Showing 101–126 of 126 entries
"He is not only dull himself, but the cause of dullness in others."
Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. viii. Chap. v. 1784.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"You see they 'd have fitted him to a T."
Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. viii. Chap. ix. 1784.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"I have found you an argument; I am not obliged to find you an understanding."
Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. viii. Chap. ix. 1784.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Who drives fat oxen should himself be fat."
Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. viii. Chap. ix. 1784.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Blown about with every wind of criticism."
Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. viii. Chap. x. 1784.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"If the man who turnips cries Cry not when his father dies, 'T is a proof that he had rather Have a turnip than his father."
Johnsoniana. Piozzi, 30.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"He was a very good hater."
Johnsoniana. Piozzi, 39.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public."
Johnsoniana. Piozzi, 58.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are."
Johnsoniana. Piozzi, 154.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Dictionaries are like watches; the worst is better than none, and the best cannot be expected to go quite true."
Johnsoniana. Piozzi, 178.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Books that you may carry to the fire and hold readily in your hand, are the most useful after all."
Johnsoniana. Hawkins. 197.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Round numbers are always false."
Johnsoniana. Hawkins. 235.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"As with my hat upon my head I walk'd along the Strand, I there did meet another man With his hat in his hand."
Johnsoniana. George Steevens. 310.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Abstinence is as easy to me as temperance would be difficult."
Johnsoniana. Hannah More. 467.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"The limbs will quiver and move after the soul is gone."
Johnsoniana. Northcote. 487.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Hawkesworth said of Johnson, "You have a memory that would convict any author of plagiarism in any court of literature in the world.""
Johnsoniana. Kearsley. 600.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"His conversation does not show the minute-hand, but he strikes the hour very correctly."
Johnsoniana. Kearsley. 604.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Hunting was the labour of the savages of North America, but the amusement of the gentlemen of England."
Johnsoniana. Kearsley. 606.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"I am very fond of the company of ladies. I like their beauty, I like their delicacy, I like their vivacity, and I like their silence."
Johnsoniana. Seward. 617.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"This world, where much is to be done and little to be known."
Prayers and Meditations. Against inquisitive and perplexing Thoughts.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Gratitude is a fruit of great cultivation; you do not find it among gross people."
Tour to the Hebrides. Sept. 20, 1773.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"A fellow that makes no figure in company, and has a mind as narrow as the neck of a vinegar-cruet."
Tour to the Hebrides. Sept. 30, 1773.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"The atrocious crime of being a young man, which the honourable gentleman has with such spirit and decency charged upon me, I shall neither attempt to palliate nor deny; but content myself with wishing that I may be one of those whose follies may cease with their youth, and not of that number who are ignorant in spite of experience."
Pitt's Reply to Walpole. Speech, March 6, 1741.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Towering in the confidence of twenty-one."
Letter to Bennet Langton. Jan. 9, 1758.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"Gloomy calm of idle vacancy."
Letter to Boswell. Dec. 8, 1763.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 9th ed. (Little, Brown, 1905), public domain
"A critic never made or killed a book or a play. The people themselves are the final judges. It is their opinion that counts. After all, the final test is truth. But the trouble is that most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession and therefore are most economical in its use."
Said to portrait painter Samuel Johnson Woolf, cited in Here am I (1941), Samuel Johnson Woolf; this has often been abbreviated: Most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are most economical in its use.
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