still less of choice, ought to be more remote from you delight to talk, and I hate to hear. "SAM. JOHNSON." [JOHNSON TO MRS. PORTER. "DEAR MADAM, "London, Nov. 29. 1783. You may perhaps think me negligent that I have not written to you again upon the loss of your brother; but condolences and consolations are such common and such useless things, that the omission of them is no great crime; and my own diseases occupy my mind and engage my care. My nights are miserably restless, and my days, therefore, are heavy. I try, however, to hold up my head as high as I can. "I am sorry that your health is impaired : perhaps the spring and the summer may, in some degree, restore it; but if not, we must submit to the inconveniences of time, as to the other dispensations of Eternal Goodness. Pray for me, and write to me, or let Mr. Pearson write for you. I am, &c., Pearson MSS. "SAM. JOHNSON," I consulted him on two questions of a very different nature: one, Whether the unconstitutional influence exercised by the peers of Scotland in the election of the representatives of the commons, by means of fictitious qualifications, ought not to be resisted; the other, What in propriety and humanity should be done with old horses unable to labour. I gave him some account of my life at Auchinleck; and expressed my satisfaction that the gentlemen of the county had, at two public meetings, elected me their præses or chairman. JOHNSON TO BOSWELL. "London, Dec. 24. 1783. Drive all "On the day when I received your letter, I think, the foregoing page was written; to which one disease or another has hindered me from making any additions. I am now a little better. But sickness and solitude press me very heavily. I could bear sickness better, if I were relieved from solitude. "The present dreadful confusion of the public ought to make you wrap yourself up in your hereditary possessions, which, though less than you may wish, are more than you can want; and in an hour of religious retirement return thanks to God. who has exempted you from any strong temptation to faction, treachery, plunder, and disloyalty. "As your neighbours distinguish you by such honours as they can bestow, content yourself with Your estate and the courts will find you full emyour station, without neglecting your profession. ployment, and your mind well occupied will be quiet. "The usurpation of the nobility, for they apparently usurp all the influence they gain by fraud and misrepresentation, I think it certainly lawful, perhaps your duty, to resist. What is not their own, they have only by robbery. "Your question about the horses gives me more perplexity. I know not well what advice to give you. I can only recommend a rule which you da not want give as little pain as you can. I suppose that we have a right to their service while their strength lasts; what we can do with them afterwards, I cannot so easily determine. But let us consider. Nobody denies that man has a right first to milk the cow, and to shear the sheep, and then to kill them for his table. May he not, by parity of reason, first work a horse, and then kill him the easiest way, that he may have the means of another horse, or food for cows and sheep? Man is influenced in both cases by different motives of self-interest. He that rejects the one must reject the other. I am, &c., SAM. JOHNSON," A happy and pious Christmas; and many happy years to you, your lady, and children.” The late ingenious Mr. Mickle, some time before his death, wrote me a letter concerning Dr. Johnson, in which he mentions,— "I was upwards of twelve years acquainted with him, was frequently in his company, always talked with ease to him, and can truly say, that I never received from him one rough word." In this letter he relates his having, while engaged in translating the Lusiad, had a dispute of considerable length with Johnso who, as usual, declaimed upon the corruption of a sea life, and used this expres misery and "It had been happy for the world Sir, if your hero, Gama, Prince Henry e Portugal, and Columbus, had never been born, or that their schemes had never gone farther than their own imaginations." If a You sion: "DEAR SIR,- Like all other men who have great friends, you begin to feel the pangs of neglected merit; and all the comfort that I can give you is, by telling you that you have probably more pangs to feel, and more neglect to suffer. have, indeed, begun to complain too soon; and I hope I am the only confidant of your discontent. Your friends have not yet had leisure to gratify personal kindness; they have hitherto been busy in strengthening their ministerial interest. vacancy happens in Scotland, give them early intelligence: and as you can serve government as powerfully as any of your probable competitors, you may make in some sort a warrantable claim. "Of the exaltations and depressions of your mind "This sentiment," says Mr. Mickle, "which is to be found in his Introduction to the World Displayed,' I, in my Dissertation prefixed to the Lusiad, have controverted; and though authors are said to be bad judges of their own works, I am no 1 L 2 1 ashamed to own to a friend, that that dissertation is my favourite above all that I ever attempted in prose. Next year, when