James Boswell Quotes - Page 2

I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically.

I have seen many a bear led by a man: but I never before saw a man led by a bear.

He had no settled plan of life, nor looked forward at all, but merely lived from day to day. Yet he read a great deal in a desultory manner, without any scheme of study, as chance threw books in his way, and inclination directed him through them.

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.

Buffon, who, with all his theoretical ingenuity and extraordinary eloquence, I suspect had little actual information in the science on which he wrote so admirably For instance, he tells us that the cow sheds her horns every two years; a most palpable error. ... It is wonderful that Buffon who lived so much in the country at his noble seat should have fallen into such a blunder I suppose he has confounded the cow with the deer.

A companion loves some agreeable qualities which a man may possess, but a friend loves the man himself.

Wine makes a man better pleased with himself. I do not say that it makes him more pleasing to others. Sometimes it does. But the danger is, that while a man grows better pleased with himself, he may be growing less pleasing to others. Wine gives a man nothing. It neither gives him knowledge nor wit; it only animates a man, and enables him to bring out what a dread of the company has presented.

When a man is familiar with many people he must expect many disagreeable familiarizations.

A woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hinter legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to see it done at all.

It is not every man who can be exquisitely miserable, any more than exquisitely happy.

O charitable philosopher, I beg you to help me. My mind is weak but my soul is strong. Kindle that soul, and the sacred fire shall never be extinguished.

Many infidels have maintained that Ignorance is the mother of Devotion.

We often observe in lawyers, who as Quicquid agunt homines is the matter of law suits, are sometimes obliged to pick up a temporary knowledge of an art or science, of which they understood nothing till their brief was delivered, and appear to be much masters of it.

A page of my journal is like a cake of portable soup. A little may be diffused into a considerable portion.

One must be strict even in little things.

Those who would extirpate evil from the world know little of human nature. As well might punch be palatable without souring as existence agreeable without care.

My mind was, as it were, strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian ether.

I think there is a blossom about me of something more distinguished than the generality of mankind.

For my own part I think no innocent species of wit or pleasantry should be suppressed: and that a good pun may be admitted among the smaller excellencies of lively conversation.

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.

I am, I flatter myself, completely a citizen of the world. In my travels through Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Corsica, France, I never felt myself from home.

Dr. Johnson ... sometimes employed himself in chymistry, sometimes in watering and pruning a vine, and sometimes in small experiments, at which those who may smile, should recollect that there are moments which admit of being soothed only by trifles.

Friendship, "the wine of life," should, like a well-stocked cellar, be continually renewed; and it is consolatory to think, that although we can seldom add what will equal the generous first growths of our youth, yet friendship becomes insensibly old in much less time than is commonly imagined, and not many years are required to make it mellow and pleasant.

My wife, who does not like journalizing, said it was leaving myself embowelled to posterity--a good strong figure. But I think itis rather leaving myself embalmed. It is certainly preserving myself.

Writing a book I have found to be like building a house. A man forms a plan, and collects materials.