On Saturday, September 20., after breakfast, when Taylor was gone out to his farm, Dr. Johnson and I had a serious conversation by ourselves on melancholy and madness; which he was, I always thought, erroneously inclined to confound together [p. 336.]. Melancholy, like great wit," may be " near allied to madness; but there is, in my opinion, a distinct separation between them. When he talked of madness, he was to be understood as speaking of those who were in any great degree disturbed, or, as it is commonly expressed, "troubled in mind." Some of the ancient philosophers held, that all deviations from right reason were madness; and whoever wishes to see the opinions both of ancients and moderns upon this subject, collected and illustrated with a variety of curious facts, may read Dr. Arnold's very entertaining work.1

Johnson said, "A madman loves to be with people whom he fears; not as a dog fears the lash, but of whom he stands in awe." I was struck with the justice of this observation. To be with those of whom a person, whose mind is wavering and dejected, stands in awe, represses, and composes an uneasy tumult of spirits, and consoles him with the contemplation of something steady, and at least comparatively great.2

He added, "Madmen are all sensual in the lower stages of the distemper. They are eager for gratifications to soothe their minds, and divert their attention from the misery which they suffer; but when they grow very ill, pleasure is too weak for them, and they seek for pain.3 Employment, Sir, and hardships, prevent melancholy. I suppose, in all our army in America, there was not one man who went mad."

are those of John Abernethy, Thomas Amory, George Benson, Hugh Broughton, the learned puritan, Simon Browne, Joseph Boyse, of Dublin, Thomas Cartwright, the learned puritan, and Samuel Chandler. The only doubt I have ever heard suggested is, whether there should have been an article of Dr. Amory. But I was convinced, and am still convinced, that he was entitled to one, from the reality of his learning, and the excellent and candid nature of his practical writings. The new lives of clergymen of the Church of England, in the same four volumes, are as follows: John Balguy, Edward Bentham, George Berkley, Bishop of Cloyne, William Ber. riman, Thomas Birch, William Borlase, Thomas Bott, James Bradley, Thomas Broughton, John Browne, John Burton, Joseph Butler, Bishop of Durham, Thomas Carte, Edmund Castell, Edmund Chishull, Charles Churchill, William Clarke, Robert Clayton, Bishop of Clogher, John Conybeare, Bishop of Bristol, George Castard, and Samuel Croxall. I am not conscious,' says Dr. Kippis, of any partiality in conducting the work. I would not willingly insert a dissenting minister that does not justly deserve to be noticed, or omit an established clergyman that does. At the same time, I shall not be deterred from introducing dissenters into the Biographia, when I am satisfied that they are entitled to that distinction, from their writings, learning, and merit.'" Let me add that the expression "A friend to the constitution in church and state," was not meant by me as any reflection upon this reverend gentleman, as if he were an enemy to the political constitution of his country, as esta blished at the Revolution, but, from my steady and avowed predilection for a Tory, was quoted from " Johnson's Dictionary," where that distinction is so defined. Note to second edition.- BOSWELL. But even Whigs could be dissatisfied with Dr. Kippis's conduct of the work. See Cowper's lively epigram, " On observing some names of little note in the Biographia," and Horace Walpole's anecdote:-"I happened to say that the Biographia was an apology for every body. This reached the ears of Dr. Kippis, who retorted that the

a

We entered seriously upon a question of much importance to me, which Johnson was pleased to consider with friendly attention. I had long complained to him that I felt myself discontented in Scotland, as too narrow sphere, and that I wished to make my chief residence in London, the great scene of ambition, instruction, and amusement; a scene which was to me, comparatively speaking, a heaven upon earth. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, I never knew any one who had such a gust for London as you have: and I cannot blame you for your wish to live there; yet, Sir, were I in your father's place, I should not consent to your settling there; for I have the old feudal notions, and I should be afraid that Auchinleck would be deserted, as you would soon find it more desirable to have a country seat in a better climate. I own, however, that to consider it as a duty to reside on a family estate is a prejudice; for we must consider, that workingpeople get employment equally, and the produce of land is sold equally, whether a great family resides at home or not; and if the rents of an estate be carried to London, they return again in the circulation of commerce; nay, Sir, we must perhaps allow, that carrying the rents to a distance is a good, because it contributes to that circulation. We must, however, allow, that a well-regulated great family may improve a neighbourhood in civility and elegance, and give an example of good order, virtue, and piety; and so its residence at home may be of much advantage. But if a great family be disorderly and vicious, its residence at home is very pernicious to a neigh

bourhood. There is not now the same inducement to live in the country as formerly; the pleasures of social life are much better enjoyed

life of Sir Robert Walpole should prove that the Biographia was not an apology for every body. Soon after this I was surprised by a visit from the Doctor to solicit materials for my father's life. You may guess that I very civilly refused." Walpoliana, xciv., and Letter to Cole, Sept., 1. 1778.CROKER, 1847.

