Reflections that may drive away despair, cannot be wanting to him who
considers how much life is now advanced beyond the state of naked,
undisciplined, uninstructed nature. Whatever has been effected for
convenience or elegance, while it was yet unknown, was believed
impossible; and therefore would never have been attempted, had not some,
more daring than the rest, adventured to bid defiance to prejudice and
censure. Nor is there yet any reason to doubt that the same labour would
be rewarded with the same success. There are qualities in the products
of nature yet undiscovered, and combinations in the powers of art yet
untried. It is the duty of every man to endeavour that something may be
added by his industry to the hereditary aggregate of knowledge and
happiness. To add much can indeed be the lot of few, but to add
something, however little, every one may hope; and of every honest
endeavour, it is certain, that, however unsuccessful, it will be at last
rewarded.
[Footnote e: Johnson gained _his_ knowledge from actual experience. He
told Boswell that before he wrote the Rambler he had been running about
the world more than almost any body. Boswell's Life of Johnson, vol. i.
p. 196.; and vol.
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