velop himself according to the
magnitude which Nature has made him of; to speak out, to act out, what
nature has laid in him. This is proper, fit, inevitable; nay it is a
duty, and even the summary of duties for a man. The meaning of life here
on earth might be defined as consisting in this: To unfold your _self_,
to work what thing you have the faculty for. It is a necessity for
the human being, the first law of our existence. Coleridge beautifully
remarks that the infant learns to _speak_ by this 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 of the man for 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,
whips, set on pillories, their ears crops off, God's Gospel-cause
trodden under foot of the unworth