"Observations on Insanity," by Thomas Arnold, M.D., London, 1782.- BOSWELL.

2He was," says Hawkins, "a great enemy to the present fashionable way of supposing worthless and infamous persons mad," that is, he disapproved of palliating wickedness by attributing it to physical causes, for he certainly thought (and no doubt felt) that the exercises of piety, and the restraints of conscience, might repress a tendency towards insanity. He also, I suppose, regretted the degree of impunity which is sometimes afforded to crime under the plea of insanity.- CROKER.

3 We read in the Gospels, that those unfortunate persons, who were possessed with evil spirits (which, after all, I think is the most probable cause of madness, as was first suggested to me by my respectable friend Sir John Pringle), had recourse to pain, tearing themselves, and jumping some times into the fire, sometimes into the water. Mr. Seward has furnished me with a remarkable anecdote in confirmation of Dr. Johnson's observation. A tradesman, who had acquired a large fortune in London, retired from business, and went to live at Worcester. His mind, being without its usual occupation, and having nothing else to supply its place, preyed upon itself, so that existence was a torment to him. At last he was seized with the stone; and a friend who found him in one of its severest fits, having expressed his concern, "No, no, Sir," said he, " don't pity me; what I now feel is ease, compared with that torture of mind from which it relieves me."- BOSWELL. Cardan composed his mind tending to madness (or rather actually mad, for such he seems in his writings, learned as they are) by exciting voluntary pain. V. Card. Op. et. Vit.-KEARNEY.

in town; and there is no longer in the country that power and influence in proprietors of land which they had in old times, and which made the country so agreeable to them. The Laird of Auchinleck now is not near so great a man as the Laird of Auchinleck was a hundred years ago."

I told him, that one of my ancestors never went from home without being attended by thirty men on horseback. Johnson's shrewd ness and spirit of inquiry were exerted upon every occasion. "Pray," said he, "how did your ancestor support his thirty men and thirty horses when he went at a distance from home, in an age when there was hardly any money in circulation?" I suggested the same difficulty to a friend who mentioned Douglas's going to the Holy Land with a numerous train of followers." Douglas could, no doubt, maintain followers enough while living upon his own lands, the produce of which supplied them with food; but he could not carry that food to the Holy Land; and as there was no commerce by which he could be supplied with money, how could he maintain them in foreign countries?

I suggested a doubt, that if I were to reside in London, the exquisite zest with which I relished it in occasional visits might go off, and I might grow tired of it. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."

To obviate his apprehension, that by settling in London I might desert the seat of my ancestors, I assured him that I had old feudal principles to a degree of enthusiasm; and that I felt all the dulcedo of the natale solum. I reminded him, that the Laird of Auchinleck had an elegant house, in front of which he could ride ten miles forward upon his own territories, upon which he had upwards of six hundred people attached to him; that the family seat was rich in natural romantic beauties of rock, wood, and water; and that in my "morn of life" I had appropriated the finest descriptions in the ancient classics to certain scenes there, which were thus associated in my mind. That when all this was considered, I should certainly pass a part of the year at home, and enjoy it the more from variety, and from bringing with me a share of the intellectual stores of the metropolis. He listened to all this, and kindly "hoped it might be as I now supposed."

1 James de Duglas was requested by King Robert Bruce in his last hours, to repair with his heart to Jerusalem, and humbly to deposit it at the sepulchre of our Lord; which (according to Boëce, whom Boswell seems to follow) he did in 1330; but other writers represent, probably more truly, that he was killed by the way in fight with the Saracens in Spain; that his remains were brought home and interred at Douglas; and that the king's heart was also brought back and buried at Melrose. -Hailes's Annals, ii. 146-151. Hence the crowned heart in the arms of Douglas. - CROKER.

