As for the success of
those, who have written without the pale of this confederacy, he
imputes it entirely to want of taste in the public; not
considering, that to the approbation of that very tasteless
public, he himself owes all the consequence he has in life.
Those originals are not fit for conversation. If they would
maintain the advantage they have gained by their writing, they
should never appear but upon paper -- For my part, I am shocked to
find a man have sublime ideas in his head, and nothing but
illiberal sentiments in his heart -- The human soul will be
generally found most defective in the article of candour -- I am
inclined to think, no mind was ever wholly exempt from envy;
which, perhaps, may have been implanted, as an instinct essential
to our nature. I am afraid we sometimes palliate this vice, under
the spacious name of emulation. I have known a person remarkably
generous, humane, moderate, and apparently self-denying, who
could not hear even a friend commended, without betraying marks
of uneasiness; as if that commendation had implied an odious
comparison to his prejudice, and every wreath of praise added to
the other's character, was a garland plucked from his own
temples.
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