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The Works of Samuel Johnson, L. L. D. (1811)
The Works of Samuel Johnson L L D - 1811 Author:Samuel Johnson Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: No. 6V SATURDAY, APRIL 7, 1750. Strenaa nos eMrrcet inertia, naviius atijut Quadrigi pctimus bene vivere : quod pctis, hie fst : Est Ulubris, animus si ... more »te non dcfidt tujvas. Hon. Active in indolence, abroad we roam Tn quest of happiness which dwells at home : With vain pursuits faliffu'd, at length you'll find No place excludes it from an equal mind. Elphinston. A HAT man should never suffer his happiness to depend upon external circumstances, is one of the chief precepts of the Stoical philosophy; a precept, indeed, which that lofty sect has extended beyond the condition of human life, and in which some of them seem to have comprised an utter exclusion of all corporal pain and pleasure from the regard or attention of a wise man. Such safiientia insaniens, s Horace calls the doctrine of another sect, such extravagance of philosophy, can want neither authority nor argument for its confutation : it is overthrown by the experience of every hour, and the powers of nature rise up against it. But we may very properly inquire, how near to this exalted state it is in our power to approach ? how far we ran exempt ourselves from outward influences, and secure to our minds a state of tranquillity ? for, though the boast of absolute independence is ridiculous and vain, yet a mean flexibility to every impulse, and a patient submission to the tyranny of casual troubles, is below the dignity of that mind, which, however depraved or weakened, boasts its derivation from a celestial original, and hopes for an union with infinite goodness) and unvariable felicity. ,i yitiis pejorafovent froprium deserat orturA. Unless the soul, to vice a thrall, Desert her own original. The necessity of erecting ourselves to some degree of intellectual dignity, and of preserving res...« less