the Lusiad was published, I waited on Dr. Johnson, who addressed me with one of his good-humoured smiles: Well, you have remembered our dispute about Prince Henry, and have cited me too. You have done your part very well indeed: you have made the best of your argument; but I am not convinced yet.' "Before publishing the Lusiad, I sent Mr. Hoole a proof of that part of the introduction in which I make mention of Dr. Johnson, yourself, and other well-wishers to the work, begging it might be shown to Dr. Johnson. This was accordingly done; and in place of the simple mention of him which I had made, he dictated to Mr. Hoole the sentence as it now stands. "Dr. Johnson told me in 1772, that, about twenty years before that time, he himself had a design to translate the Lusiad, of the merit of which he spoke highly, but had been prevented by a number of other engagements." Mr. Mickle reminds me in this letter of a conversation at dinner one day at Mr. Hoole's with Dr. Johnson, when Mr. Nicol, the king's bookseller, and I, attempted to controvert the maxim, "Better that ten guilty should escape, than one innocent person suffer," and were answered by Dr. Johnson with great power of reasoning and eloquence. I am very sorry that I have no record of that day: but I well recollect my illustrious friend's having ably shown, that unless civil institutions ensure protection to the innocent, all the confidence which mankind should have in them would be lost. I shall here mention what, in strict chronological arrangement, should have appeared in my account of last year; but may more properly be introduced here, the controversy having not been closed till this. The Reverend Mr. Shaw, [p. 528.] a native of one of the Hebrides, having entertained doubts of the authenticity of the poems ascribed to Ossian, divested himself of national bigotry; and having travelled in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, and also in Ireland, in order to furnish himself with materials for a Gaelic Dictionary, which he afterwards compiled, was so fully satisfied that Dr. Johnson was in the right upon the question, that he candidly published a pamphlet, stating his conviction, and the proofs and reasons on which it was founded. A person at Edinburgh, of the name of Clark, answered this pamphlet with much zeal, and much abuse of its author. Johnson took Mr. Shaw under his protection, and gave him his assistance in writing a reply, which has been admired by the best judges, and by many been considered as conclusive. A few paragraphs, which sufficiently mark their great author, shall be selected: 66 My assertions are, for the most part, purely negative: I deny the existence of Fingal, because in a long and curious peregrination through the Gaelic regions I have never been able to find it. "Mr. Clark compares the obstinacy of those who disbelieve the genuineness of Ossian to a blind man who should dispute the reality of colours, and deny that the British troops are clothed in red. The blind man's doubt would be rational, if he did not know by experience that others have a power which he himself wants: but what perspicacity has Mr. Clark which Nature has withheld from me or the rest of mankind? "The true state of the parallel must be this: Suppose a man, with eyes like his neighbours, was told by a boasting corporal, that the troops, indeed, wore red clothes for their ordinary dress, but that every soldier had likewise a suit of black velvet, which he puts on when the king reviews them. This he thinks strange, and desires to see the fine clothes, but finds nobody in forty thousand men that can produce either coat or waistcoat. indeed, has left them in his chest at Port Mahon; velvet clothes somewhere; and a third has heard another has always heard that he ought to have somebody say that soldiers ought to wear velvet. Can the inquirer be blamed if he goes away believing that a soldier's red coat is all that he has? One, "But the most obdurate incredulity may be shamed or silenced by facts. To overpower contradictions, let the soldier show his velvet coat, and the Fingalist the original of Ossian. "The difference between us and the blind man is this: the blind man is unconvinced, because he cannot see and we because, though we can see, we find nothing that can be shown." Notwithstanding the complication of disorders under which Johnson now laboured, he did not resign himself to despondency and discontent, but with wisdom and spirit endeavoured to console and amuse his mind with as many innocent enjoyments as he could procure. Sir John Hawkins has mentioned the cordiality with which he insisted that such of the members of the old club in Ivy Lane as survived should meet again and dine together, which they did, twice at a tavern, and once at his house. [JOHNSON TO HAWKINS. "Bolt Court, Nov. 22. 1783. "DEAR SIR,- As Mr. Ryland was talking with me of old friends and past times, we warmed our selves into a wish, that all who remained of the Club should meet and dine at the house which once was Horseman's, in Ivy-lane. I have undertaken to solicit you, and therefore desire you to tell on what day next week you can conveniently meet your old friends. I am, Sir, your most humble servant, SAM. JOHNSON." JOHNSON TO HAWKINS. "December 3. 