sions of other people. "While they confine their benevolence, in a manner, exclusively to those of their own country, they expect to share in the good offices of other people. Now," said Johnson, "this principle is either right or wrong: if right, we should do well to imitate such conduct; if wrong, we cannot too much detest it." 'Being solicited to compose a funeral sermon for the daughter of a tradesman, he naturally inquired into the character of the deceased; and being told she was remarkable for her humility and condescension to inferiors, he observed that those were very laudable qualities, but it might not be so easy to discover who the lady's inferiors were. Of a certain player he remarked, that his conversation usually threatened and announced more than it performed; that he fed you with a continual renovation of hope, to end in a constant succession of disappointment. 'When exasperated by contradiction, he was apt to treat his opponents with too much acrimony: as, "Sir, you don't see your way through that question. Sir, you talk the language of ignorance." On my observing to him that a certain gentleman had remained silent the whole evening in the midst of a very brilliant and learned society, "Sir," said he, "the conversation overflowed and drowned him." 'His philosophy, though austere and solemn, was by no means morose and cynical, and never blunted the laudable sensibilities of his character, or exempted him from the influence of the tender passions. Want of tenderness, he always alleged, was want of parts, and was no less a proof of stupidity than depravity. 'Speaking of Mr. Hanway, who published An Eight Days' Journey from London to Portsmouth, "Jonas," said he, "acquired some repatation by travelling abroad, but lost it all by travelling at home." Of the passion of love he remarked, that its violence and ill effects were much exaggerated: for who knows any real sufferings on that head, more than from the exorbitancy of any other passion? 'He much commended Law's Serious Call, which he said was the finest piece of hortatory theology in any language. "Law," said he, "fell latterly into the reveries of Jacob Behmen,1 | whom Law alleged to have been somewhat in the same state with St. Paul, and to have seen unutterable things. Were it even so," said Johnson, "Jacob would have resembled St. Paul still more by not attempting to utter them." 'He observed that the established clergy in general did not preach plain enough; and that polished periods and glittering sentences flew over the heads of the common people without A mystic, originally a shoemaker, born at Gülitz in 1573. He wrote a number of theological works, and died in 1624 any impression upon their hearts. Something might be necessary, he observed, to excite the affections of the common people, who were sunk in languor and lethargy, and therefore he supposed that the new concomitants of Methodism might probably produce so desirable an effect. The mind, like the body, he observed, delighted in change and novelty, and even in religion itself courted new appearances and modifications. Whatever might be thought of some Methodist teachers, he said he could scarcely doubt the sincerity of that man who travelled nine hundred miles in a month, and preached twelve times a week; for no adequate reward, merely temporal, could be given for such indefatigable labour. 'Of Dr. Priestley's theological works, he remarked that they tended to unsettle everything, and yet settled nothing. 'He was much affected by the death of his mother, and wrote to me to come and assist him to compose his mind, which indeed I found extremely agitated. He lamented that all serious and religious conversation was banished from the society of men, and yet great advantages might be derived from it. All acknowledged, he said, what hardly anybody practised, the obligations we were under of making the concerns of eternity the governing principles of our lives. Every man, he observed, at last wishes for retreat he sees his expectations frustrated in the world, and begins to wean himself from it, and to prepare for everlasting separation. 'He observed that the influence of London now extended everywhere, and that from all manner of communication being opened, there shortly would be no remains of the ancient simplicity or places of cheap retreat to be found. 'He was no admirer of blank verse, and said it always failed, unless sustained by the dignity of the subject. In blank verse he said the language suffered more distortion to keep it out of prose, than any inconvenience or limitation to be apprehended from the shackles and circumspection of rhyme. 'He reproved me once for saying grace without mentioning the name of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, and hoped in future I would be more mindful of the apostolical injunction. 'He refused to go out of a room before me at Mr. Langton's house, saying he hoped he knew his rank better than to presume to take place of a Doctor in Divinity. I mention such little anecdotes merely to show the peculiar turn and habit of his mind. 