Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

I am better than I should have been if I had been less afflicted. With this I will try to be content." Four years after that time, Johnson and Boswell were visiting Dr. Taylor, and Boswell had again a chance to learn that his great friend did not choose to have his birthday observed. "Last night," he says, "Dr. Johnson had proposed that the crystal lustre, or chandelier, in Dr. Taylor's large room should be lighted up some time or other. Taylor said it should be lighted up next night. That will do very well,' said I, 'for it is Dr. Johnson's birthday.'" But Johnson was again displeased, and sternly said that the chandelier should not be lighted next day, that he would not permit it to be done.— Editor.

FEAR OF DEATH.

WHEN we were alone, I introduced the subject of death, and endeavored to maintain that the fear of it might be got over. I told him that David Hume said to me he was no more uneasy to think he should not be after his life, than that he had not been before he began to exist. Johnson: "Sir, if he really thinks so, his perceptions are disturbed; he is mad. If he does not think so, he lies. He may tell you he holds his finger in the flame of a candle, without feeling pain; would you believe him? When he dies, he at least gives up all he has." Boswell: "Foote, sir, told me that, when he was very ill, he was not afraid to die." Johnson: "It is not true, sir. Hold a pistol to Foote's breast, or to Hume's breast, and threaten to kill them, and you'll see how they behave." Boswell: "But may we not fortify our minds for the approach of death?" Here I am sensible I was in the wrong, to bring before his view what he ever looked upon with horror; for, although when in a celestial frame of mind, in his "Vanity of Human Wishes," he has supposed death to be "kind nature's signal for retreat,"

from this state of being to "a happier seat," his thoughts upon this awful change were, in general, full of dismal apprehensions. His mind resembled the vast amphitheatre, the Coliseum at Rome. In the centre stood his judgment, which, like a mighty gladiator, combated those apprehensions that, like the wild beasts of the arena, were all around in cells, ready to be let out upon him. After a conflict, he drives them back into their dens; but, not killing them, they were still assailing him. To my question, whether we might not fortify our minds for the approach of death, he answered, in a passion, "No, sir, let it alone. It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance-it lasts so short a time." He added, with an earnest look, “A man knows it must be so, and submits. It will do him no good to whine." I attempted to continue the conversation. He was so provoked that he said, "Give us no more of this ;" and was thrown into such a state of agitation that he expressed himself in a way that alarmed and distressed me; showed an impatience that I should leave him, and when I was going away, called to me sternly, "Don't let us meet to-morrow."-Boswell.

The horror of death, which I had always observed in Dr. Johnson, appeared strong to-night. I ventured to tell him that I had been, for moments in my life, not afraid of death; therefore I could suppose another man in that state of mind for

considerable space of time. He said, "He never had a moment in which death was not terrible to him." He added that it had been observed that scarce any man dies in public but with apparent resolution, from that desire of praise which never quits us. I said, Dr. Dodd seemed willing to die, and full of hopes of happiness. "Sir," said he, "Dr. Dodd would have given both his hands and both his legs to have lived. The better a man is, the more he is afraid of death, having a clearer view of infinite purity."Boswell.

He said to Boswell, "I have made no approaches to a state which can look on death as not terrible." On another occasion he said that the whole of life was but keeping away the thoughts of death. An old friend of his at Lichfield tells that some one in a company, of which Johnson was one, vouched for the company that there was no one in it afraid of death. "Speak for yourself, sir," said Johnson; "for, indeed, I am." He held that the protraction of mere existence was a "sufficient recompense for very considerable degrees of torture."-Editor.

TORY AND HIGH-CHURCHMAN.