1783. "DEAR SIR,- In perambulating Ivy-lane, Mr. Ryland found neither our landlord Horseman nor his successor. The old house is shut up, and he liked not the appearance of any near it: he there "With this invitation," says Hawkins, "I cheerfully complied, and met, at the time and place appointed, all who could be mustered of our society, namely, Johnson, Mr. Ryland, and Mr. Payne of the Bank. When we were collected, the thought that we were so few occasioned some melancholy reflections, and I could not but compare our meeting, at such an advanced period of life as it was to us all, to that of the four old men in the Senile Colloquium' of Erasmus. We dined, and in the evening regaled with coffee. At ten we broke up, much to the regret of Johnson, who proposed staying but finding us inclined to separate, he left us, with a sigh that seemed to come from his heart, lamenting that he was retiring to solitude and cheerless meditation. "Johnson had proposed a meeting like this once a month, and we had one more; but, the time approaching for a third, he began to feel a return of some of his complaints, and signified a wish that we would dine with him at his own house; and accordingly we met there, and were very cheerfully entertained by him."- Life, p. 562. CROKER. 2 Johnson himself, by the mention of Barry the painter, seems to have anticipated (as he very naturally might) some reluctance on the part of Sir Joshua. Indeed, the violence of Barry's temper, and the absurdity of his conduct, rendered him no very agreeable companion: but towards Sir Joshua, his behaviour had been particularly offensive. - CROKER. 3 A biographical notice of Mr. Cooke, who died April 3. 1824, will be found in the Gentleman's Magazine for that month; and some account of Mr.Joddrell is given in Nichols's Lit. Anec. vol. viii. CROKER. I was in Scotland when this club was founded, and during all the winter. Johnson, however, declared I should be a member, and invented a word upon the occasion: "Boswell," said he, "is a very clubable man." When I came to town I was proposed by Mr. Barrington, and chosen. I believe there are few societies where there is better conversation or more decorum. Several of us resolved to continue it after our great founder was removed by death. Other members were added; and now, about eight years since that loss, we go on happily. -BOSWELL. Johnson had already invented unclubable for Sir J. Hawkins. See antè, p. 164. n. 1.- CROKER, 1847. 5 Miss Hawkins candidly says, "Boswell was well justified in his resentment of my father's designation of this as a sixpenny club at an alehouse. I am sorry my father permitted himself to be so pettish on the subject. Honestly speaking, I dare say he did not like being passed over."- Mem. vol. ii. p. 104. CROker. expenses light. Mr. Barry was adopted by Dr. Brocklesby, who joined with me in forming the plan. We meet thrice a week, and he who misses forfeits twopence. If you are willing to become a member, draw a line under your name. Return the list. We meet for the first time on Monday, at eight. I am, &c., SAM. JOHNSON." It did not suit Sir Joshua to be one of this club. But when I mention only Mr. Daines Barrington, Dr. Brocklesby, Mr. Murphy, Mr. John Nichols, Mr. Cooke 3, Mr. Joddrell, Mr. Paradise, Dr. Horseley, Mr. Windham, I shal sufficiently obviate the misrepresentation of it by Sir John Hawkins, as if it had been a low alehouse association 5, by which Johnson was degraded. Johnson himself, like his namesake Old Ben, composed the rules of his club. In the end of this year he was seized with a spasmodic asthma of such violence, that he was confined to the house in great pain, being sometimes obliged to sit all night in his chair, a recumbent posture being so hurtful to his respiration, that he could not endure lying in bed; and there came upon him at the same time that oppressive and fatal disease, & drops. It was a very severe winter, which probably aggravated his complaints; and the solitude in which Mr. Levett and Mrs. Williams had left him rendered his life very gloomy. Mrs. Desmoulins, who still lived, was herself so Every member is at liberty to introduce a friend once a week, but not oftener. "Two members shall oblige themselves to attend in ther turn every night from eight to ten, or procure two to attend in their room. "Every member present at the club shall spend at leas sixpence; and every member who stays away shall forten threepence. (sic.) "The master of the house shall keep an account of the absent members; and deliver to the president of the night a list of the forfeits incurred. "When any member returns after absence, he shall → mediately lay down his forfeits; which if he omits to do, 21 president shall require. "There shall be no general reckoning, but every man adjust his own expenses. "The night of indispensable attendance will come to rem member once a month. Whoever shall for three me together omit to attend himself, or by substitution, nor sta make any apology in the fourth month, shall be considers having abdicated the club. "When a vacancy is to be filled, the name of the candi and of the member recommending him, shall stand in 2 club-room three nights. On the fourth he may be choses ! ballot six members at least being present, and two-thirĖS the ballot being in his favour; or the majority, should th numbers not be divisible by three. "The master of the house shall give notice, six days be fore, to each of those members whose turn of necess... attendance is come. "The notice may be in these words :- Sir, On of. -, will be your turn of presiding at the Ess Head. Your company is therefore earnestly requested. "One penny shall be left by each member for the water Johnson's definition of a club, in this sense, in his D tionary, is," An assembly of good fellows, meeting certain conditions."