Page:Johnson - Rambler 4.djvu/269

No 208.

Begone, ye blockheads, Heraclitus cries, And leave my labours to the learn'd and wise; By wit, by knowledge, studious to be read, I scorn the multitude, alive and dead.

IME, which puts an end to all human pleasures and sorrows, has likewise concluded the labours of the. Having supported for two years the anxious employment of a periodical writer, and multiplied my essays to four volumes, I have now determined to desist.

The reasons of this resolution it is of little importance to declare, since justification is unnecessary when no objection is made. I am far from supposing, that the cessation of my performances will raise any inquiry, for I have never been much a favourite of the publick, nor can boast that, in the progress of my undertaking, I have been animated by the rewards of the liberal, the caresses of the great, or the praises of the eminent.

But I have no design to gratify pride by submission, or malice by lamentation; nor think it reasonable to complain of neglect from those whose regard I never solicited. If I have not been distinguished by the distributors of literary honours, I have seldom descended to the arts by which favour is obtained. I have seen the Rh