Samuel Johnson Quotes About Understanding

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

  Samuel Johnson

  Found You, Understanding, Statistics

  Quoted in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) (entry for June 1784)

• The supreme end of education is expert discernment in all things-the power to tell the good from the bad, the genuine from the counterfeit, and to prefer the good and the genuine to the bad and the counterfeit.

  Samuel Johnson

  Graduation, Education, Teaching

• Books have always a secret influence on the understanding.

  Samuel Johnson

  Book, Understanding, Secret

  Samuel Johnson, Arthur Murphy, Francis Pearson Walesby (1825). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D..: The Adventurer and Idler”, p.142

• I would advise no man to marry who is not likely to propagate understanding.

  Samuel Johnson

  Marriage, Wedding, Men

  Samuel Johnson (1836). “Johnsoniana; or supplement to Boswell; being Anecdotes and sayings of Dr. Johnson, etc”, p.34

• The size of a man's understanding might always be justly measured by his mirth.

  Samuel Johnson

  Happiness, Laughter, Men

  "Johnsoniana, Or, Supplement to Boswell: Being Anecdotes and Sayings of Dr. Johnson".

• Too much nicety of detail disgusts the greatest part of readers, and to throw a multitude of particulars under general heads, and lay down rules of extensive comprehension, is to common understandings of little use.

  Samuel Johnson

  Writing, Understanding, Littles

  Samuel Johnson (1784). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes..”, p.206

• To mean understandings, it is sufficient honour to be numbered amongst the lowest labourers of learning; but different abilities must find different tasks. To hew stone, would have been unworthy of Palladio; and to have rambled in search of shells and flowers, had but ill suited with the capacity of Newton.

  Samuel Johnson

  Flower, Mean, Science

  Samuel Johnson (1823). “The Works of Samuel Johnson: LL.D. A New Edition in Twelve Volumes. With an Essay on His Life and Genius, by Arthur Murphy, Esq”, p.76

• All discourse of which others cannot partake is not only an irksome usurpation of the time devoted to pleasure and entertainment, but, what never fails to excite resentment, an insolent assertion of superiority, and a triumph over less enlightened understandings. The pedant is, therefore, not only heard with weariness but malignity; and those who conceive themselves insulted by his knowledge never fail to tell with acrimony how injudiciously it was exerted.

  Samuel Johnson

  Understanding, Triumph, Acrimony

  Samuel Johnson (1810). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With An Essay on His Life and Genius”, p.196

• Before dinner men meet with great inequality of understanding.

  Samuel Johnson

  Food, Men, Understanding

  James Boswell, Samuel Johnson (1866). “The Life of Samuel Johnson”, p.24

• Even those to whom Providence has allotted greater strength of understanding, can expect only to improve a single science. In every other part of learning, they must be content to follow opinions, which they are not able to examine; and, even in that which they claim as peculiarly their own, can seldom add more than some small particle of knowledge, to the hereditary stock devolved to them from ancient times, the collective labour of a thousand intellects.

  Samuel Johnson

  Knowledge, Science, Understanding

  Samuel Johnson (1977). “Selected Poetry and Prose”, p.199, Univ of California Press

• The duties of religion, sincerely and regularly performed, will always be sufficient to exalt the meanest and to exercise the highest understanding.

  Samuel Johnson

  Exercise, Understanding, Religion

  Samuel Johnson (1761). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes”, p.105

• Even those to whom Providence has allotted greater strength of understanding can expect only to improve a single science.

  Samuel Johnson

  Understanding, Study, Providence

  Samuel Johnson (1977). “Selected Poetry and Prose”, p.199, Univ of California Press

• It is to be steadily inculcated, that virtue is the highest proof of understanding, and the only solid basis of greatness.

  Samuel Johnson

  Greatness, Understanding, Virtue

  Samuel Johnson (1761). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes”, p.22

• 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

• It has long been observed, that an atheist has no just reason for endeavouring conversions; and yet none harass those minds which they can influence, with more importunity of solicitation to adopt their opinions. In proportion as they doubt the truth of their own doctrines, they are desirous to gain the attestation of another understanding: and industriously labour to win a proselyte, and eagerly catch at the slightest pretense to dignify their sect with a distinguished name.

  Samuel Johnson

  Atheist, Winning, Names

  Samuel Johnson (1819). “The Beauties of Samuel Johnson: Consisting of Maxims and Observations, Moral, Critical, and Miscellaneous”, p.40

• We are unreasonably desirous to separate the goods of life from those evils which Providence has connected with them, and to catch advantages without paying the price at which they are offered to us. Every man wishes to be rich, but very few have the powers necessary to raise a sudden fortune, either by new discoveries, or by superiority of skill in any necessary employment; and among lower understandings many want the firmness and industry requisite to regular gain and gradual acquisitions.

  Samuel Johnson

  Men, Skills, Discovery

  Samuel Johnson (1824). “Works: With an Essay on His Life and Genius”, p.243

• Before dinner men meet with great inequality of understanding; and those who are conscious of their inferiority have the modesty not to talk; when they have drunk wine, every man feels himself happy, and loses that modesty, and grows impudent and vociferous; but he is not improved; he is only not sensible of his defects.

  Samuel Johnson

  Wine, Men, Drunk

  James Boswell, Samuel Johnson (1859). “The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: Including a Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides”, p.64

• Books have always a secret influence on the understanding; we cannot at pleasure obliterate ideas; he that reads books of science, thogh without any fixed desire of improvement, will grow more knowing.

  Samuel Johnson

  Book, Knowledge, Science

  Samuel Johnson, Arthur Murphy, Francis Pearson Walesby (1825). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D..: The Adventurer and Idler”, p.142

You May Also Like:

James Boswell

Dick Clark

Alexander Pope

Joshua Reynolds

John Milton

Jonathan Swift

Oliver Goldsmith