'He used frequently to observe that there was more to be endured than enjoyed in the general condition of human life, and frequently quoted those lines of Dryden : "Strange cozenage! none would live past years again, Yet all hope pleasure from what still remain.” For his part, he said he never passed that week M in his life which he would wish to repeat, were an angel to make the proposal to him. 'He was of opinion that the English nation cultivated both their soil and their reason better than any other people; but admitted that the French, though not the highest perhaps in any department of literature, yet in every department were very high. Intellectual pre-eminence, he observed, was the highest superiority; and that every nation derived their highest reputation from the splendour and dignity of their writers. Voltaire, he said, was a good narrator, and that his principal merit consisted in a happy selection and arrangement of circum stances. 'Speaking of the French novels compared with Richardson's, he said they might be pretty baubles, but a wren was not an eagle. 'In a Latin conversation with the Père Boscovitch at the house of Mrs. Cholmondeley, I heard him maintain the superiority of Sir Isaac Newton over all foreign philosophers,' with a dignity and eloquence that surprised that learned foreigner. It being observed to him that a rage for everything English prevailed much in France after Lord Chatham's glorious war, he said he did not wonder at it, for that we had drubbed those fellows into a proper reverence for us, and that their national petulance required periodical chastisement. 'Lord Lyttelton's Dialogues he deemed a nugatory performance. "That man," said he, "sat down to write a book to tell the world what the world had all his life been telling him." 'Somebody observing that the Scotch Highlanders, in the year 1745, had made surprising efforts, considering their numerous wants and disadvantages: "Yes, sir," said he, "their wants were numerous; but you have not men. tioned the greatest of them all-the want of law." 'Speaking of the inward light to which some Methodists pretended, he said it was a principle utterly incompatible with social or civil security. "If a man," said he, "pretends to a principle of action of which I can know nothing, nay, not so much as that he has it, but only that he pretends to it; how can I tell what that person may be prompted to do? When a person professes to be governed by a written ascertained law, I can then know where to find him." "The poem of Fingal, he said, was a mere unconnected rhapsody, a tiresome repetition of the same images. "In vain shall we look for the lucidus ordo, where there is neither end In a discourse by Sir William Jones, addressed to the Asiatic Society, Feb. 24, 1785, is the following passage:- 'One of the most sagacious men of this age, who continues I hope to improve and adorn it, Samuel Johnson, remarked in my hearing, that if Newton had flourished in ancient Greece, he would have been worshipped as a Divinity.'-MALONE. 'Much inquiry having been made concerning a gentleman who had quitted a company where Johnson was, and no information being obtained, at last Johnson observed, that "he did not care to speak ill of any man behind his back, but he believed the gentleman was an attorney." 'He spoke with much contempt of the notice taken of Woodhouse, the poetical shoemaker. He said it was all vanity and childishness; and that such objects were, to those who patronized them, mere mirrors of their own superiority. "They had better," said he, "furnish the man with good implements for his trade, than raise subscriptions for his poems. He may make an excellent shoemaker, but can never make a good poet. A schoolboy's exercise may be a pretty thing for a schoolboy; but it is no treat for a man." 'Speaking of Boetius, who was the favourite writer of the middle ages, he said it was very surprising that upon such a subject, and in such a situation, he should be magis philosophus quam Christianus. 'Speaking of Arthur Murphy, whom he very much loved, "I don't know," said he, "that Arthur can be classed with the very first dramatic writers; yet at present, I doubt much whether we have anything superior to Arthur." 'Speaking of the national debt, he said, "It was an idle dream to suppose that the country could sink under it. Let the public creditors be ever so clamorous, the interest of millions must ever prevail over that of thousands." 'Of Dr. Kennicott's Collations he observed, that "though the text should not be much mended thereby, yet it was no small advantage to know that we had as good a text as the most consummate industry and diligence could pro stigation of the ministry, and was equally ready to write for him, provided he found his account in it. 'A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died: Johnson said, it was the triumph of hope over experience. 