To such a degree of unrestrained frankness had he now accustomed me, that in the course of this evening I talked of the numerous reflections which had been thrown out against him on account of his having accepted a pension from his present Majesty. "Why, sir," said he, with a hearty laugh, "it is a mighty foolish noise that they make. I have accepted of a pension as a reward which has been thought due to my literary merit; and now that I have this pension, I am the same man in every respect that I have ever been; I retain the same principles. It is true that I cannot now curse" (smiling) "the house of Hanover; nor would it be decent for me to drink King James's health in the wine that King George gives me money to pay for. But, sir, I think that the pleasure of cursing the house of Hanover and drinking King James's health are amply overbalanced by three, hundred pounds a year."

There was here, most certainly, an affectation of more Jacobitism than he really had; and, indeed, an intention of admitting for the moment, in a much greater extent than it really existed, the charge of disaffection imputed to him by the world, merely for the purpose of showing how dexterously he could repel an attack, even though he were placed

in the most disadvantageous position; for I have heard him declare that if holding up his right hand would have secured victory at Culloden to Prince Charles's army, he was not sure he would have held it up, so little confidence had he in the right claimed by the house of Stuart, and so fearful was he of the consequences of another revolution on the throne of Great Britain; and Mr. Topham Beauclerk assured me he had heard him say this before he had his pension. At another time he said to Mr. Langton, "Nothing has ever offered that has made it worth my while to consider the question fully." He, however, also said to the same gentleman, talking of King James the Second, "It was become impossible for him to reign any longer in this country." He no doubt had an early attachment to the house of Stuart; but his zeal had cooled as his reason strengthened. Indeed, I heard him once say "that, after the death of a violent Whig, with whom he used to contend with great eagerness, he felt his Toryism much abated." I suppose he meant Mr. Walmesley.

Yet there is no doubt that, at earlier periods, he was wont often to exercise both his pleasantry and ingenuity in talking Jacobitism. My much respected friend, Dr. Douglas, now Bishop of Salisbury, has favored me with the following admirable instance from his lordship's own recollection: One day, when dining at old Mr. Langton's, where Miss Roberts, his niece, was one of the company, Johnson, with his usual complacent attention to the fair sex, took her by the hand, and said, "My dear, I hope you are a Jacobite." Old Mr. Langton, who, though a high and steady Tory, was attached to the present royal family, seemed offended, and asked Johnson, with great warmth, what he could mean by putting such a question to his niece. "Why, sir," said Johnson, "I meant no offence to your niece-I meant her a great compliment. A Jacobite, sir, believes in the diyine right of kings. He that believes in the divine right of kings believes in a Divinity. A Jacobite believes in the divine right

of bishops. He that believes in the divine right of bishops believes in the divine authority of the Christian religion. Therefore, sir, a Jacobite is neither an Atheist nor a Deist. That cannot be said of a Whig; for Whiggism is a negation of all principle."-Boswell (1763).

I asked if it was not strange that government should permit so many infidel writings to pass without censure. Johnson: "Sir, it is mighty foolish. It is for want of knowing their own power. The present family on the throne came to the crown against the will of nine-tenths of the people. Whether those nine-tenths were right or wrong, it is not our business now to inquire. But such being the situation of the royal family, they were glad to encourage all who would be their friends. Now, you know every bad man is a Whig; every man who has loose notions. The Church was all against this family. They were, as I say, glad to encourage any friends; and therefore, since their accession, there is no instance of any man being kept back on account of his bad principles; and hence this inundation of impiety."-Boswell.

He had this evening (partly, I suppose, from the spirit of contradiction to his Whig friend) a violent argument with Dr. Taylor as to the inclinations of the people of England at this time toward the royal family of Stuart. He grew so outrageous as to say "that, if England were fairly polled, the present king would be sent away to-night, and his adherents hanged to-morrow." Taylor, who was as violent a Whig as Johnson was a Tory, was roused by this to a pitch of bellowing. He denied loudly what Johnson said, and maintained that there was an abhorrence against the Stuart family, though he admitted that the people were not much attached to the present king.* Johnson: "Sir, the state of

*George the Third.

« AnteriorContinuar »