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Virtue and Vice
1,105. Audacity; Diligence; Vanity;
Youth
"I am afraid there is little hope of persuading the young and
sprightly part of my readers... to learn... the difference
between diligence and hurry, between speed and precipitation; to
prosecute their designs with calmness, to watch the concurrence
of opportunity, and, endeavour to find the lucky moment which
they cannot make. Youth is the time of enterprise and hope;
having yet no occasion of comparing our force with any opposing
power, we naturally form presumptions in our own favour, and
imagine that obstruction and impediment will give way before us.
The first repulses rather inflame
vehemence than teach prudence;
a brave and generous mind is long before it suspects its own
weakness, or submits to sap the difficulties which it suspected
to subdue by storm. Before disppointments have enforced the
dictates of philosophy, we believe it in our power to shorten the
interval between the first cause and the last effect; we laugh
at the timorous delay of plodding industry, and fancy that, by
increasing the fire, we can at pleasure accelerate the
projection."
Johnson: Rambler #111 (April 9, 1751)
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1,106. Audacity; Old Age; Time;
Youth
"At our entrance into the world, when health and vigour give us
fair promises of time sufficient for the regular maturation of
our schemes, and a long enjoyment of our acquisitions, we are
eager to seize the present moment; we pluck every gratification
within our reach without suffering it to ripen into perfection,
and crowd all the varieties of delight into a narrow compass;
but age seldom fails to change our conduct; we grow negligent of
time in proportion as we have less remaining, and suffer the last
part of life to steal from us in languid preparations for future
undertakings, or slow approaches to remote advantages, in weak
hopes of some fortuitous occurrence, or drowsy equilibrations of
undetermined counsel. Whether it be that the aged having tasted
the pleasures of man's condition, and found them delusive, become
less anxious for their attainment; or that frequent miscarriages
have depressed them to despair, and frozen them to inactivity;
or that death shocks them more as it advances upon them, and they
are afraid to remind themselves of their decay, or to discover o
their own hearts that the time of trifling is past."
Johnson: Rambler #111 (April 9, 1751)
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1,108. Audacity; Old Age; Youth
"A perpetual conflict with natural desires seems to be the lot of
our present state. In youth we require something of the
tardiness and frigidity of age; and in age we must labour to
recall the fire and impetuosity of youth; in youth we must learn
to respect, and in age to enjoy."
Johnson: Rambler #111 (April 9, 1751)
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1,109. Audacity
"He that too early aspires to honours must resolve to encounter
not only the opposition of interest, but the malignity of envy.
He that is too eager to be rich generally endangers his fortune
in wild adventures and uncertain projects; and he that hastens
too speedily to reputation often raises his character by
artifices and fallacies, decks himself in colours which quickly
fade, or in plumes which accident may shake off, or competition
pluck away."
Johnson: Rambler #111 (April 9, 1751)
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1,113. Audacity; Pride; Youth
"It is one of the innumerable absurdities of pride, that we are
never more impatient of direction than in the part of life when
we need it most; we are in haste to meet enemies whom we have
not strength to overcome, and to undertake tasks which we cannot
perform."
Johnson: Rambler #111 (April 9, 1751)
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1,145. Audacity; Youth
"It is very natural for young men to be vehement, acrimonious,
and severe. For as they seldom comprehend at once all the
consequences of a position, or perceive the difficulties by which
cooler and more experienced reasoners are restrained from
confidence, they form their conclusions with great precipitance.
Seeing nothing that can darken or embarrass the question, they
expect to find their own opinion universally prevalent, and are
inclined to impute uncertainty and hesitation to want of honesty
rather than of knowledge."
Johnson: Rambler #121 (May 14, 1751)
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1,257. Arrogance; Audacity
"The mental disease of the present generation is impatience of study, contempt of the great masters of ancient wisdom, and a disposition to rely wholly upon unassisted genius and natural sagacity. The wits of these happy days have discovered a way to fame, which the dull caution of our laborious ancestors durst never attempt; they cut the knots of sophistry, which it was formerly the business of years to untie, solve difficulties by sudden irradiations of intelligence, and comprehend long processes of argument by immediate intuition.
"Men who have flattered themselves into this opinion of their own abilities, look down on all who waste their lives over books, as a race of inferior beings condemned by nature to perpetual pupilage, and fruitlessly endeavouring to remedy their barrenness by incessant cultivation, or succour their feebleness by subsidiary strength. They presume that none would be more industrious than they, if they were not more sensible of deficiences; and readily conclude, that he who places no confidence in his own powers owes his modesty only to his weakness."
Johnson: Rambler #154 (September 7, 1751)
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1,284. Arrogance; Audacity
"To excite opposition and inflame malevolence is the unhappy
privilege of courage made arrogant by consciousness of
strength."
Johnson: Rambler #159 (September 24, 1751)
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1,304. Audacity
"It is not uncommon for those who have grown wise by the labour
of others to add a little of their own, and overlook their
masters."
Johnson: Addison (Lives of the Poets)
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1,456. Audacity
"Among other pleasing errors of young minds, is the opinion of
their own importance. He that has not yet remarked how little
attention his contemporaries can spare from their own affairs
conceives all eyes turned upon himself, and imagines every one
that approaches him to be an enemy or a follower, an admirer or a
spy."
Johnson: Rambler #196 (February 1, 1752)
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