"Industrious to detect wickedness"

Samuel Johnson in The Rambler, # 76 (8 Dec 1750):

It may be observed, perhaps without exception, that none are so industrious to detect wickedness, or so ready to impute it as they whose crimes are apparent and confessed. They envy an unblemished reputation, and what they envy they are busy to destroy; they are unwilling to suppose themselves meaner and more corrupt than others, and therefore willingly pull down from their elevations those with whom they cannot rise to an equality.