Though by no means disposed to hear men made much of, he always listened to praise of Burke with a boyish delight. He never wearied of it. When any new proof of Burke's intellectual prowess was brought to his notice, he would exclaim exultingly, 'Did we not always say he was a great man?' And yet how admirably did this 'poor scholar' preserve his independence and equanimity of mind! It was not easy to dazzle the Doctor. What a satisfactory story that is of Burke showing Johnson over his fine estate at Beaconsfield, and expatiating in his exuberant style on its 'liberties, privileges, easements, rights, and advantages,' and of the old Doctor, the tenant of 'a two-pair back' somewhere off Fleet Street, peering cautiously about, criticising everything, and observing with much coolness-- 'Non equidem invideo, miror magis.' A friendship like this could be disturbed but by death, and accordingly we read: 'Mr. Langton one day during Johnson's last illness found Mr. Burke and four or five more friends sitting with Johnson. Mr. Burke said to him, "I am afraid, sir, such a number of us may be oppressive to you." "No, sir," said Johnson, "it is not so; and I must be in a wretched state indeed when your company would not be a delight to me." Mr. Burke, in a tremulous voice, expressive of being very tenderly affected, replied: "My dear sir, you have always been too good to me." Immediately afterwards he went away. This was the last circumstance in the acquaintance of these two eminent men.' But this is a well-worn theme, though, like some other well-worn themes, still profitable for edification or rebuke. A hundred years can make no difference to a character like Johnson's, or to a biography like Boswell's. We are not to be robbed of our conviction that this man, at all events, was both great and good.