Excerpt from Oliver Goldsmith: A Selection From His Works With an Introduction by E. E. Hale Oliver goldsmith is read wherever men read English; and, where he is read, he is almost always loved. He died comparatively young. He was but forty five years old. He had not distinguished himself by any special research. There was no line of literature in which, at that moment, he was confessed to be a master. Men who went to his funeral called him poor Goldsmith and it is most likely that they did not know, that after a century he would be perhaps the best remembered of any Of them. Dr. Johnson seems to have surprised those around him, when he said that Goldsmith was a great man. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.