Samuel Johnson
Plain good sense against the thesis that denies matter: a stone struck with the foot is, he thinks, answer enough to Berkeley.
Life
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784), born in Lichfield, was an English writer and critic. He published A Dictionary of the English Language (1755), the philosophical tale Rasselas (1759) and the Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets (1779-1781). He is best known through the portrait drawn by his friend James Boswell in the Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), which reports his conversations, including the kick at the stone against Berkeley.
Main works
A landmark dictionary of English that illustrates each sense with quotations from authors.
A prince looks in vain for a perfectly happy life and concludes that complete happiness does not exist here below.
Biographies and critical judgments of fifty-two poets, written with robust common sense.
In his own words
« My dear friend, clear your mind of cant. »
« I refute it THUS. »
Positions
click a row to see the evidenceA devout Anglican, he lived and argued as a believer in a personal God; Boswell stresses that his piety was constant and fervent.
Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)