Philosophers there are who try to make themselves believe that this life is happy; but they believe it only while they are saying it, and never yet produced conviction in a single mind.
Interpretation
This quote critiques the notion that merely claiming life is happy can convince oneself or others of that happiness.
Samuel Johnson's quote suggests that some philosophers may attempt to convince themselves and others that life is happy, but their assertions lack genuine belief and fail to instill true conviction in any listener. It highlights the difference between stating a belief and truly living it, implying that mere words are insufficient to convey the depth of human experience.
In practice
This quote would be a great addition to a discussion on the nature of happiness in a philosophy class.
To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is animated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external ordinances, by stated calls to worship, and the salutary influence of example.
He that reads and grows no wiser seldom suspects his own deficiency, but complains of hard words and obscure sentences, and asks why books are written which cannot be understood.
To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of the weary pilgrimage.
Fly-fishing may be a very pleasant amusement; but angling or float fishing I can only compare to a stick and a string, with a worm at one end and a fool at the other.
When any anxiety or gloom of the mind takes hold of you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaining; but exert yourselves to hide it, and by endeavoring to hide it you drive it away.
A fishing rod is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.
In an age of relativism, orthodoxy is the only possible rebellion left
If you were dealing with the accumulated repressions of only one lifetime, it would be different. But these are the repressions of numerous lives. Nobody knows how many times you have been born, and how many societies have crushed you. And each time a different society, and all these societies destroying you in different ways... this is why you carry so many inner contradictions.
All that makes existence valuable to any one depends on the enforcement of restraints upon the actions of other people.
I, therefore, O Caesar, do not publish this work, merely prefixing my name to a treatise which of right belongs to others, nor think of acquiring reputation by finding fault with the works of any one.
Evil is like water, it abounds, is cheap, soon fouls, but runs itself clear of taint.
I wanted us to share the sense that the number of wrong moves far exceeds the number of good moves, to share the frightening instability of the correct decision, to bond in being confounded.
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