'He observed that a man of sense and education should meet a suitable companion in a wife. It was a miserable thing when the conversation could only be such as, whether the mutton should be boiled or roasted, and probably a dispute about that. 'He did not approve of late marriages, observing that more was lost in point of time than compensated for by any possible advantages. Even ill-assorted marriages were preferable to cheerless celibacy. Of old Sheridan he remarked that he neither wanted parts nor literature, but that his vanity and Quixotism obscured his merits. 'He said foppery was never cured; it was the bad stamina of the mind, which, like those of the body, were never rectified: once a coxcomb, and always a coxcomb. 'Being told that Gilbert Cooper called him the Caliban of literature, "Well," said he, "I must dub him the Punchinello." *Speaking of the old Earl of Cork and Orrery, he said, "That man spent his life in catching at an object (literary eminence) which he had not power to grasp." could not otherwise contrive how to fill the interval between dinner and supper. 'He went with me one Sunday to hear my old master Gregory Sharpe preach at the Temple. In the prefatory prayer, Sharpe ranted about liberty, as a blessing most fervently to be implored, and its continuance prayed for. Johnson observed, that our liberty was in no sort of danger: he would have done much better to pray against our licentiousness. 'One evening, at Mrs. Montagu's, where a splendid company was assembled, consisting of the most eminent literary characters, I thought he seemed highly pleased with the respect and attention that were shown him, and asked him, on our return home, if he was not highly gratified by his visit: "No, sir," said he, "not highly gratified; yet I do not recollect to have passed many evenings with fewer objec tions." "Though of no high extraction himself, he had much respect for birth and family, especially among ladies. He said, "adventitious accomplishments may be possessed by all ranks, but one may easily distinguish the born gentlewoman.' 'He said, the poor in England were better provided for than in any other country of the same extent: he did not mean little cantons or petty republies. "Where a great proportion of the people," said he, "are suffered to languish in helpless misery, that country must be ill policed and wretchedly governed: a decent To find a substitution for violated morality, he said, was the leading feature in all perver-provision for the poor is the true test of civilisasions of religion. 'He often used to quote, with great pathos, those fine lines of Virgil: ** Optima quæque dies miseris mortalibus ævi Prima fugit; subeunt morbi, tristisque senectus, Et labor, et duræ rapit inclementia mortis." 'Speaking of Homer, whom he venerated as the prince of poets, Johnson remarked that the advice given to Diomed' by his father, when he sent him to the Trojan war, was the noblest exhertation that could be instanced in any heathen writer, and comprised in a single line: Αὖν ἀριστεύειν, καὶ ὑπείροχον ἔμμεναι ἄλλων, which, if I recollect well, is translated by Dr. Clarke thus: Semper appetere præstantissima, et omnibus aliis antecellere. * He observed, "It was a most mortifying reflection for any man to consider what he had done, compared with what he might have done." 'He said few people had intellectual resources 66 tion. Gentlemen of education," he observed, were pretty much the same in all countries: the condition of the lower orders, the poor especially, was the true mark of national discrimination." 'When the corn laws were in agitation in Ireland, by which that country has been enabled not only to feed itself, but to export corn to a large amount, Sir Thomas Robinson observed that those laws might be prejudicial to the corn-trade of England. "Sir Thomas," said he, "you talk the language of a savage: what, sir, would you prevent any people from feeding themselves, if by any honest means they can do it?" 'It being mentioned that Garrick assisted Dr. Browne, the author of The Estimate, in some dramatic composition, "No, sir," said Johnson, "he would no more suffer Garrick to write a line in his play, than he would suffer him to mount his pulpit." sufficient to forego the pleasures of wine. They monly observed he spoke too often in Parlia'Speaking of Burke, he said, "It was com 1 Dr. Maxwell's memory has deceived him. Glanens is the person who received this counsel; and Clarke's transiation of the passage (Il. lib. x. 1. 20s) is as folLas ment; but nobody could say he did not speak well, though too frequently and too familiarly." 'Speaking of economy, he remarked it was hardly worth while to save anxiously twenty Ut semper fortissime rem gererem, et superior pounds a year. If a man could save to that virtute essem aliis.-J. BoSWELL, jun. degree, so as to enable him to assume a diffe rent rank in society, then indeed it might answer some purpose. 