Melancholy cannot be clearly proved to others, so it is better to be silent about it.

I, who have no sisters or brothers, look with some degree of innocent envy on those who may be said to be born to friends.

I am sensible that my keenness of temper, and a vanity to be distinguished for the day, make me too often splash in life.... I amresolved to restrain myself and attend more to decorum.

After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the non-existence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, "I refute it thus."

In every place, where there is any thing worthy of observation, there should be a short printed directory for strangers.

[A]s a lady adjusts her dress before a mirror, a man adjusts his character by looking at his journal.

Boswell: But, Sir is it not somewhat singular that you should happen to have Cocker's Arithmetic about you on your journey? Dr. Johnson: Why, Sir if you are to have but one book with you upon a journey, let it be a book of science. When you read through a book of entertainment, you know it, and it can do no more for you; but a book of science is inexhaustible.