Samuel Johnson Quotes About Dignity

• To see helpless infancy stretching out her hands, and pouring out her cries in testimony of dependence, without any powers to alarm jealousy, or any guilt to alienate affection, must surely awaken tenderness in every human mind; and tenderness once excited will be hourly increased by the natural contagion of felicity, by the repercussion of communicated pleasure, by the consciousness of dignity of benefaction.

  Samuel Johnson

  Hands, Mind, Guilt

  Samuel Johnson (1810). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With An Essay on His Life and Genius”, p.47

• Advice, as it always gives a temporary appearance of superiority, can never be very grateful, even when it is most necessary or most judicious. But for the same reason everyone is eager to instruct his neighbours. To be wise or to be virtuous is to buy dignity and importance at a high price; but when nothing is necessary to elevation but detection of the follies or faults of others, no man is so insensible to the voice of fame as to linger on the ground.

  Samuel Johnson

  Wise, Grateful, Men

  The Rambler, No 87, January 15, 1751.

• If we estimate dignity by immediate usefulness, agriculture is undoubtedly the first and noblest science.

  Samuel Johnson

  Agriculture, Firsts, Dignity

  Samuel Johnson (1827). “The Rambler”, p.220

• As all error is meanness, it is incumbent on every man who consults his own dignity, to retract it as soon as he discovers it.

  Samuel Johnson

  Men, Errors, Dignity

  Samuel Johnson (1784). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes..”, p.192

• A simile, to be perfect, must both illustrate and ennoble the subject; must show it to the understanding in a clearer view, and display it to the fancy with greater dignity; but either of these qualities may be sufficient to recommend it.... That it may be complete, it is required to exhibit, independently of its references, a pleasing image; for a simile is said to be a short episode.

  Samuel Johnson

  Views, Perfect, Understanding

  Samuel Johnson, William Hazlitt (1854). “Johnson's Lives of the British poets completed by W. Hazlitt”, p.226

• Without good humour, learning and bravery can only confer that superiority which swells the heart of the lion in the desert, where he roars without reply, and ravages without resistance. Without good humour virtue may awe by its dignity and amaze by its brightness, but must always be viewed at a distance, and will scarcely gain a friend or attract an imitator.

  Samuel Johnson

  Distance, Heart, Bravery

  Samuel Johnson (1784). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes..”, p.102

• Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings.

  Samuel Johnson

  Past, Thinking, Dignity

  'A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland' (1775) 'Inch Kenneth'

• Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me, and far from my friends be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to be envied whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Ionia.

  Samuel Johnson

  Philosophy, Thinking, Past

  'A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland' (1775) 'Inch Kenneth'

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