Quotes from Samuel Johnson

Potrai negarmi di accompagnarti, ma non puoi impedirmi di seguirti.

ALLICIENCY  (ALLI'CIENCY)   n.s.[allicio, Lat. to entice or draw.]The power of attracting any thing; magnetism; attraction. The feigned central alliciency is but a word, and the manner of it still occult.Glanville'sScepsis Scientifica.

She did apparel her apparel, and with the preciousness of her body made it most sumptuous.Sidney.3. To

He discovered a great ambition to excel, which roused him to counteract his indolence. He was uncommonly inquisitive; and his memory was so tenacious, that he never forgot any thing that he either heard or read. Mr. Hector remembers having recited to him eighteen verses, which, after a little pause, he repeated verbatim, varying only one epithet, by which he improved the line.

Experience has long shown this method to be so distinct as to obviate confusion, and so comprehensive as to prevent any inconvenient omissions.

APOCOPE  (APO'COPE)   n.s.[  figure in grammar,when the last letter or syllable of a word is taken away; as, ingeni for ingenii.

Tender minds should not receive early impressions of goblins, spectres, and apparitions, wherewith maids fright them into compliance.Locke.

ALTIVOLANT  (ALTI'VOLANT)   adj.[altivolans, Lat. from altus and volo.] High flying.Dict.  

When making your choice in life, do not neglect to live.

To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity.

ANTICK  (A'NTICK)   adj.[probably from antiquus, ancient, as things out of use appear old.]Odd; ridiculously wild; buffoon in gesticulation. What! dares

Anything thrice affirmed is true.

ABSTRICTED  (ABSTRI'CTED)   part. adj.[abstrictus, Lat.] Unbound.Dict.

ANGUST  (ANGU'ST)   adj.[angustus, Lat.] Narrow; strait.Dict.   ANGUSTATION  (ANGUSTA'TION)   n.s.[from angustus.]The act of making narrow; straitening; the state of being narrowed.

To ABSTRUDE  (ABSTRU'DE)   v.a.[abstrudo, Lat.] To thrust off, or pull away.Dict.

I consider the English alphabet only as it is English;

Scrambling, outfacing, fashion-mongring boys,That lye, and cog, and flout, deprave, and slander,Go antickly, and shew an outward hideousness,And speak of half a dozen dangerous words.Shakesp.Much ado about Nothing.

ANECDOTE  (A'NECDOTE)   n.s.[   yet unpublished; secret history. Some modern ancedotes aver,He nodded in his elbow-chair.Prior.

I have long known that splendour of reputation is not to be counted among the necessaries of life, and therefore shall not much repine if praise be withheld till it is better deserved.

AMBS [only in 1755 edition] (AMBS)  ACE.n.s.[from ambo, Lat. and ace.]A double ace; so called when two dice turn up the ace. I had rather be in this choice, than throw ambs ace for my life.Shakesp.All's well that ends well.

APODICTICAL  (APODI'CTICAL)   adj.[from    evident truth; demonstration.]Demonstrative; evident beyond contradiction. Holding an apodictical knowledge, and an assured knowledge of it; verily, to persuade their apprehensions otherwise, were to make Euclid believe, that there were more than one centre in

ADMONITION  (ADMONI'TION)   n.s.[admonitio, Lat.]The hint of a fault or duty; counsel; gentle reproof.

ANTIPHRASIS  (ANTI'PHRASIS)   n.s.[from    against, and uq  a form of speech.]The use of words in a sense opposite to their proper meaning. You now find no cause to repent, that you never dipt your hands in the bloody high courts of justice, so called only by antiphrasis.South'sDedication to hisSermons.

Th' eternal eye, whose sight discerns Abstrusest thoughts, from forth his holy mount,And from within the golden lamps that burn Nightly before him, saw, without their light, Rebellion rising.Milton'sParadise Lost,b. v.