"There is a wicked inclination in most people to suppose an old man decayed in his intellects. If a young or middle-aged man, when leaving a company, does not remember where he laid his hat, it is nothing; but if the same inattention is discovered in an old man, people will shrug up their shoulders, and say, "His memory is going.""

"A man may be so much of every thing, that he is nothing of any thing."

"Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult."

"To let friendship die away by negligence and silence, is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of this weary pilgrimage."

"Always, Sir, set a high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord, will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you."

"I have two very cogent reasons for not printing any list of subscribers; — one, that I have lost all the names, — the other, that I have spent all the money."

"A jest breaks no bones."

"My friend was of opinion that when a man of rank appeared in that character [as an author], he deserved to have his merit handsomely allowed."

"Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world."

"Mrs. Montagu has dropt me. Now, Sir, there are people whom one should like very well to drop, but would not wish to be dropped by."

"The applause of a single human being is of great consequence."

"No man was more foolish when he had not a pen in his hand, or more wise when he had."

"Greek, sir, is like lace; every man gets as much of it as he can."

"A Frenchman must be always talking, whether he knows anything of the matter or not; an Englishman is content to say nothing, when he has nothing to say."

"If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be not idle."

"Worth seeing? yes; but not worth going to see."

"A man who exposes himself when he is intoxicated, has not the art of getting drunk."

"Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy."

"I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be silent as to his works."

"Were it not for imagination, Sir, a man would be as happy in the arms of a chambermaid as of a Duchess."

"Wine makes a man more pleased with himself. I do not say that it makes him more pleasing to others."

"All censure of a man's self is oblique praise. It is in order to shew how much he can spare."

"The insolence of wealth will creep out."

"It is better to live rich, than to die rich."

"As the Spanish proverb says, "He, who would bring home the wealth of the Indies, must carry the wealth of the Indies with him." So it is in travelling; a man must carry knowledge with him, if he would bring home knowledge."

"All theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience for it."

"Pleasure of itself is not a vice."

"I am willing to love all mankind, except an American."

"A country governed by a despot is an inverted cone."

"Every state of society is as luxurious as it can be. Men always take the best they can get."

"Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea."

"It is man's own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age."

"All argument is against it; but all belief is for it."

"It must be agreed that in most ages many countries have had part of their inhabitants in a state of slavery; yet it may be doubted whether slavery can ever be supposed the natural condition of man. It is impossible not to conceive that men in their original state were equal; and very difficult to imagine how one would be subjected to another but by violent compulsion. An individual may, indeed, forfeit his liberty by a crime; but he cannot by that crime forfeit the liberty of his children."

"Here's to the next insurrection of the negroes in the West Indies."

"When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."

"Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."

"I [Boswell] was somewhat disappointed in finding that the edition of The English Poets, for which he was to write Prefaces and Lives, was not an undertaking directed by him: but that he was to furnish a Preface and Life to any poet the booksellers pleased. I asked him if he would do this to any dunce's works, if they should ask him. JOHNSON: "Yes, Sir, and say he was a dunce.""

"Life admits not of delays; when pleasure can be had, it is fit to catch it. Every hour takes away part of the things that please us, and perhaps part of our disposition to be pleased."

"Sir, you have but two topicks, yourself and me. I am sick of both."

"Life is a progress from want to want, not from enjoyment to enjoyment."

"While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till grief be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it."

"No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money."

"A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him. A man when he gets into a higher sphere, into other habits of life, cannot keep up all his former connections. Then, Sir, those who knew him formerly upon a level with themselves, may think that they ought still to be treated as on a level, which cannot be; and an acquaintance in a former situation may bring out things which it would be very disagreeable to have mentioned before higher company, though, perhaps, everybody knows of them."

"This is one of the disadvantages of wine, it makes a man mistake words for thoughts."

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

"There is now less flogging in our great schools than formerly, but then less is learned there; so that what the boys get at one end they lose at the other."

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

"Hell is paved with good intentions."