Samuel Johnson - Find Quotes

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Philips, whose touch harmonious could remove
The pangs of guilty power and hapless love!
Rest here, distress'd by poverty no more;
Here find that calm thou gav'st so oft before;
Sleep undisturb'd within this peaceful shrine,
Till angels wake thee with a note like thine!

Samuel Johnson
With these [Love, Patience, Faith] celestial Wisdom calms the mind, And makes the happiness she does not find.

Samuel Johnson
How small of all that human hearts endure,
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure!
Still to ourselves in every place consigned,
Our own felicity we make or find.
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.

Samuel Johnson
He that thinks with more extent than another will want words of larger meaning; he that thinks with more subtilty will seek for terms of more nice discrimination; and where is the wonder, since words are but the images of things, that he who never knew the original should not know the copies?
Yet vanity inclines us to find faults any where rather than in ourselves. He that reads and grows no wiser, seldom suspects his own deficiency; but complains of hard words and obscure sentences, and asks why books are written which cannot be understood?

Samuel Johnson
It is so far from being natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.

Samuel Johnson
The Churchyard abounds with images which find a mirror in every mind, and with sentiments to which every bosom returns an echo.

Samuel Johnson
I remember very well, when I was at Oxford, an old gentleman said to me, "Young man, ply your book diligently now, and acquire a stock of knowledge; for when years come upon you, you will find that poring upon books will be but an irksome task."

Samuel Johnson
Shakspeare never has six lines together without a fault. Perhaps you may find seven: but this does not refute my general assertion.

Samuel Johnson
Allow them [children] to be happy their own way, for what better way will they ever find?

Samuel Johnson
Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.

Samuel Johnson
Sir, I have found you an argument; but I am not obliged to find you an understanding.

Samuel Johnson
He that floats lazily down the stream, in pursuit of something borne along by the same current, will find himself indeed moved forward; but unless he lays his hand to the oar, and increases his speed by his own labour, must be always at the same distance from that which he is following.

Samuel Johnson
It is seldom that we find either men or places such as we expect them.... Yet it is necessary to hope, though hope should always be deluded, for hope itself is happiness, and its frustrations, however frequent, are yet less dreadful than its extinction.

Samuel Johnson
Do not accustom yourself to consider debt only as an inconvenience; you will find it a calamity.

Samuel Johnson
A man finds in the productions of nature an inexhaustible stock of material on which he can employ himself, without any temptations to envy or malevolence, and has always a certain prospect of discovering new reasons for adoring the sovereign author of the universe.

Samuel Johnson
It is always observable that silence propagates itself, and that the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find any thing to say.

Samuel Johnson
[Of Lord Chesterfield] This man, I thought, had been a Lord among wits; but, I find, he is only a wit among Lords!

Samuel Johnson
I [Boswell] happened to say, it would be terrible if he should not find a speedy opportunity of returning to London, and be confined in so dull a place.
JOHNSON: "Don't, Sir, accustom yourself to use big words for little matters. It would not be terrible, though I were to be detained some time here."

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

Samuel Johnson
Gratitude is a fruit of great cultivation; you do not find it among gross people.

Samuel Johnson
Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention, or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness had before concealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty.

Samuel Johnson
I dogmatise and am contradicted, and in this conflict of opinions and sentiments I find delight.
On his conversation in taverns

Samuel Johnson