It is the just doom of laziness and gluttony to be inactive without ease and drowsy without tranquility.
Interpretation
Laziness and excess result in a state of unrest and dissatisfaction.
In this quote, Samuel Johnson highlights the consequences of laziness and gluttony, suggesting that those who indulge in idleness and overindulgence will find themselves in a state of discomfort and unease. Rather than achieving true relaxation, their inactivity leads to restlessness and a lack of peace, emphasizing the irony that indulgence does not automatically lead to satisfaction or happiness.
In practice
This quote can be used in a motivational speech to encourage productivity and a balanced lifestyle.
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.
There is a false modesty, which is vanity; a false glory, which is levity; a false grandeur, which is meanness; a false virtue, which is hypocrisy, and a false wisdom, which is prudery.
I have been in Sorrow's kitchen and licked out all the pots. Then I have stood on the peaky mountain wrapped in rainbows, with a harp and sword in my hands.
Take one, and you cannot take the other. But neither path is safe. Which way would you walk β the way of hard truths or the way of fine lies?
My interest in well-being evolved from my interest in decision making - from raising the question of whether people know what they will want in the future and whether the things that people want for themselves will make them happy.
For the most part, we inherit our opinions. We are the heirs of habits and mental customs.
The mastery of nature is vainly believed to be an adequate substitute for self mastery.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.