Quotes and anectdotes from the wise to the foolish, and the courageous to the drunk

Samuel Richardson Novelist

  • Gender: Male
  • Citizenship: England
  • Born: Aug 19, 1689
  • Died: Jul 4, 1761

Samuel Richardson was an 18th-century English writer and printer. He is best known for his three epistolary novels: Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded, Clarissa: Or the History of a Young Lady and The History of Sir Charles Grandison. Richardson was an established printer and publisher for most of his life and printed almost 500 different works, including journals and magazines.

At a very early age, Richardson was apprenticed to a printer, whose daughter he eventually married. He lost his first wife along with their five sons, and eventually remarried. Although with his second wife he had four daughters who lived to become adults, they had no male heir to continue running the printing business. While his print shop slowly ran down, at the age of 51 he wrote his first novel and immediately became one of the most popular and admired writers of his time.

He knew leading figures in 18th-century England, including Samuel Johnson and Sarah Fielding. In the London literary world, he was a rival of Henry Fielding, and the two responded to each other's literary styles in their own novels.

As a child is indulged or checked in its early follies, a ground is generally laid for the happiness or misery of the future man. future & happiness

Let a man do what he will by a single woman, the world is encouragingly apt to think Marriage a sufficient amends. marriage

There is a pride, a self-love, in human minds that will seldom be kept so low as to make men and women humbler than they ought to be. women

Love before marriage is absolutely necessary. marriage

Women do not often fall in love with philosophers. women

Women are always most observed when they seem themselves least to observe, or to lay out for observation. women

O! what a Godlike Power is that of doing Good! I envy the Rich and the Great for nothing else! power

Vast is the field of Science. The more a man knows, the more he will find he has to know. science

Women love to be called cruel, even when they are kindest. women

The plays and sports of children are as salutary to them as labor and work are to grown persons. sports

The Cause of Women is generally the Cause of Virtue. women

The difference in the education of men and women must give the former great advantages over the latter, even where geniuses are equal. education

Quantity in food is more to be regarded than quality. A full meal is a great enemy both to study and industry. food

Married people should not be quick to hear what is said by either when in ill humor. humor

Hope is the cordial that keeps life from stagnating. hope

Smatterers in learning are the most opinionated. learning

A widow's refusal of a lover is seldom so explicit as to exclude hope. hope

From sixteen to twenty, all women, kept in humor by their hopes and by their attractions, appear to be good-natured. humor & women

Nothing in human nature is so God-like as the disposition to do good to our fellow-creatures. nature

Every one, more or less, loves Power, yet those who most wish for it are seldom the fittest to be trusted with it. power

Men will bear many things from a kept mistress, which they would not bear from a wife. men

Where words are restrained, the eyes often talk a great deal. great