2 Now, at the distance of fifteen years since this conversation passed, the observation which I have had an opportunity of making in Westminster Hall has convinced me that, however true the opinion of Dr. Johnson's legal friend may have been some time ago, the same certainty of success cannot

He said, a country gentleman should bring his lady to visit London as soon as he can, that they may have agreeable topics for conversation when they are by themselves.

As I meditated trying my fortune in Westminster Hall, our conversation turned upon the profession of the law in England. JOHNSON. You must not indulge too sanguine hopes, should you be called to our bar. I was told, by a very sensible lawyer, that there are a great many chances against any man's success in the profession of the law; the candidates are so numerous, and those who get large practice so few. He said, it was by no means true that a man of good parts and application is sure of having business, though he, indeed, allowed that if such a man could but appear in a few causes, his merit would be known, and he would get forward; but that the great risk was, that a man might pass half a lifetime in the courts, and never have an opportunity of showing his abilities."

We talked of employment being absolutely necessary to preserve the mind from wearying and growing fretful, especially in those who have a tendency to melancholy; and I mentioned to him a saying which somebody had related of an American savage, who, when an European was expatiating on all the advantages of money, put this question: "Will it purchase occupation?" JOHNSON. "Depend upon it, Sir, this saying is too refined for a savage. And, Sir, money will purchase occupation; it will purchase all the conveniencies of life; it will purchase variety of company; it will purchase all sorts of entertainment." "3

I talked to him of Forster's "Voyage to the South Seas," which pleased me; but I found he did not like it. "Sir," said he, "there is a great affectation of fine writing in it." BosWELL. "But he carries you along with him." JOHNSON. "No, Sir; he does not carry me along with him; he leaves me behind him; or rather, indeed, he sets me before him; for he makes me turn over many leaves at a time."

On Sunday, September 21., we went to the church of Ashbourne, which is one of the largest and most luminous that I have seen in any town of the same size. I felt great satisfaction in considering that I was supported in my fondness for solemn public worship by the general concurrence and munificence of mankind.

Johnson and Taylor were so different from each other, that I wondered at their preserving an intimacy. Their having been at school and college together might, in some degree, account for this: but Sir Joshua Reynolds has furnished me with a stronger reason; for Johnson mentioned to him, that he had been told by Taylor he was to be his heir. I shall not take upon me to animadvert upon this; but certain it is that Johnson paid great attention to Taylor. He now, however, said to me, “Sir, I love him; but I do not love him more; my regard for him does not increase. As it is said in the Apocrypha, 'his talk is of bullocks.' 2 I do not suppose he is very fond of my company. His habits are by no means sufficiently clerical: this he knows that I see; and no man likes to live under the eye of perpetual disapprobation."

I have no doubt that a good many sermons were composed for Taylor by Johnson. At this time I found upon his table a part of one which he had newly begun to write and Concio pro Tayloro appears in one of his diaries. When to these circumstances we add the internal evidence from the power of thinking and style, in the collection which the Reverend Mr. Hayes had published, with the significant title of "Sermons left for Publication, by the Reverend John Taylor, LL.D.," our conviction will be complete.3

I, however, would not have it thought that Dr. Taylor, though he could not write like Johnson, (as, indeed, who could?) did not sometimes compose sermons as good as those which we generally have from very respectable divines. He showed me one with notes on the margin in Johnson's handwriting; and I was present when he read another to Johnson, that he might have his opinion of it, and Johnson said it was 66 very well." These, we may be sure, were not Johnson's; for he was above little arts, or tricks of deception.

Johnson was by no means of opinion that every man of a learned profession should consider it as incumbent upon him, or as necessary to his credit, to appear as an author. When, in the ardour of ambition for literary fame, I regretted to him one day that an eminent judge had nothing of it, and therefore would leave no perpetual monument of himself to posterity; "Alas! Sir," said Johnson, "what a mass of confusion should we have, if every bishop, and

1 Not of the same college, nor even, it seems, cotemporaries at the university. See antè, p. 18. n. 3. — CROKER, 1847.

Ecclesiasticus, chap. xxxviii. v. 25. The whole chapter may be read as an admirable illustration of the superiority of cultivated minds over the gross and illiterate. BOSWELL. It is quoted in Burke's "Reflections on the French Revolution."- CROKER.

