J. O. M.
D'Israeli: Pope and Goldsmith.
—Mr. D'Israeli congratulates himself with much satisfaction, in his Essay on the Literary Character, both in his Preface, p. xxix., and in the text, p. 187. vol. i., in having written this immortal sentence:
"The defects of great men are the consolation of the dunces."
—more particularly as it appears Lord Byron had "deeply underscored it." Perhaps he was unaware that Pope, in a letter to Swift, Feb. 16, 1733, had said:
"A few loose things sometimes fall from men of wit by which censorious fools judge as ill of them as they possibly can, for their own comfort."
And that Goldsmith says:
"The folly of others is ever most ridiculous to those who are themselves most foolish."—Citizen of the World.
JAMES CORNISH.