their lot as to wish to have their life over again, and yet as many
have expressed themselves to the contrary.

Dr. Johnson, who always spoke of human life in the most desponding
terms, and considered earth a vale of tears,

"Yet hope, not life from pain or sorrow free,
Or think the doom of man reversed for thee--"

declared that he would not live over again a single week of his life,
had it been allowed him.[2] Such was his opinion on the past; but so
great is the cheering influence with which Hope irradiates the mind,
that in looking forward to the future, he always talked with pleasure
on the prospect of a long life.

[2] Chamfort observes, that the writers on physics, natural
history, physiology, and chemistry, have been generally men of a
mild, even, and happy temperament, while the writers on politics,
legislation, and even morals, commonly exhibited a melancholy and
fretful spirit. It is to be expected that an inspection of the
beauty and order of nature should affect the mind with peculiar
pleasure.--_Gaieties and Gravities_.

When he was in Scotland, Boswell told him that after his death, he
intended to erect a memorial to him. Johnson, to whom the very
mention of death was unpleasant, replied, "Sir, I hope to see your
grand-children." On his death-bed he observed to the surgeon who was
attending him, "_I want life_, you are afraid of giving me pain."

It has been supposed that this question had been settled by the