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A wise man is cured of ambition by ambition itself; his aim is so exalted that riches, office, fortune and favour cannot satisfy him.


Samuel Johnson

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Ambition is like a plague that can only be cured by success.
TERRANCE ROBINSON- ARTIST EDUCATOR SCHOLAR ENTREPRENEUR A man without ambition is dead. A man with ambition but no love is dead. A man with ambition and lov...
PEARL BAILEY Children, you must remember something. A man without ambition is dead. A man with ambition but no lo...
PEARL BAILEY A slave has but one master. An ambition man, has as many as there are people who helped him get his ...
JEAN DE LA BRUYERE A man without ambition is dead. A man with ambition but no love is dead. A man with ambition and lov...
PEARL BAILEY The appellation of a Scottish Bard is by far my highest pride; to continue to deserve it is my most ...
ROBERT BURNS Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN Ambition is not what a man would do, but what a man does, for ambition without action is fantasy.
BRYANT H. MCGILL Ambition is not in itself an evil; nor is he to be condemned whose spirit prompts him to seek fame b...
FRANCESCO GUICCIARDINI After a rich man gets rich, his next ambition is to get richer.
PROVERB I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.
THOMAS JEFFERSON I have no ambition to govern men. It is a painful and thankless office
THOMAS JEFFERSON To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to thr...
EDWARD M. HALLOWELL Though ambition in itself is a vice, it often is also the parent of virtue.
EDGAR QUINET Though ambition in itself is a vice, it often is also the parent of virtue.
EDGAR QUINET Though ambition in itself is a vice, it often is also the parent of virtue.
HOSEA BALLOU I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal, I had an ambition to ...
EDEN PHILLPOTTS I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal, I had an ambition to ...
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal, I had an ambition to...
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that...
ABRAHAM LINCOLN Cultivated leisure is the aim of man.
OSCAR WILDE Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.
ELEANOR ROOSEVELT Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.
JOSEPH JOUBERT Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.
JOSEPH JOUBERT The grandest ambition that any man can possibly have is to so live and so improve himself in heart a...
ROBERT GREEN INGERSOLL Though ambition itself be a vice, yet it is often times the cause of virtues.
QUINTILIAN Great ambition, the desire of real superiority, of leading and directing, seems to be altogether pec...
ADAM SMITH Ambition has its disappointments to sour us, but never the good fortune to satisfy us. Its appetite ...
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN Ambition has its disappointments to sour us, but never the good fortune to satisfy us. Its appetite ...
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN My second wife left me because she said I was too ambitious. She didn't realize that it is only the ...
GRAHAM GREENE Praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language was his mother-to...
WILLIAM COWPER A young man without ambition is an old man waiting to be.
STEVEN BRUST The value of a man is in his intrinsic qualities: in that of which power cannot strip him and which ...
WILLIAM GODWIN Revenge, lust, ambition, pride, and self-will are too often exalted as the gods of man's idolatr...
CHARLES SPURGEON My ambition is handicapped by laziness
CHARLES BUKOWSKI As favour and riches forsake a man, we discover in him the foolishness they concealed, and which no ...
JEAN DE LA BRUYèRE I hold ambition of so light a quality that is is but a shadow's shadow.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE The greatest evil which fortune can inflict on men is to endow them with small talents and great amb...
LUC DE CLAPIERS The greatest evil which fortune can inflict on men is to endow them with small talents and great amb...
VAUVENARGUES MARQUIS DE Mangina= equals a man that has no ambition, cant please his women, lazy, loser, no intelligence
NERISSA IRVING Ambition is not what man does... but what man would do.
ROBERT BROWNING If anyone rises to power, it's not only because he could, but also because the stars were aligned in...
BANGAMBIKI HABYARIMANA The tragedy is that so many have ambition and so few have ability
WILLIAM FEATHER I am so attracted to ambition and drive and talent. If a man loves something and can put his heart i...
MEAGHAN RATH A wise man is out of the reach of fortune.
SIR THOMAS BROWNE So long as the man with ambition is a failure, the world will tell him to let go of his ideal; but w...
CHRISTIAN D. LARSON Ambition is a lust that is never quenched, but grows more inflamed and madder by enjoyment.
THOMAS OTWAY Ambition is a lust that is never quenched, but grows more inflamed and madder by enjoyment.
THOMAS OTWAY Ambition is a lust that is never quenched, but grows more inflamed and madder by enjoyment.
THOMAS OTWAY Evil, unlike good, is constantly at war with those most like itself, and ambition is its spur.
JOHN CONNOLLY Ambition if it feeds at all, does so on the ambition of others.
SUSAN SONTAG The power to know a great entrepreneur is by identifying the one with greater ambition than his reso...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) Without ambition,&without action for ambition, one can’t define his goal as ambition paves the way...
