Samuel Johnson

Never, my dear Sir, do you take it into your head that I do not love you; you may settle yourself in full confidence both of my love and my esteem; I love you as a kind man, I value you as a worthy man, and hope in time to reverence you as a man of exemplary piety.

Do not discourage your children from hoarding, if they have a taste to it; whoever lays up his penny rather than part with it for a cake, at least is not the slave of gross appetite; and shows besides a preference always to be esteemed, of the future to the present moment.

Christianity is the highest perfection of humanity.

All the arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil show it evidently to be a great evil.

The happiest part of a man’s life is what he passes lying awake in bed in the morning.

Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content.

Without friends the world is but a wilderness. There is no man that imparteth his joys to his friends, but he joyeth the more; and no man that imparteth his grieves to his friend, but he grieveth the less.

Difficult do you call it, Sir? I wish it were impossible.

I never resist temptation, because I have found that things that are bad for me do not tempt me.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

To die is but to leave off dying and do the thing once for all.

Any man or institution that tries to rob me of my dignity will lose.

Nobody can bring you peace but yourself.

I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.

The world will only, in the end, follow those who have despised as well as served it.

Men are conservatives when they are least vigorous, or when they are most luxurious. They are conservatives after dinner, or before taking their rest; when they are sick or aged. In the morning, or when their intellect or their conscience has been aroused, when they hear music, or when they read poetry, they are radicals.

What is Man? Man is a noisome bacillus whom Our Heavenly Father created because he was disappointed in the monkey.

The office of the scholar is to cheer, to raise, and to guide men by showing them facts amidst appearances. He plies the slow, unhonored, and unpaid task of observation. He is the world’s eye.

The world is seldom what it seems; to man, who dimly sees, realities appear as dreams, and dreams realities.

Breed is stronger than pasture.

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