ABSTRACT
It is the common failing of an ambitious mind to over-rate itself – to imagine that it has been, by the caprices of fortune,a defrauded of the high honours due to its supposed superiority. It conceives itself to have been injured – to have fallen from its destination; and these unfounded claims become the source of endless discontent. The mind, thus disappointed, preys upon itself, and compares its present lowliness with the imaginary heights for which it fancies itself to have been intended.b Under the influence of these reflections, the character grows sullen and reserved, detaches itself from all social enjoyments, and professes to despise the honours for which it secretly pines. Mediocrity,c and a common lot, a man of this disposition cannot bring himself to endure; and he wilfully rejects the little granted, because all cannot be obtained, to which he onced aspired.20
