Quote #114
A lady once asked him how he came to define Pastern the knee of a horse: instead of making an elaborate defence, as she expected, he at once answered, 'Ignorance, Madam, pure ignorance.'
More from Samuel Johnson
- A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a horse still.
- If a man does not make new acquaintance as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, Sir, should keep his frie…
- [Of Lord Chesterfield] This man, I thought, had been a Lord among wits; but, I find, he is only a wit among Lords!
- Towering is the confidence of twenty-one.
- Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and when he has reached ground encumbers …
- No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of b…
- A man may write at any time, if he will set himself doggedly to it.
- Hope is itself a species of happiness, and, perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords.