The true art of memory is the art of attention.
Samuel Johnson

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.
Samuel Johnson

The two offices of memory are collection and distribution.
Samuel Johnson

The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.
Samuel Johnson

The usual fortune of complaint is to excite contempt more than pity.
Samuel Johnson

The vanity of being known to be trusted with a secret is generally one of the chief motives to disclose it.
Samuel Johnson

The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.
Samuel Johnson

The world is seldom what it seems; to man, who dimly sees, realities appear as dreams, and dreams realities.
Samuel Johnson

The wretched have no compassion, they can do good only from strong principles of duty.
Samuel Johnson

There are charms made only for distant admiration.
Samuel Johnson

There are few things that we so unwillingly give up, even in advanced age, as the supposition that we still have the power of ingratiating ourselves with the fair sex.
Samuel Johnson

There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.
Samuel Johnson

There are goods so opposed that we cannot seize both, but, by too much prudence, may pass between them at too great a distance to reach either.
Samuel Johnson

There are minds so impatient of inferiority that their gratitude is a species of revenge, and they return benefits, not because recompense is a pleasure, but because obligation is a pain.
Samuel Johnson

There are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits that are not good until they are rotten.
Samuel Johnson

There is no private house in which people can enjoy themselves so well as at a capital tavern... No, Sir; there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern or inn.
Samuel Johnson

There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern.
Samuel Johnson

There is nothing, Sir, too little for so little a creature as man. It is by studying little things that we attain the great art of having as little misery and as much happiness as possible.
Samuel Johnson

There is, indeed, nothing that so much seduces reason from vigilance, as the thought of passing life with an amiable woman.
Samuel Johnson

Those who attain any excellence, commonly spend life in one pursuit; for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms.
Samuel Johnson