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 ��seldom consulted and little obeyed, how much cause shall his contemporaries have to rejoice that their living Johnson forced them to feel the reproofs due to vice and folly while Seneca and Tillotson were no longer able to make impression except on our shelves. Few things indeed which pass well enough with others would do with him: he had been a great reader of Mandeville J, and was ever on the watch to spy out those stains of original corruption, so easily discovered by a penetrating observer even in the purest minds. I mentioned an event, which if it had happened would greatly have injured Mr. Thrale and

his family and then, dear Sir, said I, how sorry you would

have been ! ' I hope (replied he after a long pause) I should have

been very sorry ; but remember Rochefoucault's maxim 2 .'

1 would rather (answered I) remember Prior's verses,

and ask.

What need of books these truths to tell,

Which folks perceive that [who] cannot spell ?

And must we spectacles apply,

To see [view] what hurts our naked eye 3 ?

Will any body's mind bear this eternal microscope that you place upon your own so ? 'I never (replied he) saw one that would, except that of my dear Miss Reynolds and her's is very

near to purity itself 4 .' Of slighter evils, and friends less

distant than our own household, he spoke less cautiously. An acquaintance lost the almost certain hope of a good estate that had been long expected 5. Such a one will grieve (said I) at her friend's disappointment. ' She will suffer as much perhaps (said

he) as your horse did when your cow miscarried.' 1 professed

myself sincerely grieved when accumulated distresses crushed Sir George Colebrook's family ; and I was so. ' Your own

1 'I read Mandeville,' he said, pas.' See Letters, ii. 421, n. 2.

' forty, or, I believe, fifty years ago. For the strong interest which

He did not puzzle me ; he opened Johnson took in Mr. Thrale's affairs

my views into life very much.' Life, see ib. i. 194, n.

iii. 292. Dr. Franklin describes 3 Alma, 1. 1660.

Mandeville as ' a most facetious, en- 4 Boswell complained that 'her

tertaining companion.' Franklin's too nice delicacy would not permit

Works, ed. 1887, i. 89. Johnson's letters to her to be pub-

2 'Dans 1'adversite de nos meil- lished.' Life, i. 486, n. i.

leurs amis nous trouvons toujours 5 Mrs. Thrale herself suffered such

quelque chose qui ne nous deplait a loss. Letters, i. 292, n. 5.

prosperity

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