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Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20543, 19 February 1935, Page 6

Life of Johnson. (")NE OBSERVATION which Johnson makes in Swift's life should be often inculcated: — / “It may be justly supposed, that there was in his conversation what appears so frequently in his letters, an affectation of familiarity with the great, an ambition of momentary equality, sought and enjoyed by the neglect of those ceremonies which custom has established as the barriers between one order of society and another. This transgression of regularity was by himself and his admirers termed greatness of soul; but a great mind disdains to hold any thing by courtesy, and therefore never usurps what a lawful claimant may take away. lie that encroaches on another’s dignity puts himself in his power; he is either repelled with helpless indignity, or endured by clemency and condescension.” “My dear friend Dr Bathurst (said he with a warmth of approbation), declared he was glad that his father, who was a WestIndian planter, had left his affairs in total ruin, because having no estate, he not under the temptation of having slaves.”