"To fix deeply in the mind the principles of science, to settle their limitations, and deduce the long succession of their consequences; to comprehend the whole compass of complicated systems, with all the arguments, objections, and solutions, and to reposite in the intellectual treasury the numberless facts, experiments, apophthegms, and positions which must stand single in the memory, and of which none has any perceptible connection with the rest, is a task which, tho' undertaken with ardour and pursued with diligence, must at last be left unfinished by the frailty of our nature."
— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Author
Work Title
Date
January 12, 1760
Metaphor
"To fix deeply in the mind the principles of science, to settle their limitations, and deduce the long succession of their consequences; to comprehend the whole compass of complicated systems, with all the arguments, objections, and solutions, and to reposite in the intellectual treasury the numberless facts, experiments, apophthegms, and positions which must stand single in the memory, and of which none has any perceptible connection with the rest, is a task which, tho' undertaken with ardour and pursued with diligence, must at last be left unfinished by the frailty of our nature."
Metaphor in Context
The difficulty of obtaining knowledge is universally confessed. To fix deeply in the mind the principles of science, to settle their limitations, and deduce the long succession of their consequences; to comprehend the whole compass of complicated systems, with all the arguments, objections, and solutions, and to reposite in the intellectual treasury the numberless facts, experiments, apophthegms, and positions which must stand single in the memory, and of which none has any perceptible connection with the rest, is a task which, tho' undertaken with ardour and pursued with diligence, must at last be left unfinished by the frailty of our nature.
Categories
Provenance
Reading at The Yale Digital Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson.
Citation
Samuel Johnson, The Idler and The Adventurer, vol. 2 of The Works of Samuel Johnson (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1963). <Link to www.yalejohnson.com>
Date of Entry
04/17/2018
