He was afflicted with a bodily disease, which made
him often restless and fretful; and with a constitutional melancholy,
the clouds of which darkened the brightness of his fancy, and gave a
gloomy cast to his whole course of thinking: we, therefore, ought not to
wonder at his sallies of impatience and passion at any time; especially
when provoked by obtrusive ignorance, or presuming petulance; and
allowance must be made for his uttering hasty and satirical sallies even
against his best friends. And, surely, when it is considered, that,
'amidst sickness and sorrow[1292],'he exerted his faculties in so many
works for the benefit of mankind, and particularly that he atchieved the
great and admirable DICTIONARY of our language, we must be astonished at
his resolution. The solemn text, 'of him to whom much is given, much
will be required[1293],' seems to have been ever present to his mind, in
a rigorous sense, and to have made him dissatisfied with his labours and
acts of goodness, however comparatively great; so that the unavoidable
consciousness of his superiority was, in that respect, a cause of
disquiet.
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