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 268 Anecdotes.

��by any expence or fatigue of his own, sooner than any of the canters. Canter indeed was he none : he would forget to ask people after the health of their nearest relations, and say in excuse, ' That he knew they did not care : why should they ? (says he ;) every one in this world has as much as they can do in caring for themselves, and few have leisure really to think of their neighbours distresses, however they may delight their tongues with talking of them I .'

The natural depravity of mankind and remains of original sin were so fixed in Mr. Johnson's opinion 2, that he was indeed a most acute observer of their effects ; and used to say some times, half in jest half in earnest, that they were the remains of his old tutor Mandeville's instructions 3. As a book how ever, he took care always loudly to condemn the Fable of the Bees, but not without adding, 'that it was the work of a thinking man.' loudly condemned for uttering sentiments, which twenty years after I have heard as loudly applauded from the lips of Dr. Johnson, concerning the well-known writer of that celebrated work : but if people will live long enough in this capricious world, such instances of partiality will shock them less and less, by frequent repetition. Mr. Johnson knew mankind, and wished to mend them : he therefore, to the piety and pure religion, the untainted integrity, and scrupulous morals of my earliest and most disinterested friend, judiciously contrived to join a cautious

1 On April 28, 1768, he wrote to of another.' Letters, i. 141. Mrs. Thrale : * Yet when any man 2 ' Lady Macleod asked if no man finds himself disposed to complain was naturally good. JOHNSON. "No, with how little care he is regarded, Madam, no more than a wolf." let him reflect how little he contri- BOSWELL. "Nor no woman, Sir?" butes to the happiness of others, and JOHNSON. " No, Sir." Lady Mac- how little, for the most part, he leod started at this, saying in a low suffers from their pains. . . Nor can voice, " This is worse than Swift." ' we wonder that, in a state in which Life, v. 211. all have so much to feel of their own 3 Ante, p. 207. evils, very few have leisure for those 4 Ante, p. 246.

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