necessity it feels.--We will say therefore: To decide
about ambition, whether it is bad or not, you have two things to take
into view. Not the coveting of the place alone, but the fitness for
the man of the place withal: that is the question. Perhaps the place
was _his_, perhaps he had a natural right, and even obligation to seek
the place! Mirabeau's ambition to be Prime Minister, how shall we
blame it, if he were "the only man in France that could have done any
good there"? Hopefuler perhaps had he not so clearly _felt_ how much
good he could do! But a poor Necker, who could do no good, and had
even felt that he could do none, yet sitting broken-hearted because
they had flung him out and he was now quit of it, well might Gibbon
mourn over him.--Nature, I say, has provided amply that the silent
great man shall strive to speak withal; _too_ amply, rather!

Fancy, for example, you had revealed to the brave old Samuel Johnson,
in his shrouded-up existence, that it was possible for him to do
priceless divine work for his country and the whole world. That the
perfect Heavenly Law might be made Law on this Earth; that the prayer
he prayed daily, "Thy kingdom come," was at length to be fulfilled! If
you had convinced his judgment of this; that it was possible,
practicable; that he the mournful silent Samuel was called to take a
part in it! Would not the whole soul of the man have flamed-up into a
divine clearness, into noble utterance and determination to act;
casting all sorrows and misgivings under his feet, counting all
affliction and contradiction small,--the whole dark element of his
existence blazing into articulate radiance of light and lightning? It
were a true ambition this! And think now how it actually was with
Cromwell. From of old, the sufferings of God's Church, true zealous
Preachers of the truth flung into dungeons, whipt, set on pillories,
their ears cropt off, God's Gospel-cause trodden under foot of the
unworthy: all this had lain heavy on his soul. Long years he had
looked upon it in silence, in prayer; seeing no remedy on Earth;
trusting well that a remedy in Heaven's goodness would come,--that
such a course was false, unjust, and could not last forever. And now
behold the dawn of it; after twelve years' silent waiting, all England
stirs itself; there is to be once more a Parliament, the Right will
get a voice for itself: inexpressible well-grounded hope has come
again into the Earth. Was not such a Parli