f writers of somewhat better position than the mere
libellers whose pens were the slaves of anybody's purse; and a Mr.
Scott, a chaplain of Lord Sandwich, appears to have imagined that it
would be worth while to buy Goldsmith. He applied to Goldsmith in due
course; and this is an account of the interview. "I found him in a
miserable set of chambers in the Temple. I told him my authority; I
told him I was empowered to pay most liberally for his exertions; and,
would you believe it! he was so absurd as to say, 'I can earn as much
as will supply my wants without writing for any party; the assistance
you offer is therefore unnecessary to me.' And I left him in his
garret." Needy as he was, Goldsmith had too much self-respect to
become a paid libeller and cutthroat of public reputations.

On the evening of Friday, the 29th of January, 1768, when Goldsmith
had now reached the age of forty, the comedy of _The Good-natured Man_
was produced at Covent Garden Theatre. The Prologue had, according to
promise, been written by Johnson; and a very singular prologue it was.
Even Boswell was struck by the odd contrast between this sonorous
piece of melancholy and the fun that was to follow. "The first lines
of this Prologue," he conscientiously remarks, "are strongly
characteristical of the dismal gloom of his mind; which, in his case,
as in the case of all who are distressed with the same malady of
imagination, transfers to others its own feelings. Who could suppose
it was to introduce a comedy, when Mr. Bensley solemnly began--

"'Pressed with the load of life, the weary mind
Surveys the general toil of humankind'?

But this dark ground might make Goldsmith's humour shine the more."
When we come to the comedy itself, we find but little bright humour in
the opening passages. The author is obviously timid, anxious, and
constrained. There is nothing of the brisk, confident vivacity with
which _She Stoops to Conquer_ opens. The novice does not yet
understand the art of making his characters explain themselves; and
accordingly the benevolent uncle and honest Jarvis indulge in a
conversation which, laboriously descriptive of the character of young
Honeywood, is spoken "at" the audience. With the entrance of young
Honeywood himself, Goldsmith endeavours to become a little more
sprightly; but there is still anxiety hanging over him, and the
epigrams are little more than merely formal antitheses.

"_Jarvis._ This bill from you