last, said
the Corporal, and what will become of his boy? He _shall not_ drop
said my uncle Toby, firmly,--Ah, well-a-day!--do what we can for
him, said Trim, maintaining his point,--the poor soul will
die.--_He shall not die, by G--_, cried my uncle Toby.

--The _accusing spirit_, which flew up to Heaven's chancery with
the oath, blushed as he gave it in;--and the _recording angel_, as
he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word, and blotted it out
for ever.[190]

"Ye, who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy, and pursue
with eagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform
the promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day
will be supplied by the morrow; attend to the history of Rasselas,
Prince of Abyssinia." Thus begins the famous tale which Dr. Johnson
made the repository of so much of his wisdom, and so beautiful an
example of English style. Rasselas and his royal brothers and sisters
live in a secluded portion of the earth known as the Happy Valley,
where, completely isolated from the world, they await their succession
to the crown of the imaginary land of Abyssinia, surrounded by every
luxury which can make life agreeable, and shut off from all knowledge
of those evils which can make it painful. The aim of the story is to
show the vanity of expecting perfect happiness, and the folly of
sacrificing present advantages for the delusive promises of the future.

The scene opens in the Happy Valley, where there is all that labor or
danger can procure or purchase, without either labor to be endured or
danger to be dreaded. Rasselas illustrates the habitual discontent of
man by wearying of the monotonous happiness of his royal home, and,
together with his sister Nekayah, who shares his ennui, and Imlac, a
man of learning, he escapes from the abode of changeless joys and
perpetual merriment.

Once beyond the barriers of the Happy Valley, Rasselas and Nekayah
seek in the various ranks and conditions of men the abode of true
happiness. It is sought in vain amidst the hollow and noisy pleasures
of the young and thoughtless; in vain among philosophers, whose
theories so ill accord with their practice; in vain among shepherds,
whose actual life contrasts so painfully with the descriptions of the
poet; in vain in crowds, where sorrow lurks beneath the outward smile;
in vain in the cell of the hermit, who counts the days till he shall
once more