Date: Saturday March 24, 1750
"Those who have proceeded so far as to appeal to the tribunal of succeeding times, are not likely to be cured of their infatuation; but all endeavours ought to be used for the prevention of a disease, for which, when it has attained its height, perhaps no remedy will be found in the gardens of ph...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, November 3, 1750
"Some of these instructors of mankind have not contented themselves with checking the overflows of passion, and lopping the exuberance of desire, but have attempted to destroy the root as well as the branches; and not only to confine the mind within bounds, but to smooth it for ever by a dead calm."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, November 3, 1750
"When we have heated our zeal in a cause, and elated our confidence with success, we are naturally inclined to persue the same train of reasoning, to establish some collateral truth, to remove some adjacent difficulty, and to take in the whole comprehension of our system. As a prince in the ardou...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, November 3, 1750
"The philosophers having found an easy victory over those desires which we produce in ourselves, and which terminate in some imaginary state of happiness unknown and unattainable, proceeded to make further inroads upon the heart, and attacked at last our senses and our instincts."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, November 3, 1750
"Yet it cannot be with justice denied, that these men have been very useful monitors, and have left many proofs of strong reason, deep penetration, and accurate attention to the affairs of life, which it is now our business to separate from the foam of a boiling imagination, and to apply judiciou...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Tuesday, November 20, 1750
"Yet, if we consider the conduct of those sententious philosophers, it will often be found, that they repeat these aphorisms, merely because they have somewhere heard them, because they have nothing else to say, or because they think veneration gained by such appearances of wisdom, but that no id...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Tuesday, November 20, 1750
"Of this kind is the well known and well attested position, 'that life is short,' which may be heard among mankind by an attentive auditor, many times a day, but which never yet within my reach of observation left any impression upon the mind."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: 1751
One may be "tost about at the pleasure of every wind" and"hurried thro' the ocean of life, just as each each predominant passion direction
preview | full record— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)
Date: 1751
Beauty may "take the senses as it were by surprise; but the impression soon wears off, and the captivated heart regains its former liberty"
preview | full record— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)
Date: 1751
"While the blood runs high, and desire is rampant for possession, prudence is of little force; but when the one begins to flag, the other resumes its empire over the mind, and never rests till it finds means to retrieve what it has lost"
preview | full record— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)