good things you call for, the welcomer you are. No fervants will attend you with the alacrity which waiters do, who are incited by the profpect of an immediate reward in proportion as they pleafe. No, Sir; there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which fo much happiness is produced as by a good tavern or inn *. He then repeated, with great emotion, Shenftone's lines:

"Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round,
"Where'er his stages may have been,

"May figh to think he still has found
"Ihe warmest welcome at an inn.”

Sir John Hawkins (fays Mr. B.1 has preferved very few Memorabilia of Johnfon. There is, however, to be found, in his bulky tome, a very excellent one upon this fubject. "In contradiction to thofe who, having a wife and children, prefer domeftic enjoyment to thofe which a tavern affords, I have heard him affert, that a tavern chair was the throne of human felicity. As foon (faid he) as I enter the door of a tavern, I experience an oblivion of care, and a freedom from folicitude; when I am feated, I find the mafter courteous, and the fervants obfequious to my call; anxious to know and ready to fupply my wants: wine there exhilarates my fpirits, and prompts me to free converfation and an interchange of difcourfe with those whom I moft love: I dogmatife and am contradicted, and in this conflict of opinions and fentiments I find delight.

POLITICS.

POLITICS.

There is in

JOHNSON arraigned the modern politics of this country, as entirely devoid of all principle of whatever kind.-" Politics (faid he) are now nothing more than means of rifing in the world. With this fole view do men engage in politics, and their whole conduct proceeds upon it. How different in that refpect is the ftate of the nation now from what it was in the time of Charles the Firft, during the Ufurpation, and after the Reftoration, in the time of Charles the Second. Hudibras affords a ftrong proof how much hold political principles had then upon the minds of men. Hudibras a great deal of bullion which will always laft. But to be fure the brightest strokes of his wit owed their force to the impreffion of the characters which was upon men's minds at the time; to their knowing them, at table and in the street: in fhort being familiar with them and above all, to his fatire being directed against those whom a little while before they had hated and feared. The nation in general has ever been loyal, has been at all times attached to the monarch, though a few daring rebels have been wonderfully powerful for a time.

A

The murder of Charles the Firft was undoubt→ edly not committed with the approbation or confent of the people. Had that been the cafe, Parliament would not have ventured to confign the regicides to their deserved punishment. And we know what exuberance of joy there was when Charles the Second was reftored. If Charles the Second had bent all his mind to it, had made it his fole object, he might have been as abfolute as Louis the Fourteenth." gentleman obferved he would have done no harm if he had. - JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, abfolute princes feldom do any harm. But they who are governed by them are governed by chance. There is no fecurity for good government." Mr. Cambridge faid, There have been many fad victims to abfolute government."-7. "So, Sir, have there been to popular factions."—B. "The question is, which is worft, one wild beaft or many?"

Talking of different governments, Johnson faid, "The more contracted a power is, the more eafily it is deftroyed. A country governed by a defpot is an inverted cone. Government there cannot be fo firm as when it refts upon a broad bafis gradually contracted, as the government of Great-Britain, which is founded on the parliament, then is in the privycouncil, then in the king."-BoS WELL." Power

when

1

when contracted into the perfon of a defpot may be easily destroyed, as the prince may be cut off. So Caligula wished that the people of Rome had but one neck, that he might cut them off at a blow."-GENERAL OGLETHORPE. "It was of the Senate he wifhed that. The Senate by its ufurpation controuled both the Emperor and the people."

At another time Johnson said, "The mode of government by one may be ill adapted to a small society, but is beft for a great nation.The characteristic of our own government at present is imbecillity. The magistrate dare not call the guards for fear of being hanged.The guards will not come, for fear of being given up to the blind rage of popular juries *."

Patriotism having become one of the topics, Johnson fuddenly uttered, in a flrong determined tone, an apophthegm, at which many will start" Patriotifm is the last refuge of a fcoundrel." But let it be confidered, that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotifm which fo many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak for felf-intereft." I maintained (fays Mr. B.) that certainly all patriots were not

*This was a juft obfervation before the riots in 1780. Since that time the advantage of a vigorous government has been univerfally acknowledged.

fcoundrels.

b

fcoundrels. Being urged (not by Johnson) to name one exception, I mentioned an eminent perfon, whom we all greatly admired.-JOHNSON. Sir, I do not fay that he is not honeft; but we have no reafon to conclude, from his political conduct, that he is honeft. Were he to accept of a place from this miniftry, he would lofe that character of firmness which he has, and might be turned out of his place in a year. This miniftry is neither stable nor grateful to their friends, as Sir Robert Walpole was; fo that he may think it more for his intereft to take the chance of his party coming in."

He faid, "Lord Chatham was a Dictator ; he poffeffed the power of putting the State in motion; now there is no power, all order is relaxed."-BOSWELL. "Is there no hope of a change to the better."-JOHNSON. "Why, yes Sir, when we are weary of this relaxation. So the city of London will appoint its mayors again by feniority*."-B." But is not that taking a mere chance for having a good or a bad mayor?". "Yes, Sir; but the evil of competition is greater than that of the worst mayor that can come befides, there is no more reason to fuppofe that the choice of a rabble will be right, than that chance will be right."

# City diffenfions ran high at the time; and fome Aldermen were put afide to elect others to the chair.