Samuel Johnson

Poverty is often concealed in splendor, and often in extravagance. It is the task of many people to conceal their neediness from others. Consequently they support themselves by temporary means, and everyday is lost in contriving for tomorrow.

Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it is associated with vice.

To get a name can happen but to few; it is one of the few things that cannot be brought. It is the free gift of mankind, which must be deserved before it will be granted, and is at last unwillingly bestowed.

I would be loath to speak ill of any person who I do not know deserves it, but I am afraid he is an attorney.

Fly fishing may be a very pleasant amusement; but angling or float fishing I can only compare to a stick and a string, with a worm at one end and a fool at the other.

No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it. There is a remedy in human nature against tyranny, that will keep us safe under every form of government.

The greatest gift is the ability to forget – to forget the bad things and focus on the good.

He presents me with what is always an acceptable gift who brings me news of a great thought before unknown. He enriches me without impoverishing himself.

Let your literary compositions be kept from the public eye for nine years at least.

Plenty of times I wanted to haul off when somebody insulted me for the color of my skin, but I had to hold to myself. I knew I was kind of an experiment. The whole thing was bigger than me.

To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity.

Any emotion, if it is sincere, is involuntary.

The pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.

A broken heart is a very pleasant complaint for a man in London if he has a comfortable income.

A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.

Life affords no higher pleasure than that of surmounting difficulties, passing from one step of success to another, forming new wishes and seeing them gratified.

Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.

It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.

Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both.

All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently the first condition of progress is the removal of censorships. There is the whole case against censorships in a nutshell.

Adam was but human-this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple’s sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.