OLIYEE GOLDSMITH'S LIFE AND TIMES. [BOOK n.

1759. good of mankind; and it is a set-off, doubtless, in the large
mill, account. The " two carriages " and the " style " of Griffiths
are long passed away into the rubbish they sprang from, and
all of us will be apt enough now to thank heaven that we
were not Griffiths. Jacob Tonson's hundred thousand
pounds are now of less account, than the bad shillings
he insinuated into Dryden's payments; and the fame of
Secretary Nottingham is very much overtopped by the
pillory of De Foe. The Italian princes who beggared Dante
are still without pity writhing in his deathless poem, while
Europe looks to the beggar as to a star in heaven; nor has
Italy's greater day, or the magnificence which crowded the
court oŁ Augustus, left behind them a name of any earthly
interest to compare with his who restored land to Virgil,
and who succoured the fugitive Horace. These are results
which have obtained in all countries, and been confessed by
every age; and it will be well when they win for literature
other living regards, and higher present consideration, than
it has yet been able to obtain. Men of genius can more
easily starve, than the world, with safety to itself, can con-
tinue to neglect and starve them. What new arrangement,
what kind of consideration may be required, will not be very
distant from the simple acknowledgment that greater honour
and respect ABE due.

This is what literature has wanted in England, and] not
the laced coat and powdered wig, the fashionable acceptance
and great men's feasts, which have on rare occasions been
substituted for it. The most liberal patronage vouchsafed
in this country to living men-of-letters, lias never been
unaccompanied by degrading incidents; nor their claims
at any time admitted without discourtesy or contumely.
It is a century and a half since an act of parliamentas a very large man, and made out the triumvirate with