3"Before I release you," writes Bishop Porteus to Dr. Beattie, 1788, "I must mention one more publication, on account of its singularity as well as its merit. It is a volume of sermons, published by Dr. Taylor, prebendary of Westminster, who is lately dead. He was an old friend and schoolfellow of Dr. Johnson's, and was long suspected of preaching sermons written by the Doctor. To confute this calumny, he ordered this volume of sermons to be published after his

every judge, every lawyer, physician, and divine, were to write books!"

I mentioned to Johnson a respectable person of a very strong minds, who had little of that tenderness which is common to human nature; as an instance of which, when I suggested to him that he should invite his son, who had been settled ten years in foreign parts, to come home and pay him a visit, his answer was, "No, no, let him mind his business." JOHNSON. "I do not agree with him, Sir, in this. Getting money is not all a man's business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life." In the evening, Johnson, being in very good spirits, entertained us with several characteristical portraits: I regret that any of them escaped my retention and diligence. I found from experience, that to collect my friend's conversation so as to exhibit it with any degree of its original flavour, it was necessary to write it down without delay. To record his sayings, after some distance of time, was like preserving or pickling long-kept and faded fruits, or other vegetables, which, when in that state, have little or nothing of their taste when fresh.

I shall present my readers with a series of what I gathered this evening from the Johnsonian garden.

"My friend, the late Earl of Cork, [p. 57.] had a great desire to maintain the literary character of his family: he was a genteel man, but did not keep up the dignity of his rank. He was so generally civil, that nobody thanked him for it."

"Did we not hear so much said of Jack Wilkes, we should think more highly of his conversation. Jack has a great variety of talk, Jack is a scholar, and Jack has the manners of a gentleman. But after hearing his name sounded from pole to pole, as the phoenix of convivial felicity, we are disappointed in his company. He has always been at me: but I would do Jack a kindness, rather than not. The contest is now over."

"Garrick's gaiety of conversation has delicacy and elegance: Foote makes you laugh more; but Foote has the air of a buffoon paid for entertaining the company. He indeed well deserves his hire."

"Colley Cibber once consulted me as to one of his birthday odes [antè, p. 137.] a long time before it was wanted. I objected very freely to several passages. Cibber lost patience, and

death. But I am afraid it will not quite answer his purpose; for I will venture to say, that there is not a man in England who knows anything of Dr. Johnson's peculiarities of style, sentiment, and composition, that will not instantly pronounce these sermons to be his. Indeed, they are (some of them at least) in his very best manner; and Taylor was no more capable of writing them than of making an epic poem.". MARKLAND. It seems, then, that the candour of the significant or rather equivocating title was Mr. Hayes's; and yet it seems incredible that Dr. Taylor could have meant to have practised such a deception. There can be no doubt that the sermons were Johnson's.-CROKER, 1847.

Probably Lord Mansfield. - CROKER.

5 He means his father, Lord Auchinleck; and the absent son was David, who spent so many years in Spain.-CROKER.

When we

would not read his ode to an end. had done with criticism we walked over to Richardson's, the author of 'Clarissa,' and I wondered to find Richardson displeased that I 'did not treat Cibber with more respect.' Now, Sir, to talk of respect for a player!"1 (smiling disdainfully.) BOSWELL. "There, Sir, you are always heretical: you never will allow merit to a player." JOHNSON. "Merit, Sir! what merit? Do you respect a rope-dancer or a ballad-singer?" BOSWELL. "No, sir; but we respect a great player, as a man who can conceive lofty sentiments, and can express them gracefully." JOHNSON. "What! Sir, a fellow who claps a hump on his back, and a lump on his leg, and cries, I am Richard the Third?'

Nay, Sir, a ballad-singer is a higher man, for he does two things; he repeats and he sings: there is both recitation and music in his performance; the player only recites." BOSWELL. "My dear Sir, you may turn any thing into ridicule. I allow, that a player of farce is not entitled to respect; he does a little thing; but he who can represent exalted characters, and touch the noblest passions, has very respectable powers; and mankind have agreed in admiring great talents for the stage. We must consider, too, that a great player does what very few are capable to do; his art is a very rare faculty. Who can repeat Hamlet's soliloquy, To be, or not to be, as Garrick does it?" JOHNSON. "Any body may. Jemmy, there (a boy about eight years old, who was in the room), will do as well in a week." BosWELL. "No, no, Sir: and as a proof of the merit of great acting, and of the value which mankind set upon it, Garrick has got a hundred thousand pounds." JOHNSON. "Is getting a hundred thousand pounds a proof of excellence? That has been done by a scoundrel commissary."