'He observed, a principal source of erroneous judgment was viewing things partially and only on one side: as, for instance, fortune-hunters, when they contemplated the fortunes singly and separately, it was a dazzling and tempting object; but when they came to possess the wives and their fortunes together, they began to suspect they had not made quite so good a bargain. 'Speaking of the late Duke of Northumberland living very magnificently when Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, somebody remarked it would be difficult to find a suitable successor to him: "Then," exclaimed Johnson, "he is only fit to succeed himself." 'He advised me, if possible, to have a good orchard. He knew, he said, a clergyman of small income who brought up a family very reputably, which he chiefly fed with apple dumplings. 'He said he had known several good scholars among the Irish gentlemen, but scarcely any of them correct in quantity. He extended the same observation to Scotland. Speaking of a certain prelate who exerted himself very laudably in building churches and parsonage-houses; "However," said he, "I do not find that he is esteemed a man of much "He who has early known the pomps of state (For things unknown 'tis ignorance to condemn); And, after having view'd the gaudy bait, Can boldly say, The trifle I contemn; 1 Being desirous to trace these verses to the fountainhead, after having in vain turned over several of applied to Dr. Maxwell, now resident at Bath, for the our elder poets with the hope of lighting on them, I purpose of ascertaining their author; but that gentleman could furnish no aid on this occasion. At length the lines have been discovered by the author's second | son, Mr. James Boswell, in the London Magazine for July 1732, where they form part of a poem on Retire ment,' there published anonymously, but in fact (as he afterwards found) copied, with some slight variations, from one of Walsh's smaller poems, entitled The Retirement; and they exhibit another proof of what has been elsewhere observed by the author of the work before us, that Johnson retained in his memory fragments of obscure or neglected poetry. In quoting verses of that description, he appears by a slight variation to have sometimes given them a noral turn, and to have dexterously adapted them to his own sentiments, where the original had a very different tendency. Thus, in the present instance (as Mr. J. Boswell observes to me), the author of the poem above mentioned exhibits himself as having retired to the country, to avoid the vain follies of a town life,ambition, avarice, and the pursuit of pleasure, contrasted with the enjoyments of the country, and the delightful conversation that the brooks, etc., furnish; which he holds to be infinitely more pleasing and professional learning, or a liberal patron of it; instructive than any which towns afford. He is then yet it is well where a man possesses any strong positive excellence. Few have all kinds of merit belonging to their character. We must not examine matters too deeply. No, sir, a fallible being will fail somewhere." Talking of the Irish clergy, he said, "Swift was a man of great parts, and the instrument of much good to his country. Berkeley was a profound scholar as well as a man of fine imagination; but Usher," he said, was the great luminary of the Irish Church; and a greater," he added, "no church could boast of, at least in modern times." 'We dined tête-à-tête at the Mitre, as I was preparing to return to Ireland after an absence of many years. I regretted much leaving London, where I had formed many agreeable connections. "Sir," said he, "I don't wonder at it; no man fond of letters leaves London with out regret. But remember, sir, you have seen and enjoyed a great deal; you have seen life in its highest decorations, and the world has nothing new to exhibit. No man is so well qualified to leave public life as he who has long tried it and known it well. We are always hankering after untried situations, and imagining greater felicity from them than they can afford. No, sir, knowledge and virtue may be acquired in all countries, and your local consequence will make you some amends for the intellectual gratifications you relinquish." Then he quoted the following lines with great pathos: led to consider the weakness of the human mind; ani If beauty always must my heart enthral, Than madly thus become a slave to all: (For things unknown 'tis ignorance to condemn); And, after having view'd the gaudy bait, Can coldly say, The trifle I contemn; With hopes of joys impossible to find."