DR ANIL KUMAR SINHA Woe is the mind of the common man, so easily controlled by the prospect of an ambition never to be t...
EVAN MEEKINS Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself And falls on the other side
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Ambition is a very good quality to have. Ambition and the competitive spirit go hand in hand.
RYAN KWANTEN Ambition is a stairway that never ends.
JOYCE RACHELLE Fiction is about small ambition, small failed ambition, small disappointed hope.
ETHAN CANIN Having the ambition of becoming Olympic champion is a whole different ambition from wanting to be th...
DALEY THOMPSON By low ambition and the thirst of praise.
WILLIAM COWPER Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say for one that I...
ABRAHAM LINCOLN An educated man without ambition is as badly off as an ambitious man without education.
VIKRANT PARSAI He that is proud of riches is a fool. For if he is exalted above his neighbors because he has more g...
JEREMY TAYLOR Every man must play the part of his ambition. If you are trying to be a successful man, you must pla...
ORISON SWETT MARDEN Pride went before, ambition follows him.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, ...
JOSEPH CONRAD A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, ...
JOSEPH CONRAD A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, ...
MARCUS AURELIUS A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, ...
HENRY WARD BEECHER The truth is an ambition which is beyond us.
PETER USTINOV A man having no ambition in life is a ship having no rudder in the sea.
VIKRANT PARSAI The man of petty ambition if invited to dinner will be eager to be set next his host.
THEOPHRASTUS He that is proud of riches is a fool. For if he be exalted above his neighbors because he hath mor...
JEREMY TAYLOR Ambition is not a vice of little people.
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE The man of ambition thinks to find his good in the operations of others; the man of pleasure in his ...
MARCUS AURELIUS His ambition is to be the spider in the World Wide Web.
JOHN MCCARTHY Discontent is something that follows ambition like a shadow.
HENRY H. HASKINS Wisdom alone is true ambition's aim, wisdom is the source of virtue and of fame; obtained with l...
ALFRED NORTH WHITEHEAD He has to do a whole lot to make up for what he did with BET. There is a whole lot about Bob Johnson...
BARRY SAUNDERS Golf is an open exhibition of overweening ambition, courage deflated by stupidity, skill soured by a...
ALISTAIR COOKE You cannot kill a breeze, a wind, a fragrance; you cannot kill a dream or an ambition.
MICHEL ONFRAY The great Cham of literature. (Samuel Johnson)
TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT Define yourself by action.& make every action the mirror of ambition. Have ambition to climb the sky...
DR ANIL KUMAR SINHA Great abundance of riches cannot be gathered and kept by any man without sin.
DESIDERIUS ERASMUS Great abundance of riches cannot be gathered and kept by any man without sin
DESIDERIUS ERASMUS All it takes is a vision and a bit of ambition
CHRISTIAN F COLòN Religion is a means of exploitation employed by the strong against the weak; religion is a cloak of ...
GEORGES BIZET Religion is a means of exploitation employed by the strong against the weak; religion is a cloak of ...
GEORGES BIZET It's so funny, actors usually have a directing ambition. I've got no ambition for directing.
MAJANDRA DELFINO Ambition is enthusiasm with a purpose
FRANK TYGER My ambition is peace and perfection.
DEFOREST KELLEY An ounce of hypocrisy is worth a pound of ambition. •Michael Korda We ought to see far enoug...
MICHAEL KORDA I was the ugly kid that didn't listen. Little big man, full of ambition
ATMOSPHERE Ambition is a drug that makes its addicts potential madmen.
EMILE M. CIORAN Wisdom alone is true ambition's aim, wisdom the source of virtue, and of fame, obtained with lab...
WILLIAM WHITEHEAD True ambition is not what we thought it was. True ambition is the profound desire to live usefully a...
BILL WILSON Ambition is the last refuge of failure.
OSCAR WILDE 'Intensity' is a good word. It's like ambition, if it's not ambition at expense of s...
THOM TILLIS Live neither in the past nor in the future, but let each day's work absorb your entire energies, and...
WILLIAM OSLER Live neither in the past nor in the future, but let each day's work absorb your entire energies, and...
SIR WILLIAM OSLER

More Samuel Johnson

He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own...
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Love is only one of many passions.