This was most fallacious reasoning. I was sure, for once, that I had the best side of the argument. I boldly maintained the just distinction between a tragedian and a mere theatrical droll; between those who rouse our terror and pity, and those who only make us laugh. "If," said I, "Betterton and Foote were to walk into this room, you would respect Betterton much more than Foote." JOHNSON. "If Betterton were to walk into this room with Foote, Foote would soon drive him out of it. Foote, Sir, quatenùs Foote, has powers superior to them all."2

1 Johnson seems to have had a personal pique against Cibber. I hope it had some better grounds than his having kept Johnson waiting in Lord Chesterfield's ante-room (antè, p. 84. n. 3). Cibber was not merely a good actor, but one of the best of our comic dramatists. - CROKER.

2" The fact was," says Murphy, "that Johnson could not see the passions as they rose and chased one another in the varied features of the expressive face of Garrick." Mr. Murphy remembered being in conversation with Johnson near the

CHAPTER LXI.

Personal Disputes.

is

1777-1778.

Duke of Devonshire. Burke's Definition of a Free Government. The Christian Revelation.

Ilam. Mungo Campbell. "Esop at play." Poems. Homer and Virgil.- Lord Bacon. Topham Beauclerk. - Grainger's "Ode on Solitude.”. Future State. — Happiness. American Independence.

Music. Trade.

Slave

Corruption

"Oddity Johnson." Decision of the Negro Cause. Mr. Saunders Advice to Travellers. Correspondence.

Welch.

-

On Monday, September 22., when at breakfast, I unguardedly said to Dr. Johnson, “I wish I saw you and Mrs. Macaulay together." He grew very angry; and, after a pause, while a Sir; you would not see us quarrel, to make cloud gathered on his brow, he burst out, "No, uncivil to pit two people against one another?" you sport. Don't you know that it is very Then, checking himself, and wishing to be more gentle, he added, "I do not say you should be hanged or drowned for this; but it the wrong, and spoke to him privately of it; very uncivil." Dr. Taylor thought him in that I was to blame, for I candidly owned but I afterwards acknowledged to Johnson that I meant to express a desire to see a then I knew how the contest would end; so contest between Mrs. Macaulay and him; but that I was to see him triumph. JOHNSON. end; and no man has a right to engage two "Sir, you cannot be sure how a contest will people in a dispute by which their passions may be inflamed, and they may part with bitter resentment against each other. I would I must guard my pockets, than with a man sooner keep company with a man from whom who contrives to bring me into a dispute with somebody that he may hear it. This is the friends), endeavouring to introduce a subject great fault of 3 (naming one of our upon which he knows two people in the com"But he told me, pany, differ." BOSWELL. Sir, he does it for instruction." JOHNSON. Whatever the motive be, Sir, the man who does so, does very wrong. He has no more right to instruct himself at such risk, than he has to make two people fight a duel, that he may learn how to defend himself."

side of the scenes, during the tragedy of King Lear: when Garrick came off the stage, he said, "You two talk so loud, you destroy all my feelings."-"Prithee," replied Johnson, do not talk of feelings; Punch has no feelings."- CROKER. 3 Mr. Langton is, no doubt, meant here, and in the next paragraph. See antè, pp. 263, 265, and 292., the possible cause of Johnson's frequent and fretful recurrence to this complaint. -CROKER.

He found great fault with a gentleman of our acquaintance for keeping a bad table. "Sir," said he, "when a man is invited to dinner, he is disappointed if he does not get something good. I advised Mrs. Thrale, who has no card-parties at her house, to give sweetmeats, and such good things, in an evening, as are not commonly given, and she would find company enough come to her; for every body loves to have things which please the palate put in their way, without trouble or preparation." Such was his attention to the minutia of life and manners.

He thus characterised the Duke of Devonshire, grandfather of the present representative of that very respectable family: "He was not a man of superior abilities, but he was a man strictly faithful to his word. If, for instance, he had promised you an acorn, and none had grown that year in his woods, he would not have contented himself with that excuse he would have sent to Denmark for it. So unconditional was he in keeping his word; so high as to the point of honour." This was a liberal testimony from the Tory Johnson to the virtue of a great Whig noble

man.

