But while both these great minds were
writing at nearly the same time on the same theme of human misery, the
lessons they taught differed in a manner which is strongly illustrative
of the differences between the two men and their respective
surroundings. French scepticism and distrust of divine power led
Voltaire to impute human griefs to the incapacity of the Creator. But
Johnson, writing "Rasselas" in an hour of sorrow, to obtain means to
pay for his mother's funeral, taught that that happiness, which this
world can not afford, should be sought in the prospect of another and a
better.[192]
All readers of Boswell know how the "Vicar of Wakefield" found a
publisher. How Goldsmith's landlady arrested him for his rent, and how
he wrote to Johnson in his distress. How the kind lexicographer sent a
guinea at once, and followed to find the guinea already changed, and a
bottle of Madeira before the persecuted but philosophical author. How
Johnson put the cork in the bottle, and after a hasty glance at the MS.
of the "Vicar of Wakefield," went out and sold it for sixty pounds. And
how triumphantly Goldsmith rated his landlady.
In the hands of that bookseller, who purchased the novel as much out of
charity as in hope of profit, the "Vicar of Wakefield" remained
neglected, until the publication of "The Traveler" had made the author
famous.
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