SAMUEL JOHNSON My dear friend, clear your mind of cant.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Bounty always receives part of its value from the manner in which it is bestowed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is very natural for young men to be vehement, acrimonious and severe. For as they seldom comprehe...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Among the calamities of war, may be justly numbered the diminution of the love of truth, by the fals...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who praises every body, praises nobody.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The mind is never satisfied with the objects immediately before it, but is always breaking away from...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died: Johnson ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that will enjoy the brightness of sunshine, must quit the coolness of the shade.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Gloomy calm of idle vacancy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Ignorance, madam, pure ignorance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Do not discourage your children from hoarding, if they have a taste to it; whoever lays up his penny...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Whatever you have spend less.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON What is twice read is commonly better remembered that what is transcribed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little g...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Books have always a secret influence on the understanding; we cannot at pleasure obliterate ideas: ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The habit of looking on the bright side of every event is worth more than a thousand pounds a year.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Politics are now nothing more than means of rising in the world. With this sole view do men engage i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Wickedness is always easier than virtue, for it takes a short cut to everything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON By taking a second wife he pays the highest compliment to the first, by showing that she made him so...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is not from reason and prudence that people marry, but from inclination.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Marriage is the best state for man in general, and every man is a worst man in proportion to the lev...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talk...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Books that you carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are most useful after all.
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man ought to read just as his inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him littl...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that reads and grows no wiser seldom suspects his own deficiency, but complains of hard words and...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The most heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together; nature and art are ransacked for illust...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON This merriment of parsons is mighty offensive.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Never, my dear Sir, do you take it into your head that I do not love you; you may settle yourself in...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The endearing elegance of female friendship.
SAMUEL JOHNSON To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to thr...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The most fatal disease of friendship is gradual decay, or dislike hourly increased by causes too sle...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Friendship, 'the wine of life,' said Boswell, should, like a well-stocked cellar, be thus continuall...
SAMUEL JOHNSON To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his ut...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is wonderful when a calculation is made, how little the mind is actually employed in the discharg...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The next best thing to knowing something is knowing where to find it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I will be conquered; I will not capitulate.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the publi...
SAMUEL JOHNSON "He was a very good hater."
SAMUEL JOHNSON I like a good hater.
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are long before we are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it posse...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Read your own compositions, and when you meet a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Composition is, for the most part, an effort of slow diligence and steady perseverance, to which the...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I know not, Madam, that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much...
SAMUEL JOHNSON In all pointed sentences, some degree of accuracy must be sacrificed to conciseness.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading, in order to write; a man will turn over ha...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is the only instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purc...
SAMUEL JOHNSON My congratulations to you, sir. Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Pride is seldom delicate; it will please itself with very mean advantages.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Prejudice not being funded on reason cannot be removed by argument.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The applause of a single human being is of great consequence.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who praises everybody, praises nobody.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The real satisfaction which praise can afford, is when what is repeated aloud agrees with the whispe...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A continual feast of commendation is only to be obtained by merit or by wealth: many are therefore o...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Hunger is never delicate; they who are seldom gorged to the full with praise may be safely fed with ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be sile...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few things that we so unwillingly give up, even in advanced age, as the supposition that w...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Men know that women are an over-match for them, and therefore they choose the weakest or most ignora...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The true art of memory is the art of attention.
SAMUEL JOHNSON What is read twice is usually remembered more than what is once written.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The Irish are a fair people: They never speak well of one another.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees is the high road that leads him to England.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Difficult do you call it, Sir? I wish it were impossible.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is the only sensual pleasure without vice.
SAMUEL JOHNSON That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are few minds to which tyranny is not delightful.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The majority have no other reason for their opinions than that they are the fashion.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Ah! Sir, a boy's being flogged is not so severe as a man's having the hiss of the world against him.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is the great privilege of poverty to be happy and yet unenvied, to be healthy with physic, secure...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nature makes us poor only when we want necessaries, but custom gives the name of poverty to the want...
SAMUEL JOHNSON This mournful truth is everywhere confessed, slow rises worth by poverty depressed.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Poverty is often concealed in splendor, and often in extravagance. It is the task of many people to ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If pleasure was not followed by pain, who would forbear it?
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Many things difficult in design prove easy in performance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON If he really thinks there is no distinction between vice and virtue, when he leaves our houses let u...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The usual fortune of complaint is to excite contempt more than pity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagre...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If I have said something to hurt a man once, I shall not get the better of this by saying many thing...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but per...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
SAMUEL JOHNSON In all evils which admits a remedy, impatience should be avoided, because it wastes the time and att...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dr...
SAMUEL JOHNSON If a man could say nothing against a character but what he can prove, history could not be written.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Your manuscript is both good and original; but the parts that are good are not original, and the par...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I found you essay to be good and original. However, the part that was original was not good and the ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, he was dull in company, dull in his closet, dull everywhere. He was dull in a new way, and that...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, a man may be so much of everything, that he is nothing of anything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who has provoked the shaft of wit, cannot complain that he smarts from it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Their learning is like bread in a besieged town: every man gets a little, but no man gets a full mea...
