s of mind, or that he should be
distinguished by such a deliverance as I have here related.

_The folly of youthful Extravagance._

RAMBLER, No. 26.

1. It is usual for men, engaged in the same pursuits, to be inquisitive
after the conduct and fortune of each other; and therefore, I suppose it
will not be unpleasing to you to read an account of the various changes
which have appeared in part of a life devoted to literature. My
narrative will not exhibit any great variety of events, or extraordinary
revolutions; but may perhaps be not less useful, because I shall relate
nothing which is not likely to happen to a thousand others.

2. I was born heir to a very small fortune, and left by my father, whom
I cannot remember, to the care of an uncle. He having no children,
always treated me as his son, and finding in me those qualities which
old men easily discover in sprightly children when they happen to love
them, declared that a genius like mine should never be lost for want of
cultivation.

3. He therefore placed me for the usual time at a great school, and then
sent me to the university, with a larger allowance than my own patrimony
would have afforded, that I might not keep mean company, but learn to
become my dignity when I should be made Lord Chancellor, which he often
lamented that the increase of his infirmities was very likely to
preclude him from seeing.

4. This exuberance of money displayed itself in gaiety of appearance,
and wantonness of expence, and introduced me to the acquaintance of
those whom the same superfluity of fortune had betrayed to the same
licence and ostentation: young heirs who pleased themselves with a
remark very frequently in their mouths, that though they were sent by
their fathers to the university, they were not under the necessity of
living by their learning.

5. Among men of this class I easily obtained the reputation of a great
genius, and was persuaded that, with such liveliness of imagination, and
delicacy of sentiment, I should never be able to submit to the drudgery
of the law.

6. I therefore gave myself wholly to the more airy and elegant parts of
learning, and was often so much elated with my superiority to the youths
with whom I conversed, that I began to listen with great attention, to
those who recommended to me a wider and more conspicuous theatre; and
was particularly touched with an observation made by one of my friends,
that it was not by lingering in the