The present time is seldom able to fill desire or imagination with immediate enjoyment, and we are forced to supply its deficiencies by recollection or anticipation.
Interpretation
The present often fails to satisfy our desires, leading us to rely on memories or future hopes for fulfillment.
In this quote, Samuel Johnson reflects on the nature of human experience, suggesting that the present moment often falls short of our expectations or dreams. This inadequacy drives us to either dwell on past experiences that provided joy or to look forward to future possibilities for satisfaction, thus highlighting the tension between our current existence and our desires.
In practice
In a discussion about the importance of living in the moment, this quote can emphasize the struggle between present experiences and past memories.
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.
We are here speaking in open disapproval of that false system of philosophy, not so long ago introduced, by which, because of an extended and unbridled desire of novelty, truth is not sought where it truly resides, and, with a disregard for the holy and apostolic traditions, other vain, futile, uncertain doctrines, not approved by the Church are accepted as true, on which very vain men mistakenly think that truth itself is supported and sustained.
I think of a man and I take away reason and accountability.
I can see he's not in your good books,' said the messenger. 'No, and if he were I would burn my library.
I am a Negro: Black as the night is black, Black like the depths of my Africa.
Where both reason and experience fall short, there occurs a vacuum that can be filled by faith.
It was like certain dinners I remember from the war. There was much wine, an ignored tension, and a feeling of things coming that you could not prevent happening. Under the wine I lost the disgusted feeling and was happy. It seemed they were all such nice people.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.