SAMUEL JOHNSON As peace is the end of war, so to be idle is the ultimate purpose of the busy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Perhaps man is the only being that can properly be called idle.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Turn on the prudent ant thy heedful eyes. Observe her labors, sluggard, and be wise.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Lawyers know life practically. A bookish man should always have them to converse with.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would be loath to speak ill of any person who I do not know deserves it, but I am afraid he is an ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON What provokes your risibility, Sir? Have I said anything that you understand? Then I ask pardon of t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The next best thing to knowing something is knowing where to find it.
SAMUEL JOHNSON More knowledge may be gained of a man's real character by a short conversation with one of his serva...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Man is not weak; knowledge is more than equivalent to force.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge always demands increase; it is like fire, which must first be kindled by some external age...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge is more than equivalent to force.
SAMUEL JOHNSON All wonder is the effect of novelty on ignorance.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, they are a race of convicts, and ought to be thankful for anything we allow them short of hangi...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated, has not the art of getting drunk.
SAMUEL JOHNSON There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits that are not good unti...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, I have no objection to a man's drinking wine, if he can do it in moderation. I found myself apt...
SAMUEL JOHNSON The advice that is wanted is commonly not welcome and that which is not wanted, evidently an effront...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Disease generally begins that equality which death completes.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The trade of advertising is now so near perfection that it is not easy to propose any improvement. B...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Adversity is the state in which man mostly easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make fa...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Disappointment, when it involves neither shame nor loss, is as good as success; for it supplies as m...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Every man who attacks my belief, diminishes in some degree my confidence in it, and therefore makes ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON When speculation has done its worst, two and two still make four.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, I have found you an argument. I am not obliged to find you an understanding.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No member of society has the right to teach any doctrine contrary to what society holds to be true.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It seems not more reasonable to leave the right of printing unrestrained, because writers may be aft...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Censure is willingly indulged, because it always implies some superiority: men please themselves wit...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There is nothing so much seduces reason from vigilance as the thought of passing life with an amiabl...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Bravery has no place where it can avail nothing.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that would be superior to external influences must first become superior to his own passions.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Surely a long life must be somewhat tedious, since we are forced to call in so many trifling things ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON It generally happens that assurance keeps an even pace with ability.
SAMUEL JOHNSON When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Extended empires are like expanded gold, exchanging solid strength for feeble splendor.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Those who attain to any excellence commonly spend life in some single pursuit, for excellence is not...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Prepare for death, if here at night you roam, and sign your will before you sup from home.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The happiest conversation is that of which nothing is distinctly remembered but a general effect of ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Christianity is the highest perfection of humanity.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He who waits to do a great deal of good at once, will never do anything.
SAMUEL JOHNSON You are much surer that you are doing good when you pay money to those who work, as the recompense o...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A decent provision for the poor is the true test of civilization.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I am sorry I have not learnt to play at cards. It is very useful in life: it generates kindness, and...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Self-love is often rather arrogant than blind; it does not hide our faults from ourselves, but persu...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Were it not for imagination a man would be as happy in arms of a chambermaid as of a duchess.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, an...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Patron: One who countenances, supports or protects. Commonly a wretch who supports with insolence, a...
SAMUEL JOHNSON No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.
SAMUEL JOHNSON To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and la...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Truth, Sir, is a cow which will yield such people no more milk, and so they are gone to milk the bul...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly beco...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Suspicion is most often useless pain.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion, and he whose real wants are supplied must admit tho...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I have always considered it as treason against the great republic of human nature, to make any man's...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We are inclined to believe those whom we don not know because they have never deceived us.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Small debts are like small gun shot; they are rattling around us on all sides and one can scarcely e...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous mind.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. He whom natur...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Criticism, as it was first instituted by Aristotle, was meant as a standard of judging well.
SAMUEL JOHNSON I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be sile...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that pursues fame with just claims, trusts his happiness to the winds; but he that endeavors afte...
SAMUEL JOHNSON To get a name can happen but to few; it is one of the few things that cannot be brought. It is the f...
SAMUEL JOHNSON We love to expect, and when expectation is either disappointed or gratified, we want to be again exp...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying t...
SAMUEL JOHNSON I know not any thing more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is generally known, that he who expects much will be often disappointed; yet disappointment seldo...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Hope is itself a species of happiness, and, perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords: b...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy.
SAMUEL JOHNSON No two men can be half an hour together but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other.
SAMUEL JOHNSON Nothing is more common than mutual dislike, where mutual approbation is particularly expected.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The chains of habit are generally too week to be felt, until they are too strong to be broken.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The habit of looking on the best side of every event is worth more than a thousand pounds a years.
SAMUEL JOHNSON While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till grief be digested, ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON Where grief is fresh, any attempt to divert it only irritates.
SAMUEL JOHNSON The superiority of some men is merely local. They are great because their associates are little.
SAMUEL JOHNSON He was dull in a new way, and that made many think him great.
SAMUEL JOHNSON