There must always be a struggle between a father and son, while one aims at power and the other at independence. (Samuel Johnson)
Power is always gradually stealing away from the many to the few, because the few are more vigilant and consistent. (Samuel Johnson)
There are few things that we so unwillingly give up, even in advanced age, as the supposition that we still have the power of ingratiating ourselves with the fair sex. (Samuel Johnson)
When once a man has made celebrity necessary to his happiness, he has put it in the power of the weakest and most timorous malignity, if not to take away his satisfaction, at least to withhold it. His enemies may indulge their pride by airy negligence and gratify their malice by quiet neutrality. (Samuel Johnson)
It is difficult to conjecture, from the conduct of him whom we see in a low condition, how he would act if wealth and power were put into his hands (Samuel Johnson)
He that has once concluded it lawful to resist power, when it wants merit, will soon find a want of merit, to justify his resistance to power (Samuel Johnson)
The supreme end of education is expert discernment in all things - the power to tell the good from the bad, the genuine from the counterfeit, and to prefer the good and the genuine to the bad and the counterfeit. (Samuel Johnson)
No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it. . . . There is a remedy in human nature against tyranny, that will keep us safe under every form of government. (Samuel Johnson)
Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not. (Samuel Johnson)
Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings (Samuel Johnson)
I cannot forbear to wish, that this commotion (in the colonies) may end without bloodshed, and that the rebels may be subdued by terror rather than by violence and, therefore, recommend such a force as may take away, not only the power, but the hope (Samuel Johnson)
Every other enjoyment malice may destroy every other panegyric envy may withhold but no human power can deprive the boaster of his own encomiums. (Samuel Johnson)
Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages we expect from them. (Samuel Johnson)
Power is not sufficient evidence of truth. (Samuel Johnson)