I simply experiment, an endless seeker, with no past at my back.

That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another s. We see so much only as we possess.

Quarrel? Nonsense; we have not quarreled. If one is not to get into a rage sometimes, what is the good of being friends?