36

Boswell's defence of Burke's wit. [August 15.

most envy Burke for, is his being constantly the same. He is never what we call hum-drum; never unwilling to begin

(True wit is Nature to advantage drest;

What oft was thought, but ne'er so well exprest.)

[Pope's Essay on Criticism, ii. 297.]

but surprising allusions, brilliant sallies of vivacity, and pleasant conceits. His speeches in parliament are strewed with them. Take, for instance, the variety which he has given in his wide range, yet exact detail, when exhibiting his Reform Bill. And his conversation abounds in wit. Let me put down a specimen. I told him, I had seen, at a Blue stocking assembly, a number of ladies sitting round a worthy and tall friend of ours, listening to his literature. 'Ay, (said he,) like maids round a May-pole.' I told him, I had found out a perfect definition of human nature, as distinguished from the animal. An ancient philosopher said, Man was ‘a two-legged animal without feathers,' upon which his rival Sage had a Cock plucked bare, and set him down in the school before all the disciples, as a Philosophick Man.' Dr. Franklin said, Man was 'a tool-making anímal,' which is very well; for no animal but man makes a thing, by means of which he can make another thing. But this applies to very few of the species. My definition of Man is, 'a Cooking animal.' The beasts have memory, judgment, and all the faculties and passions of our mind in a certain degree; but no beast is a cook. The trick of the monkey using the cat's paw to roast a chestnut, is only a piece of shrewd malice in that turpissima bestia, which humbles us so sadly by its similarity to us. Man alone can dress a good dish; and every man whatever is more or less a cook, in seasoning what he himself eats. Your definition is good, said Mr. Burke, and I now see the full force of the common proverb, 'There is reason in roasting of eggs.' When Mr. Wilkes, in his days of tumultuous opposition, was borne upon the shoulders of the mob, Mr. Burke (as Mr. Wilkes told me himself, with classical admiration,) applied to him what Horace says of Pindar,

numerisque fertur

LEGE solutis. [Odes, iv. 2. 11.]

Sir Joshua Reynolds, who agrees with me entirely as to Mr. Burke's fertility of wit, said, that this was 'dignifying a pun.' He also observed, that he has often heard Burke say, in the course of an evening, ten good things, each of which would have served a noted wit (whom he named) to live upon for a twelvemonth.

I find, since the former edition, that some persons have objected to the instances which I have given of Mr. Burke's wit, as not doing justice to my very ingenious friend; the specimens produced having, it is alleged, more of conceit than real wit, and being merely sportive

to

August 15.] Boswell's defence of Burke's wit.

37

to talk, nor in haste to leave off.' BOSWELL. Yet he can listen.' JOHNSON. 'No: I cannot say he is good at that'. So desirous is he to talk, that, if one is speaking at this end of the table, he'll speak to somebody at the other end. Burke, Sir, is such a man, that if you met him for the first

sailies of the moment, not justifying the encomium which, they think with me, he undoubtedly merits. I was well aware, how hazardous it was to exhibit particular instances of wit, which is of so airy and spiritual a nature as often to elude the hand that attempts to grasp it. The excellence and efficacy of a bon mot depend frequently so much on the occasion on which it is spoken, on the particular manner of the speaker, on the person to whom it is applied, the previous introduction, and a thousand minute particulars which cannot be easily enumerated, that it is always dangerous to detach a witty saying from the group to which it belongs, and to set it before the eye of the spectator, divested of those concomitant circumstances, which gave it animation, mellowness, and relief. I ventured, however, at all hazards, to put down the first instances that occurred to me, as proofs of Mr. Burke's lively and brilliant fancy; but am very sensible that his numerous friends could have suggested many of a superior quality. Indeed, the being in company with him, for a single day, is sufficient to shew that what I have asserted is well founded; and it was only necessary to have appealed to all who know him intimately, for a complete refutation of the heterodox opinion entertained by Dr. Johnson on this subject. He allowed Mr. Burke, as the reader will find hereafter [post, Sept. 15 and 30], to be a man of consummate and unrivalled abilities in every light except that now under consideration; and the variety of his allusions, and splendour of his imagery, have made such an impression on all the rest of the world, that superficial observers are apt to overlook his other merits, and to suppose that wit is his chief and most prominent excellence; when in fact it is only one of the many talents that he possesses, which are so various and extraordinary, that it is very difficult to ascertain precisely the rank and value of each. BOSWELL. For Malone's share in this note, see ante, iii. 367, note 3. For Burke's Economical Reform Bill, which was brought in on Feb. 11, 1780, see Prior's Burke, p. 184. For Blue Stocking, see ante, iv. 125. The 'tall friend of ours' was Mr. Langton (ante, i. 389, 390). For Franklin's definition, see ante, iii. 278, and for Burke's classical pun, ib. p. 367, 368. For Burke's 'talent of wit,' see ante, i. 525, iii. 367, iv. May 15, 1784, and post, Sept. 15.

1 See ante, iv. 31, where Burke said :-'It is enough for me to have rung the bell to him [Johnson].'

38

Burke an extraordinary man.

