A Quote by Samuel Johnson

No man reads a book of science from pure inclination. The books that we do read with pleasure are light compositions, which contain a quick succession of events. — © Samuel Johnson
No man reads a book of science from pure inclination. The books that we do read with pleasure are light compositions, which contain a quick succession of events.
It's different to read a book for pleasure than to read it analytically. In the past, I'd read Pride and Prejudice for pleasure. This time, I was really looking at the structure, the order of events, how the characters interact with each other and how the book is paced.
The parent reads the book. The kid reads the book and then they can talk about the characters instead of talking about themselves. You know there's a connection even if you don't talk about it when you read the same books.
'First Light' has gotten a reputation as a kind of cult classic about science. I never really intended it to be read as a science book, but books, like children, have a way of choosing their own friends.
If a man begins to read in the middle of a book, and feels an inclination to go on, let him not quit it to go to the beginning. He may perhaps not feel again the inclination.
Books have always a secret influence on the understanding; we cannot at pleasure obliterate ideas; he that reads books of science, thogh without any fixed desire of improvement, will grow more knowing.
The aims of pure basic science, unlike those of applied science, are neither fast-flowing nor pragmatic. The quick harvest of applied science is the useable process, the medicine, the machine. The shy fruit of pure science is understanding.
You have read very good books, I am sure; there is an excellent book however, that never grows old; it is the one that God has written on every plant, on every grain of sand, in yourself; it is the book of Divine love. Give, therefore, your preference to that beautiful book and add to it a few pages of admiration and gratefulness. Read and understand all other books in the light of this one.
A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good.
Most scholarly books we read for the information or insight they contain. But some we return to simply for the pleasure of the author's company.
There are books that one reads over and over again, books that become part of the furniture of one's mind and alter one's whole attitude to life, books that one dips into but never reads through, books that one reads at a single sitting and forgets a week later.
The mind which is created quick to love, is responsive to everything that is pleasing, soon as by pleasure it is awakened into activity. Your apprehensive faculty draws an impression from a real object, and unfolds it within you, so that it makes the mind turn thereto. And if, being turned, it inclines towards it, that inclination is love; that is nature, which through pleasure is bound anew within you.
I'm grateful for every teacher or librarian who reads a book and says, "This is exactly the book that so-and-so needs to read; I'll get it in his hands." I'm amazed at the network of adults who make sure that kids get books.
No one ever reads a book. He reads himself through books.
If one reads enough books one has a fighting chance. Or better, one's chances of survival increase with each book one reads.
You can't write a book if you've never read a book. And if you've read five books and you try to write a book, your book will mainly encompass the themes and the context of the five books you've read. Now, the more books you read, the more you can bring to a book when you decide to write one. So the more rap I learned, the more I was able to bring to rap when I decided to rap. But this was all subconscious.
Historical chronology, human or geological, depends... upon comparable impersonal principles. If one scribes with a stylus on a plate of wet clay two marks, the second crossing the first, another person on examining these marks can tell unambiguously which was made first and which second, because the latter event irreversibly disturbs its predecessor. In virtue of the fact that most of the rocks of the earth contain imprints of a succession of such irreversible events, an unambiguous working out of the chronological sequence of these events becomes possible.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!