- Boswell. H boddo. - Dr. Ross. George Steevens. Foote. - Burke's Conversation. Montagu. AND now I am arrived at the last year of the life of SAMUEL JOHNSON; a year in which, although passed in severe indisposition, he nevertheless gave many evidences of the continuance of those wondrous powers of mind which raised him so high in the intellectual world. His conversation and his letters of this year were in no respect inferior to those of former years. The following is a remarkable proof of his being alive to the most minute curiosities of literature. « SIR, me. JOHNSON TO MR. DILLY, Bookseller, in the Poultry.. "Jan 6. 1784. There is in the world a set of books which used to be sold by the booksellers on the bridge, and which I must entreat you to procure They are called Burton's Books: the title of one is Admirable Curiosities, Rarities, and Wonders in England.' I believe there are about five or six of them; they seem very proper to allure backward readers; be so kind as to get them for me, and send me them with the best printed edition of Baxter's Call to the Unconverted.' I am, &c., "SAM. JOHNSON." JOHNSON TO PERKINS. "Jan. 21. 1784. "DEAR SIR, -I was very sorry not to see you when you were so kind as to call on me; but to dis On the 30th Dec., Dr. and Miss Fanny Burney visited him. On parting he grasped her hand and said, " The blister I have tried for my breath has betrayed some very bad tokens, but 1 will not terrify myself by talking of them. Ah, pricz Dieu pour moi." This was the only time he ever addressed her in French, and she thought he did so that some other persons who were in the room might not hear this injunction.- Life of Burney, i. 363. CROKER, 1847. Old London Bridge, once covered on both hands with shops and houses over them.- CROKER, 1847. "Jan 27. 1784. "DEAR SIR, - You will receive a requisition, according to the rules of the club, to be at the house as president of the night. This turn comes once a month, and the member is obliged to attend, or send another in his place. You were inrolled in the club by my invitation, and I ought to introduce you; but as I am hindered by sickness, Mr. Hoole will very properly supply my place as introductor, or yours as president. I hope in milder weather to be a very constant attendant. I am, Sir, &c., SAM. JOHNSON. began with the year, and that every night of non"You ought to be informed that the forfeits attendance incurs the mulet of threepence, that is, ninepence a-week." On the 8th of January I wrote to him, anxiously inquiring as to his health, and enclosing my "Letter to the People of Scotland on the Present State of the Nation." "I trust," said I, "that you will be liberal enough to make allowance for my differing from you on two points, [the Middlesex election and the American war,] when my general principles of government are according to your own heart, and when, at a crisis of doubtful event, I stand forth with honest zeal as an ancient and faith ful Briton. My reason for introducing those two points was, that as my opinions with regard to them had been declared at the periods when they were least favourable, I might have the credit of a man who is not a worshipper of ministerial power." [BOSWELL TO REYNOLDS. "Edinburgh, 6th February, 1784. "MY DEAR SIR, - I long exceedingly to hear from you. Sir William Forbes brought me good accounts of you, and Mr. Temple sent me very pleasing intelligence concerning the fair Palmeria 3. But a line or two from yourself is the next thing to seeing you. "My anxiety about Dr. Johnson is truly great. 3 These books are much more numerous than Johnson supposed. MALONE. Mr. Malone adds a list of 29 of them. -CROKER, 1847. 4 My venerable friend Mr. Clark, who had contributed some information to my first edition, died at Chertsey, Jan. 16. 1831, æt. 93. CHOKER, 5 No doubt Miss Palmer, afterwards Lady Thomond, Sir Joshua's niece. - CROKER. ever to him within these six weeks, this usual acuteness and vigour of She complained sadly of the state of and I have been informed since that he end to be in London next month, be an accred upon him with respectful affecBot in the mean time, it will be a great our done me, if you, who know him so well, wis, be kind enough to let me know particularly how he is. 1 hope Mr. Dilly conveyed to you my Letter on the State of the Nation, from the Author. I know your political principles, and indeed your settled system of thinking upon civil society and subordination, to be according to my own heart; and therefore I doubt not you will approve of my honest zeal. But what monstrous effects of party do we now see! I am really vexed at the conduct of some of our friends.1 Amidst the conflict our friend of Port Eliot is with much propriety created a peer. But why, O why did he not obtain the title of Baron Mahogany? (p. 680.) Genealogists and heralds would have had curious work of it to explain and illustrate that title. I ever am, with sincere regard, my dear Sir, your affectionate humble servant, -Reynolds MSS. "JAMES BOSWELL."] JOHNSON TO BOSWELL. "Feb. 11. 