We desire to treat the President with the utmost courtesy
and respect as the head of the American Republic, but is not his whole attitude a little liable to the criticism which Dr. Johnson math on Lord Chesterfield's eulogy of his Dictionary ? Dr. Wilson speaks, as did Lord Chesterfield, as the polite patron of the Allies. Here is the other Doctor's very English reply to Lord Chesterfield :—
" I have been pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to complain, and have brought it, at last, to the verge of publication, without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one. smile of favour. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a Patron before. The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and found him a native of the rocks. Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man straggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, encumbers him with help ? The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labours, had it been early, had been kind ; but it has been delayed till I am indifferent. . . . I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations where no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the public should consider mo as owing that to a Patron, wino h Providence has enabled me to do for myself."
That was not a just retort We agree that it wee not; but who can deny that it was a very natural and a very human one in all
the circumstances
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