Samuel Johnson

Knowledge always demands increase; it is like fire, which must first be kindled by some external agent, but will afterwards always propagate itself.

Knowledge is more than equivalent to force.

Were it not for imagination a man would be as happy in arms of a chambermaid as of a duchess.

There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.

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.

A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good.

Only trust theyself, and another shall noet betray thee

Most of us who turn to any subject we love remember some morning or evening hour when we got on a high stool to reach down an untried volume, or sat with parted lips listening to a new talker, or for very lack of books began to listen to the voices within, as the first traceable beginning of our love.

Be a little careful about your library. Do you foresee what you will do with it? Very little to be sure. But the real question is, What it will do with you?

But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?

Life isn’t as serious as the mind makes it out to be.

We all have our challenges, issues, things that we’re working through and insecurity is there because nobody is perfect no matter who you are. It’s that imperfection that makes you so dope.

Gross and obscure natures, however decorated, seem impure shambles; but character gives splendor to youth, and awe to wrinkled skin and gray hairs.

Drunkenness spoils health, dismounts the mind, and unmans man. It reveals secrets, is quarrelsome, lascivious, impudent, dangerous, and mad.

I have thought of a pulley to raise me gradually; but that would give me pain, as it would counteract my natural inclination. I would have something that can dissipate the inertia and give elasticity to the muscles. We can heat the body, we can cool it; we can give it tension or relaxation; and surely it is possible to bring it into a state in which rising from bed will not be a pain.

No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.

I cannot see how a man of any large degree of humorous perception can ever be religious – except he purposely shut the eyes of his mind and keep them shut by force.

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

Nothing so needs reforming as other people’s habits.

Even the youngest of us may be wrong sometimes.

Write without pay until somebody offers to pay you. If nobody offers within three years, sawing wood is what you were intended for.