Samuel Johnson

I have protracted my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise.

If pleasure was not followed by pain, who would forbear it?

If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in a constant repair.

If your determination is fixed, I do not counsel you to despair. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but perseverance.

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.

Tomorrow is an old deceiver, and his cheat never grows stale.

Great hearts steadily send forth the secret forces that incessantly draw great events.

Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.

What is it they want from a man that they didn’t get from his work? What do they expect? What is there left of him when he’s done his work? What’s any artist, but the dregs of his work? the human shambles that follows it around. What’s left of the man when the work’s done but a shambles of apology.

My favorite nightcap, after all this time, is still the cocktail of you.

Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.

When men come to like a sea-life, they are not fit to live on land.

A true friend freely, advises justly, assists readily, adventures boldly, takes all patiently, defends courageously, and continues a friend unchangeably.

You should always own a black dress because no one ever remembers a black dress.

There is nothing which at once affects a man so much and so little as his own death.

The only reward of virtue is virtue the only way to have a friend is to be one.

Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other.

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire; you will what you imagine; and at last you create what you will.

Children sweeten labours, but they make misfortunes more bitter.

Very few people can afford to be poor.

There is nothing that can be changed more completely than human nature when the job is taken in hand early enough.