Conversation is a game where the wise do not always win. When men talk together, the acute man will count higher than the subtle man; and he who, though infinitely far from truth, can handle a solid point of argument, will seem wiser than the man round whom truth plays like 'an atmosphere,' but who cannot reason as he feels. The one forms opinions unconsciously, the other none for which he cannot give specific grounds; and it was not inaptly, though humourously, said by Goldsmith of himself, that he disputed best when nobody was by, and always got the better when he argued alone. Society exposed him to continual misconstruction; so that few more touching things have been recorded of him than those which have most awakened laughter. 'People are greatly mistaken ' in me,' he remarked on one occasion. 'A notion goes 'about that when I am silent, I mean to be impudent; 'but I assure you, gentlemen, my silence proceeds from 'bashfulness.' From the same cause proceeded the unconsidered talk which was less easily forgiven than silence; with which we shall find so frequently mixed up the imputation of vanity and envy; and to properly comprehend which there must always be kept in mind the grudging and long-delayed recognition of his genius. Exceptions no doubt there were. Johnson, Burke, and Reynolds, were large exceptions; and with what excellent effect upon his higher nature a sense of his growing fame with such men as these descended, will be plainly hereafter seen. Never is success obtained, if deserved, that it does not

open and improve the mind; and never had Goldsmith

reason to believe the world in any respect disposed to do him justice, that he was not also most ready and desirous to do justice to others. But even with the friends I have named, remained too much of the fondness of pity, the familiarity of condescension, the air of generosity, the habit of patronage; too readily did these appear to justify an illdisguised contempt, a sort of corporate spirit of disrespect, in the rest of the men of letters of that circle; and when was the applause of even the highest, yet counted a sufficient set-off against the depreciation of the lowest of mankind?

No one who thus examines the whole case can doubt, I think, that Goldsmith had never cause to be really content with his position among the men of his time, or with the portion of celebrity at any period during his life assigned to him. All men can patronise the useful, since it so well caters for itself; but as many as there are to need the beautiful, there are few to set it forth, and fewer still to encourage it; and even the booksellers who crowded round the author of the Vicar of Wakefield and the Traveller, came to talk but of booksellers' drudgery and catchpenny compilations. Is it strange that as such a man stood amid the Boswells, Beatties, Bickerstaffes, Murphys, Grahams, Hawkinses, and men of that secondary class, unconscious comparative criticism should have risen in his mind, and taken the form of a very innocent vanity? It is a harsh word, yet often stands for a harmless thing. May it not even be forgiven him if, in galling moments of slighting disregard, he made

occasional silent comparison of Rasselas with the Vicar, of the Rambler with the Citizen of the World, of London with the Traveller? Doctor, I should be glad to see you at 'Eton,' said one of the Eton masters and author of an indifferent Masque of Telemachus, as he sat at supper with Johnson and Goldsmith, indulging somewhat freely in wine, and arrived at that pitch in his cups, when he gave this invitation, of looking at one man and talking to another. 'I shall be glad to wait upon you,' answered Goldsmith. 'No, no,' replied Graham: "'tis not you 'I mean, Doctor Minor; 'tis Doctor Major, there.' 'Now, that Graham,' said Goldsmith afterward, 'is a fellow to make one commit suicide;' and upon nothing graver than expressions such as this, have men like Hawkins inferred that he loved not Johnson but rather envied him for his parts. 'Indeed,' pursues the musical knight, he once entreated a friend to desist from praising him; "for in doing so," said he, "you harrow up my "soul: which it may be admitted was not at all improbable, if it was Hawkins praising him; for there is nothing so likely as a particular sort of praise to harrow up an affectionate soul. Such most certainly was Goldsmith's, and he loved with all his grateful heart whatever was loveable in Johnson. Boswell himself admits it, on more than one occasion; and contradicts much of what he has chosen to say on others, by the remark that in his opinion Goldsmith had not really more of envy than other people, but only talked of it freely.

That free talking did all the mischief. He was candid and simple enough to say aloud, what others would more prudently have concealed. 'Here's such a stir,' he exclaimed to Johnson one day, in a company at Thrale's (it was when London had gone mad about Beattie's common-place Essay on Truth, had embraced the author as the long-delayed 'avenger of insulted Christianity,' and had at last treated, flattered, and caressed him into a pension of £200 a-year) : 'here's such a stir about a fellow that has written one 'book, and I have written many.' 'Ah, Doctor!' retorted Johnson, on his discontented, disregarded, unpensioned friend; 'there go two-and-forty sixpences, you 'know, to one guinea:' whereat the lively Mrs. Thrale claps her hands with delight, and poor Goldsmith can but sulk in a corner. Being an author, it is true, he had no business to be thus thin-skinned, and should rather have been shelled like a rhinoceros; but a stronger man than he was, might have fretted with the irritation of such doubtful wit, and been driven to even intemperate resentment. Into that he never was betrayed. With all that at various times, and in differing degrees, depressed his honest ambition, ruffled his pride, or invaded his self-respect, it will on the whole be very plain, by the time this narrative has closed, that no man more thoroughly, and even in his own despite, practised those gracious and golden maxims with which Edmund Burke this very year rebuked the hasty temper of his protégé Barry, and which every man should take for ever to his heart. Who can live in the world without

occasional silent comparison of Rasselas with the Vicar, of the Rambler with the Citizen of the World, of London with the Traveller? 'Doctor, I should be glad to see you at 'Eton,' said one of the Eton masters and author of an indifferent Masque of Telemachus, as he sat at supper with Johnson and Goldsmith, indulging somewhat freely in wine, and arrived at that pitch in his cups, when he gave this invitation, of looking at one man and talking to another. 'I shall be glad to wait upon you,' answered Goldsmith. 'No, no,' replied Graham: "'tis not you 'I mean, Doctor Minor; 'tis Doctor Major, there.'

Now, that Graham,' said Goldsmith afterward, is a fellow to make one commit suicide;' and upon nothing graver than expressions such as this, have men like Hawkins inferred that he loved not Johnson but rather envied him for his parts. Indeed,' pursues the musical knight, he once entreated a friend to desist from praising him; "for in doing so," said he, "you harrow up my ""soul: "" which it may be admitted was not at all improbable, if it was Hawkins praising him; for there is nothing so likely as a particular sort of praise to harrow up an affectionate soul. Such most certainly was Goldsmith's, and he loved with all his grateful heart whatever was loveable in Johnson. Boswell himself admits it, on more than one occasion; and contradicts much of what he has chosen to say on others, by the remark that in his opinion Goldsmith had not really more of envy than other people, but only talked of it freely.