You cannot give me an instance of any man who is permitted to lay out his own time contriving not to have tedious hours.
Samuel JohnsonWhoever rises above those who once pleased themselves with equality, will have many malevolent gazers at his eminence.
Samuel JohnsonSir, a man who cannot get to heaven in a green coat, will not find his way thither the sooner in a grey one.
Samuel JohnsonWe 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 JohnsonMany of our miseries are merely comparative: we are often made unhappy, not by the presence of any real evil, but by the absence of some fictitious good; of something which is not required by any real want of nature, which has not in itself any power of gratification, and which neither reason nor fancy would have prompted us to wish, did we not see it in the possession of others.
Samuel Johnson