Page:The Works of Samuel Johnson ... A journey to the Hebrides. The vision of Theodore, the hermit of Teneriffe. The fountains. Prayers and meditations. Sermons.v. 10-11. Parliamentary debates.pdf/396

 whose attention is confined within the narrow limits of their own employments, and who have not often leisure to think of more than the means of relieving their own wants, by supplying the demands of others.

With these, and such as these, placed sometimes, by whatever means, in much higher stations, a man of learning has such frequent opportunities of comparing himself; and is so strongly incited, by that comparison, to indulge the contemplation of his own superiority, that it is not to be considered as wonderful, that vanity creeps in upon him; that he does not willingly withdraw his imagination from objects that so much flatter his passions; that he pursues the train of thought from one reflection to another, places himself and others in every situation in which he can appear with advantage in his own eyes, rises to comparisons with still higher characters, and still retains the habit of giving himself the preference; and in all disputable cases, turns the balance in his own favour, by superadding, from his own conceit, that wisdom which by nature he does not possess, or by industry he has not acquired.

This wisdom in his own conceit is very easily at first mistaken for qualities, not in themselves criminal, nor in themselves dangerous; nor is it easy to fix the limits, in speculation, between a resolute adherence to that which appears truth, and an obstinate obtrusion of peculiar notions upon the understanding of others; between the pleasure that naturally arises from the enlargement of the mind, and increase of knowledge, and that which proceeds from a contempt of others, and the insolent triumphs of intellectual superiority. Yet, though the confines of these qualities are nearly alike, their extremes are widely different; and it will soon be discovered, how much evil is avoided by repressing that opinion of ourselves, which vanity suggests; and that confidence, which is gained only by measuring ourselves by ourselves, dwelling on our own excellence, and flattering ourselves with secret panegyricks.