[August 15.

time in the street where you were stopped by a drove of oxen, and you and he stepped aside to take shelter but for five minutes, he'd talk to you in such a manner, that, when you parted, you would say, this is an extraordinary man'. Now, you may be long enough with me, without finding any thing extraordinary.' He said, he believed Burke was intended for the law; but either had not money enough to follow it, or had not diligence enough'. He said, he could not understand how a man could apply to one thing, and not to another. ROBERTSON said, one man had more judg ment, another more imagination. JOHNSON. 'No, Sir; it is only, one man has more mind than another. He may direct it differently; he may, by accident, see the success of one kind of study, and take a desire to excel in it. I am persuaded that, had Sir Isaac Newton applied to poetry, he would have made a very fine epick poem. I could as easily apply to law as to tragick poetry.' BOSWELL. 'Yet, Sir, you did apply to tragick poetry, not to law.' JOHNSON. 'Because, Sir, I had not money to study law. Sir, the man who has vigour, may walk to the east, just as well as to the west, if he happens to turn his head that way'.' BOSWELL. 'But, Sir, 'tis like walking up and down a hill; one man will naturally do the one better than the other. A hare will run up a hill best, from her fore-legs being short; a dog down.' JOHNSON. Nay, Sir; that is from mechanical powers. If you make mind mechanical, you may argue in that manner. One mind is a vice, and holds fast; there's a good memory. Another is a file; and he is a disputant, a controversialist. Another is a razor; and he is sarcastical.' We talked of Whitefield. He said he was at the same college with him', and knew him before he began to be better than other people

1 See ante, vol. iv. May 15, 1784.

'Prior (Life of Burke, pp. 31, 36) says that 'from the first his destination was the Bar.' His name was entered at the Middle Temple in 1747, but he was never called. Why he gave up the profession his biographer cannot tell.

'See ante, ii. 500, note 2.

See ante, i. 91, note 1.

(smiling

August 15.]

Wesley and Whitefield.

39

(smiling;) that he believed he sincerely meant well, but had a mixture of politicks and ostentation: whereas Wesley thought of religion only'. ROBERTSON said, Whitefield had strong natural eloquence, which, if cultivated, would have done great things. JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, I take it, he was at the height of what his abilities could do, and was

'That cannot be said now, after the flagrant part which Mr. John Wesley took against our American brethren, when, in his own name, he threw amongst his enthusiastick flock, the very individual combustibles of Dr. Johnson's Taxation no Tyranny; and after the intolerant spirit which he manifested against our fellow-christians of the Roman Catholick Communion, for which that able champion, Father O'Leary, has given him so hearty a drubbing. But I should think myself very unworthy, if I did not at the same time acknowledge Mr. John Wesley's merit, as a veteran 'Soldier of Jesus Christ' [2 Timothy, ii. 3], who has, I do believe, 'turned many from darkness into light, and from the power of Satan to the living GOD' [Acts, xxvi. 18]. BosWELL. Wesley wrote on Nov. 11, 1775 (Journal, iv. 56), ‘I made some additions to the Calm Address to our American Colonies. Need any one ask from what motive this was wrote? Let him look round; England is in a flame! a flame of malice and rage against the King, and almost all that are in authority under him. I labour to put out this flame.' He wrote a few days later:-'As to reviewers, newswriters, London Magazines, and all that kind of gentlemen, they behave just as I expected they would. And let them lick up Mr. Toplady's spittle still; a champion worthy of their cause.' Journal, p. 58. In a letter published in Jan. 1780, he said :— I insist upon it, that no government, not Roman Catholic, ought to tolerate men of the Roman Catholic persuasion. They ought not to be tolerated by any government, Protestant, Mahometan, or Pagan.' To this the Rev. Arthur O'Leary replied with great wit and force, in a pamphlet entitled, Remarks on the Rev. Mr. Wesley's Letters. Dublin, 1780. Wesley (Journal, iv. 365) mentions meeting O'Leary, and says:-' He seems not to be wanting either in sense or learning.' Johnson wrote to Wesley on Feb. 6, 1776 (Croker's Boswell, p. 475), I have thanks to return you for the addition of your important suffrage to my argument on the American question. To have gained such a mind as yours may justly confirm me in my own opinion. What effect my paper has upon the public, I know not; but I have no reason to be discouraged. The lecturer was surely in the right, who, though he saw his audience slinking away, refused to quit the chair while Plato staid:

sensible

40

Sticking to a party.

[August 1. sensible of it. He had the ordinary advantages of educa tion; but he chose to pursue that oratory which is for the mob'.' BOSWELL. He had great effect on the passions.' JOHNSON. Why, Sir, I don't think so. He could not represent a succession of pathetic images. He vociferated, and made an impression. There, again, was a mind like a hammer.' Dr. Johnson now said, a certain eminent political friend of ours was wrong, in his maxim of sticking to a certain set of men on all occasions. 'I can see that a man may do right to stick to a party (said he ;) that is to say, he is a Whig, or he is a Tory, and he thinks one of those parties upon the whole the best, and that to make it prevail, it must be generally supported, though, in particulars it may be wrong. He takes its faggot of principles, in which there are fewer rotten sticks than in the other, though some rotten sticks to be sure; and they cannot well be separated. But, to bind one's self to one man, or one set of men, (who may be right to-day and wrong to-morrow,) without any general preference of system, I must disapprove".'

''Powerful preacher as he was,' writes Southey, 'he had neither strength nor acuteness of intellect, and his written compositions are nearly worthless.' Southey's Wesley, i. 323. See ante, ii. 91. 'Mr. Burke. See ante, ii. 255, 326, note 3, and iii. 52.

If due attention were paid to this observation, there would be more virtue, even in politicks. What Dr. Johnson justly condemned, has, I am sorry to say, greatly increased in the present reign. At the distance of four years from this conversation, 21st February, 1777, My Lord Archbishop of York, in his 'sermon before the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts,' thus indignantly describes the then state of parties:

'Parties once had a principle belonging to them, absurd perhaps, and indefensible, but still carrying a notion of duty, by which honest minds might easily be caught.

'But there are now combinations of individuals, who, instead of being the sons and servants of the community, make a league for advancing their private interests. It is their business to hold high the notion of political honour. I believe and trust, it is not injurious to say, that such a bond is no better than that by which the lowest and wickedest combinations are held together; and that it denotes the last stage of political depravity.'

He