' JOHNSON. 'Then,
Sir, the horse would throw them both.' MRS. KNOWLES. 'Well, I hope that
in another world the sexes will be equal.' BOSWELL. 'That is being too
ambitious, Madam. _We_ might as well desire to be equal with the angels.
We shall all, I hope, be happy in a future state, but we must not expect
to be all happy in the same degree. It is enough if we be happy
according to our several capacities. A worthy carman will get to heaven
as well as Sir Isaac Newton. Yet, though equally good, they will not
have the same degrees of happiness.' JOHNSON. 'Probably not.'
Upon this subject I had once before sounded him, by mentioning the late
Reverend Mr. Brown, of Utrecht's, image; that a great and small glass,
though equally full, did not hold an equal quantity; which he threw out
to refute David Hume's saying[839], that a little miss, going to dance at
a ball, in a fine new dress, was as happy as a great oratour, after
having made an eloquent and applauded speech. After some thought,
Johnson said, 'I come over to the parson.' As an instance of coincidence
of thinking, Mr. Dilly told me, that Dr. King, a late dissenting
minister in London, said to him, upon the happiness in a future state of
good men of different capacities, 'A pail does not hold so much as a
tub; but, if it be equally full, it has no reason to complain.
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