1784. "DEAR SIR, I hear of many inquiries which your kindness has disposed you to make after me. I have long intended you a long letter, which perhaps the imagination of its length hindered me from beginning. I will, therefore, content myself with a shorter. "Having promoted the institution of a new club in the neighbourhood, at the house of an old servant of Thrale's, I went thither to meet the company, and was seized with a spasmodic asthma, so violent, that with difficulty I got to my own house, in which I have been confined eight or nine weeks, and from which I know not when I shall be able to go even to church. The asthma, however, is not the worst. A dropsy gains ground upon me: my legs and thighs are very much swollen with water, which I should be content if I could keep there; but I am afraid that it will soon be higher. My nights are very sleepless and very tedious, and yet I am extremely afraid of dying. "My physicians try to make me hope that much of my malady is the effect of cold, and that some degree at least of recovery is to be expected from vernal breezes and summer suns. If my life is prolonged to autumn, I should be glad to try a warmer climate; though how to travel with a diseased body, without a companion to conduct me, and with very little money, I do not well see. Ramsay has recovered his limbs in Italy; and 1 Messrs. Fox and Burke. - CROKER. See post, p. 753., Mr. Boswell's statement of this extraordinary relief: Hawkins's is still more circumstantial and curious.-Life, 563.- CROKER, 1847. 3 Letter to the People of Scotland on the present State of the Nation." I sent it to Mr. Pitt, with a letter, in which I thus expressed myself:-" My principles may appear to you too monarchical; but I know and am persuaded they are not inconsistent with the true principles of liberty. Be this as it may, you, Sir, are now the prime minister, called by the Fielding was sent to Lisbon, where, indeed, he died; but he was, I believe, past hope when he went. Think for me what I can do. "I received your pamphlet, and when I write again may perhaps tell you some opinion about it; but you will forgive a man struggling with disease his neglect of disputes, politics, and pamphlets Let me have your prayers. My compliments to your lady and young ones. Ask your physician about my case: and desire Sir Alexander Dick write me his opinion. I am, dear Sir, &c., “SAM. JOHNSON." JOHNSON TO MRS. PORTER. “Feb. 23. 1784. "MY DEAREST LOVE,- I have been extremely ill of an asthma and dropsy, but received by the mercy of God sudden and unexpected relief last Thursday, by the discharge of twenty pints si water. Whether I shall continue free, or shall fill again, cannot be told. Pray for me. Death, y dear, is very dreadful; let us think nothing worth amiss in ourselves let us make haste to amend, and our care but how to prepare for it: what we know put our trust in the mercy of God and the intercession of our Saviour. I am, &c., "SAM. JOHNSON." JOHNSON TO BOSWELL. "London, Feb. 27. 178 "DEAR SIR, I have just advanced so far towards recovery as to read a pamphlet; and you may reasonably suppose that the first pamphlet which I read was yours. I am very much of your opinion, and, like you, feel great indignation at the indecency with which the king is every day treated. Your paper contains very considerable knowledge of history and of the constitution, very properly i produced and applied. It will certainly raise your character, though perhaps it may not make you a minister of state. tell her, that in the letter-case was a letter relating I desire you to see Mrs. Stewart once again, and to me, for which I will give her, if she is willing to give it me, another guinea. The letter is of cossequence only to me.. I am, dear Sir, &c., "SAM. JOHNSON." should ask our physicians about his case, and In consequence of Johnson's request that I I transmitted him a letter from that very desire Sir Alexander Dick to send his opinion amiable baronet, then in his eighty-first yer, with his faculties as entire as ever, and mentioned his expressions to me in the note accom panying it, "With my most affectionak wishes for Dr. Johnson's recovery, in which b friends, his country, and all mankind have s deep a stake;" and at the same time a f sovereign to maintain the rights of the crown, as well as thew of the people, against a violent faction. As such, you entitled to the warmest support of every good subject in ere department." He answered, "I am extremely obliged to pe for the sentiments you do me the honour to express, and s observed with great pleasure the zealous and able suppo given to the cause of the public in the work you were so ga to transmit to me."- BOSWELL. 4 See antè, p. 641., and the Appendix. — CROKER. |