When I was running about this town
a very poor fellow, I was a great arguer for the advantages of poverty;
but I was, at the same time, very sorry to be poor. Sir, all the
arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil, shew it to
be evidently a great evil. You never find people labouring to convince
you that you may live very happily upon a plentiful fortune.--So you
hear people talking how miserable a King must be; and yet they all wish
to be in his place.'
It was suggested that Kings must be unhappy, because they are deprived
of the greatest of all satisfactions, easy and unreserved society.
JOHNSON. 'That is an ill-founded notion. Being a King does not exclude a
man from such society. Great Kings have always been social. The King
of Prussia, the only great King at present, is very social. Charles the
Second, the last King of England who was a man of parts, was social; and
our Henrys and Edwards were all social.'
Mr. Dempster having endeavoured to maintain that intrinsick merit
OUGHT to make the only distinction amongst mankind.
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