orrow,
are benevolent and active; considering man, as the victim of sin,
and woe, and death, for a cause which reason cannot unfold, but
which religion promises to terminate, they sooth the short-lived
disappointments of life, by pointing to a loftier and more lasting
state. Candide is the book of the one party, Rasselas of the
other. They appeared nearly together; they exhibit the same
picture of change, and misery, and crime. But the one demoralized
a continent, and gave birth to lust, and rapine, and
bloodshed; the other has blessed many a heart, and gladdened
the vale of sorrow, with many a rill of pure and living water.
Voltaire may be likened to the venomous toad of eastern allegory,
which extracts a deadly poison from that sunbeam which
bears health, and light, and life to all beside: the philosopher,
in Rasselas, like some holy and aged man, who has well nigh run
his course, in recounting the toils and perils of his pilgrimage,
may sadden the young heart, and crush the fond hopes of inexperience;
but, while he wounds, he presents the antidote and the
balm, and tells, where promises will be realized, and hopes will
no more be disappointed. We have ventured to detain our
readers thus long from Rasselas itself, because, from its similar
view of life with the sceptical school, many well-intentioned men
have apprehended, its effects might be the same. We have,
therefore, attempted briefly to distinguish the sources whence
these different writings have issued, and, we trust, we have
pointed out their remoteness from each other. And we do not
dwell on the subject, at greater length, because Johnson's writings,
in various parts, will require our attention on this particular head.
To be restless and weary of the dull details and incomplete enjoyments
of life, is common to all lofty minds. Frederick of
Prussia sought, in the bosom of a cold philosophy, to chill every
generous impulse, and each warm aspiration after immortality;
but he painfully felt, how inefficient was grandeur, or power, to
fill the heart, and plaintively exclaimed to Maupertuis, "Que
notre vie est peu de chose;" all is vanity. The philosophy of
Rasselas, however, though it pronounces on the unsatisfactory
nature of all human enjoyments, and though its perusal may
check the worldling in his mirth, and bring down the mighty
in his pride, does not, with the philosophic conqueror, sullenly
despair, but gently sooths the mourner, by the prospect of a fina