s made him justly
think that, to many of his readers, this form of instruction would, in
some degree, have the advantage of novelty. A few days before the first
of his Essays came out, there started another competitor for fame in the
same form, under the title of The Tatler Revived, which I believe was
'born but to die.' Johnson was, I think, not very happy in the choice
of his title, The Rambler, which certainly is not suited to a series
of grave and moral discourses; which the Italians have literally,
but ludicrously translated by Il Vagabondo; and which has been lately
assumed as the denomination of a vehicle of licentious tales, The
Rambler's Magazine. He gave Sir Joshua Reynolds the following account of
its getting this name: 'What MUST be done, Sir, WILL be done. When I was
to begin publishing that paper, I was at a loss how to name it. I sat
down at night upon my bedside, and resolved that I would not go to sleep
till I had fixed its title. The Rambler seemed the best that occurred,
and I took it.'

With what devout and conscientious sentiments this paper was undertaken,
is evidenced by the following prayer, which he composed and offered up
on the occasion: 'Almighty GOD, the giver of all good things, without
whose help all labour is ineffectual, and without whose grace all wisdom
is folly; grant, I beseech Thee, that in this undertaking thy Holy
Spirit may not be with-held from me, but that I may promote thy glory,
and the salvation of myself and others: grant this, O LORD, for the sake
of thy son JESUS CHRIST. Amen.'

The first paper of The Rambler was published on Tuesday the 20th
of March, 1750; and its authour was enabled to continue it, without
interruption, every Tuesday and Friday, till Saturday the 17th of March,
1752, on which day it closed. This is a strong confirmation of the truth
of a remark of his, which I have had occasion to quote elsewhere, that
'a man may write at any time, if he will set himself doggedly to it;'
for, notwithstanding his constitutional indolence, his depression of
spirits, and his labour in carrying on his Dictionary, he answered the
stated calls of the press twice a week from the stores of his mind,
during all that time.

Posterity will be astonished when they are told, upon the authority of
Johnson himself, that many of these discourses, which we should suppose
had been laboured with all the slow attention of literary leisure, were
written in haste as the moment pressed, w