Other related topics at: Virtue and Vice 370. Patience "Savages, in all countries, have patience proportionate to their unskilfulness, and are content to attain their end by very tedious methods." Johnson: Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland Link 496. Knowledge; Learning; Patience "Men advanced far in knowledge do not love to repeat the elements of their art." Johnson: Rasselas [Imlac] Note: If you haven't read it yet, please read this note of caution regarding quotes from Rasselas. Link 592. Patience "In all evils which admit a remedy, impatience is to be avoided, because it wastes that time and attention in complaints that, if properly applied, might remove the cause." Johnson: Rambler #32 (July 7, 1750) Link 593. Adversity; Diligence; Equanimity; Misfortune; Patience; Perseverance "Patience and submission are very carefully to be distinguished from cowardice and indolence. We are not to repine, but we may lawfully struggle; for the calamities of life, like the necessities of nature, are calls to labour and diligence. When we feel any pressure of distress, we are not to conclude that we can only obey the will of Heaven by languishing under it, any more than when we perceive the pain of thirst, we are to imagine that water is prohibited." Johnson: Rambler #32 (July 7, 1750) Link 1,205. Awe; Effort; Intimidation; Patience "It is common for those who have never accustomed themselves to the labour of inquiry, nor invigorated their confidence by conquests over difficulty, to sleep in the gloomy quiescence of astonishment, without any effort to animate inquiry or dispel obscurity. What they cannot immediately conceive they consider as too high to be reached, or too extensive to be comprehended; they therefore content themselves with the gaze of folly, forbear to attempt what they have no hopes of performing; and resign the pleasure of rational contemplation to more pertinacious study or more active faculties." Johnson: Rambler #137 (July 9, 1751) Link 1,206. Awe; Patience; Teamwork "Among the productions of mechanic art many are of a form so different from that of their first materials, and many consist of parts so numerous and so nicely adapted to each other, that it is not possible to view them without amazement. But when we enter the shops of artificers, observe the various tools by which by which every operation is facilitated, and trace the progress of a manufacture through the different hands that, in succession to each other, contribute to its perfection, we soon discover that every single man has an easy task, and that the extremes, however remote, of natural rudeness and artificial elegance are joined by a regular concatenation of effects, of which every one is introduced by that which precedes it, and equally introduces that which is to follow." Johnson: Rambler #137 (July 9, 1751) Link