Mr. Burke's "Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, on the Affairs of America," being mentioned, Johnson censured the composition much, and he ridiculed the definition of a free government; viz. "For any practical purpose, it is what the people thinks so." "I will let the King of France govern me on those conditions," said he, " for it is to be governed just as I please." And when Dr. Taylor talked of a girl being sent to a parish workhouse, and asked how much she could be obliged to work, แ "Why," said Johnson, " as much as is reasonable; and what is that? as much as she thinks reasonable."

Dr. Johnson obligingly proposed to carry me to see Ilam, a romantic scene, now belonging to a family of the name of Port, but formerly the seat of the Congreves.3 I suppose it is well described in some of the tours. Johnson described it distinctly and vividly; at which I could not but express to him my wonder; because, though my eyes, as he

1 "Of another lady's entertainments he said, 'What signifies going thither? there is neither meat, drink, nor talk."" Hawkins. - CROKER.

2 William, third Duke of Devonshire, who died in 1758. His knowledge of the Duke of Devonshire he derived, no doubt, from Dr. Taylor and Mr. Fitzherbert.-CROKER.

3 This is a mistake. The Ports had been seated at Ilam time out of mind; and, perhaps, derived their name from the narrow pass into Dovedale. Congreve had visited that family at Ilam; and his seat, that is, the bench on which he sometimes sat, in the gardens, used to be shown: this, Mr. Bernard Port- one of the ancient family, and now vicar of Ilam thinks was the cause of Mr. Boswell's error. Ilam has since passed into the hands of Mr. Watts Russell, who has replaced the old residence of the Ports by a stately Gothic mansion. — CROKER, 1831.

4 So fond are people of fabricating anecdotes, that the gardener at Ilam told me that it was Johnson himself who had made this experiment. But there is no doubt that the river sinks suddenly into the earth behind a hill above the valley, and bursts out again about four miles below. — CROKER.

observed, were better than his, I could not by any means equal him in representing visible objects. I said, the difference between us in this respect was as that between a man who has a bad instrument, but plays well on it, and a man who has a good instrument, on which he can play very imperfectly.

I recollect a very fine amphitheatre, surrounded with hills covered with woods, and walks neatly formed along the side of a rocky steep, on the quarter next the house, with recesses under projections of rock, overshadowed with trees; in one of which recesses, we were told, Congreve wrote his "Old Bachelor." We viewed a remarkable natural curiosity at Ilam; two rivers bursting near each other from the rock, not from immediate springs, but after having run for many miles under ground. Plott, in his "History of Staffordshire" (p. 69.), gives an account of this curiosity; but Johnson would not believe it, though we had the attestation of the gardener, who said he had put in corks, where the river Manyfold sinks into the ground, and had catched them in a net, placed before one of the openings where the water bursts out. Indeed, such subterraneous courses of water are found in various parts of our globe.5

Talking of Dr. Johnson's unwillingness to believe extraordinary things, I ventured to say, "Sir, you come near Hume's argument against miracles, that it is more probable witnesses should lie, or be mistaken, than that they should happen.' JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, Hume, taking the proposition simply, is right. But the Christian revelation is not proved by the miracles alone, but as connected with prophecies, and with the doctrines in confirmation of which the miracles were wrought."

He repeated his observation, that the dif ferences among Christians are really of no consequence. "For instance," said he, "if a Protestant objects to a Papist, 'You worship images;' the Papist can answer, 'I do not insist on your doing it; you may be a very good Papist without it; I do it only as a help to my devotion.' I said, the great article of Christianity is the revelation of immortality.7 Johnson admitted it was.

5 See Plott's "History of Staffordshire," p. 88., and the authorities referred to by him. BOSWELL.

6 This is not quite true. It is, indeed, more probable that one or two witnesses should lie, than that a miracle should have happened; but that distant and unconnected witnesses and circumstances should concur in evidencing a falsehood, -and that falsehood one in itself unnatural, would be as miraculous as any miracle in Scripture; and thus, by Hume's own argument, the balance of probability is in favour of the miracles. CROKER.

7 This is loosely expressed. The ancients believed in immortality, and even a state of retribution. One sect, at least, of the Jews, as well as the Mahomedans, acknowledge a future state. On so vital a question it is not safe to rest on Mr. Boswell's colloquial phrases, which have some importance when they appear to be sanctioned by the admission of Dr. Johnson. Immortality is, indeed, assured, and a thousand social blessings and benefits are vouchsafed to us by the Christian revelation; but "the great article of Christianity" is surely the ATONEMENT-CROKER.