* Another instance of Johnson's retaining in his memory verses by obscure authors, is given in Mr. Boswell's Journal of a Tour in the Hebrides; where, in consequence of hearing a girl spinning in a chamber over that in which he was sitting, he repeated these lines, which he said were written by one Gifard, a clergyman; but the poem in which they are introduced has hitherto been undiscovered: 'Verse sweetens toil, however rude the sound: In the autumn of 1782, when he was at Brighthelmstone, he frequently accompanied Mr. Philip Metcalfe in his chaise to take the air; and the conversation in one of their excursions happening to turn on a celebrated historian, since deceased, he repeated, with great precision, some verses as very characteristic of that gentleman. These furnish another proof of what IN 1771 Johnson published another political pamphlet, entitled Thoughts on the late Transactions respecting Falkland's Islands, in which, upon materials furnished to him by the ministry, and upon general topics, expanded in his rich style, he successfully endeavoured to persuade the nation that it was wise and laudable to suffer the question of right to remain undecided, rather than involve our country in another war. It has been suggested by some, with what truth I shall not take upon me to decide, that he rated the consequence of those islands to Great Britain too low. But however this may be, every humane mind must surely applaud the earnestness with which he averted the calamity of war: a calamity so dreadful, that it is astonishing how civilised, nay, Christian nations can deliberately continue to renew it. His description of its miseries in this pamphlet is one of the finest pieces of eloquence in the English language. Upon this occasion, too, we find Johnson lashing the party in opposition with unbounded severity, and making the fallest use of what he ever reckoned a most effectual argumentative instrument-contempt. His character of their very able mysterious champion, Junius, is executed with all the force of his genius, and finished with the highest care. He seems to have exulted in sallying forth to ingle combat against the boasted and formidable hero, who bade defiance to 'principalities and powers, and the rulers of this world.' This pamphlet, it is observable, was softened in one particular after the first edition; for the been above observed; for they are found in a very here quarter, among some anonymous poems appended to the second volume of a collection frequently priated by Lintot, under the title of Pope's Miscellanies: See how the wand'ring Danube flows, Realms and religions parting; A friend to all true Christian foes, To Peter, Jack, and Martin. 'Now Protestant, and Papist now, And ends his journey neither. 'Thus many a youth I've known set out, And rambling long the world about, In reeting these verses I have no doubt that JohnBaletitted some word for infidel in the second stanza, to avoid the disagreeable repetition of the same EX-MALONE. conclusion of Mr. George Grenville's character stood thus: 'Let him not, however, be depreciated in his grave. He had powers not universally possessed: could he have enforced payment of the Manilla ransom, he could have counted it ;' which, instead of retaining its sly sharp point, was reduced to a mere flat unmeaning expression, or, if I may use the word, truism: He had powers not universally possessed: and if he sometimes erred, he was likewise sometimes right." TO BENNET LANGTON, ESQ. 'March 20, 1771. 'DEAR SIR,-After much lingering of my own, and much of the ministry, I have at length got out my paper.' But delay is not yet at an end not many had been dispersed before Lord North ordered the sale to stop. His reasons I do not distinctly know. You may try to find them in the perusal. Before his order a sufficient number were dispersed to do all the mischief, though perhaps not to make all the sport that might be expected from it. 'Soon after your departure I had the pleasure of finding all the danger past with which your navigation was threatened. I hope nothing happens at home to abate your satisfaction; but that Lady Rothes and Mrs. Langton, and the young ladies, are all well. 'I was last night at THE CLUB. Dr. Percy has written a long ballad in many fits; it is pretty enough. He has printed, and will soon publish it. Goldsmith is at Bath with Lord Clare. Mr. Thrale's, where I am now writing, all are well.--I am, dear sir, your most humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.' At Mr. Strahan, the printer, who had been long in intimacy with Johnson in the course of his literary labours, who was at once his friendly agent in receiving his pension for him, and his banker in supplying him with money when he wanted it; who was himself now a member of Parliament, and who loved much to be employed in political negotiation; thought he should do eminent service, both to Government and Johnson, if he could be the means of his getting a seat in the House of Commons. With this view he wrote a letter to one of the Secretaries of the Treasury, of which he gave me a copy in his own handwriting, which is as follows:- 'NEW STREET, March 30, 1771. 'SIR,-You will easily recollect, when I had the honour of waiting upon you some time ago, 1 Thoughts on the late Transactions respecting Falkland's Islands. 2 By comparing the first with the subsequent editions, this curious circumstance of ministerial author. ship may be discovered. It can only be discovered (as Mr. Bindley observes to me) by him who possesses a copy of the first edition, issued out before the sale was stopped.-MALONE |