on the subject.


But, not to trouble the reader with anecdotes, contrary to my own
rule laid down in my preface, I assure him I thought my family
was very slenderly provided for; and that my health began to
decline so fast that I had very little more of life left to
accomplish what I had thought of too late. I rejoiced therefore
greatly in seeing an opportunity, as I apprehended, of gaining
such merit in the eve of the public, that, if my life were the
sacrifice to it, my friends might think they did a popular act in
putting my family at least beyond the reach of necessity, which I
myself began to despair of doing. And though I disclaim all
pretense to that Spartan or Roman patriotism which loved the
public so well that it was always ready to become a voluntary
sacrifice to the public good, I do solemnly declare I have that
love for my family.

After this confession therefore, that the public was not the
principal deity to which my life was offered a sacrifice, and
when it is farther considered what a poor sacrifice this was,
being indeed no other than the giving up what I saw little
likelihood of being able to hold much longer, and which, upon the
terms I held it, nothing but the weakness of human nature could
represent to me as worth holding at all; the world may, I
believe, without envy, allow me all the praise to which I have
any title. My aim, in fact, was not praise, which is the last
gift they care to bestow; at least, this was not my aim as an
end, but rather as a means of purchasing some moderate provision
for my family, which, though it should exceed my merit, must fall