Hope is itself a species of happiness, and, perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords: but, like all other pleasures immoderately enjoyed, the excesses of hope must be expiated by pain; and expectations improperly indulged, must end in disappointment. If it be asked, what is the improper expectation which it is dangerous to indulge, experience will quickly answer, that it is such expectation as is dictated not by reason, but by desire; expectation raised, not by the common occurrences of life, but by the wants of the expectant; an expectation that requires the common course of things to be changed, and the general rules of action to be broken.


Samuel Johnson

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He that will enjoy the brightness of sunshine, must quit the coolness of the shade.
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Gloomy calm of idle vacancy.
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Ignorance, madam, pure ignorance.
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When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped.
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No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.
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Whatever you have spend less.
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There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
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What is twice read is commonly better remembered that what is transcribed.
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Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make fa...
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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
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
No one ever became great by imitation.
SAMUEL JOHNSON