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OLIVBB GOLDSMITH S LIFE AND TIMES. [BOOK m.
1760. .length in the course of coming right. " At present, the few
Mtjiz. " poets of England no longer depend on the great for sub- " sistence; they have now no other patrons but the public, " and the public, collectively considered, is a good and a " generous master. It is, indeed, too frequently mistaken " as to the merits of every candidate for favour; but to make " amends, it is never mistaken long. . . A man of letters at " present, whose works are valuable, is perfectly sensible of " their value. Every polite member of the community, by " buying what he writes, contributes to reward him. The " ridicule, therefore, of living in a garret, might have been " wit in the last age, but continues such no longer, because " no longer true." *
The quiet composure of this passage exhibits the healthiest
aspect of his mind. Bookseller and public are confronted calmly, and the consequences fairly challenged. It is indeed very obvious, at the close of this first year of the Public Ledger, that increasing opportunities of employment (to say nothing of the constant robbery of his writings by pirate magazine-men) were really teaching him his value, and suggesting hopes he had not earlier dared to entertain. He resumed his connection with the Lady's Magazine, and became its editor: publishing in it, among other writings known and unknown, what he had written of his Life of Voltaire; and retiring from its editorship at the close of a year, when he had raised its circulation (if Mr. Willde's advertisements are to be believed) to three thousand three hundred. He continued his contributions, meanwhile, to the British Magazine;. from which he was not wholly separated till two months before poor Smollett, pining for the loss of his only daughter, went upon the continent (in 1763) never
* Qitizen of the World. Letter Ixxxiv.
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