Such, Mr. Adventurer, is the life to which I am condemned by a foolish endeavour to be happy by imitation; such is the happiness to which I pleased myself with approaching, and which I considered as the chief end of my cares and my labours.  I toiled year after year with cheerfulness, in expectation of the happy hour in which I might be idle:  the privilege of idleness is attained, but has not brought with it the blessing of tranquillity.

I am yours, &c. 
MERCATOR.

[1] Johnson was too apt to destroy the keeping of character in his
    correspondences.  A retired trader might desire a little more
    slumber, “a little folding of the hands to sleep;” but the lofty
    malignity of a fallen spirit sickening at the beams of day, would
    not be among the feelings of an ordinary mind.  Some good remarks on
    this point may be seen in Miss Talbot’s Letters to Mrs. Carter.

No. 107.  TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1753.

 —­Sub judice lis est. HOR.  De Ar.  Poet. 78.

  And of their vain disputings find no end.  FRANCIS.

It has been sometimes asked by those who find the appearance of wisdom more easily attained by questions than solutions, how it comes to pass, that the world is divided by such difference of opinion? and why men, equally reasonable, and equally lovers of truth, do not always think in the same manner?

With regard to simple propositions, where the terms are understood, and the whole subject is comprehended at once, there is such an uniformity of sentiment among all human beings, that, for many ages, a very numerous set of notions were supposed to be innate, or necessarily co-existent with the faculty of reason:  it being imagined, that universal agreement could proceed only from the invariable dictates of the universal parent.

In questions diffuse and compounded, this similarity of determination is no longer to be expected.  At our first sally into the intellectual world, we all march together along one straight and open road; but as we proceed further, and wider prospects open to our view, every eye fixes upon a different scene; we divide into various paths, and, as we move forward, are still at a greater distance from each other.  As a question becomes more complicated and involved, and extends to a greater number of relations, disagreement of opinion will always be multiplied; not because we are irrational, but because we are finite beings, furnished with different kinds of knowledge, exerting different degrees of attention, one discovering consequences which escape another, none taking in the whole concatenation of causes and effects, and most comprehending but a very small part, each comparing what he observes with a different criterion, and each referring it to a different purpose.

Where, then, is the wonder, that they who see only a small part should judge erroneously of the whole? or that they, who see different and dissimilar parts, should judge differently from each other?