Samuel Johnson

He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind than the strokes of the oar; and many fold in their passage; while they lie waiting for the gale.

They that have grown old in a single state are generally found to be morose, fretful and captious; tenacious of their own practices and maxims; soon offended by contradiction or negligence; and impatient of any association but with those that will watch their nod, and submit themselves to unlimited authority.

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.

It was his peculiar happiness that he scarcely ever found a stranger whom he did not leave a friend; but it must likewise be added, that he had not often a friend long without obliging him to become a stranger.

Count on it, if a person talks of their misfortune, there is something in it that is not disagreeable to them.

Melancholy, indeed, should be diverted by every means but drinking.

Condense some daily experience into a glowing symbol and an audience is electrified.

Fearful of missing anything, he read on, filled with this anticipation which was half terror, of coming upon something which would touch him, not simply touch him but lift him and carry him away.

Every great movement must experience three stages ridicule, discussion, adoption.

A am a great friend of public amusements, they keep people from vice.

Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.

Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.

The easy confidence with which I know another man’s religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.

The only way to avoid being miserable is not to have enough leisure to wonder whether you are happy or not.

I would advise you Sir, to study algebra, if you are not already an adept in it: your head would be less muddy, and you will leave off tormenting your neighbors about paper and packthread, while we all live together in a world that is bursting with sin and sorrow.

The minority is sometimes right; the majority always wrong.

To the dull mind all nature is leaden. To the illumined mind the whole world burns and sparkles with light.

Often the surest way to convey misinformation is to tell the strict truth.

He’s a man of great common sense and good taste – meaning thereby a man without originality or moral courage.

It is in these acts called trivialities that the seeds of joy are forever wasted, until men and women look round with haggard faces at the devastation their own waste has made, and say, the earth bears no harvest of sweetness – calling their denial knowledge.

Images also help me find and realise ideas. I look at hundreds of very different, contrasting images and I pinch details from them, rather like people who eat from other people