the fallacy of Johnson, I only deterge his writings from those impurities which none can admire, and none can be anxious to conceal. The London, and Vanity of Human Wishes of Johnson, may be considered as forming a part of his moral writings; but they add nothing to his fame, and would in all probability have been forgotten, had he written nothing else. Indeed he possessed little that could dignify poetry. He has none of those daring sublimities which give energy to description, none of those gentle graces which relieve attention. His acquaintance with the English language never suffered him to want an appropriate expression or a pleasing ryhme; but there is a monotony which dwells upon the ear, and renders his versification dull and unpleasing. Of many of his verses, it may be said they are Such lays as neither ebb nor flow, РОРЕ. This can however be said only of parts, there being some lines which may justly contest even the superiority with Pope. But London presents less of these than the Vanity of Human Wishes. Yet the former is said to have obtained the approbation of a man (Pope) well qualified to judge; who declared that the author of such an excellent work could not be long concealed. This story is related, but is, I think, little deserving of credit. Pope, whose ear was accustomed to the nicest harmony, and who could easily discern the minutest deviation from propriety, can hardly be supposed to have overlooked, the many weak lines and puerile tautologies which this presents; and if he saw them, it can as little be supposed that he would have conferred upon it such a disqualified commendation.* ** It "His poetry, though not any where loaded with epithets, is destitute of animation. We are now and then struck with a fine thought, a fine line, or a fine passage, but little interested by the whole. After reading his best pieces once, few are desirous of reading them again.” Life of Johnson, 8vo. 1785. It is an invidious mode of criticism to detect and expose trifling errors in a work, which otherwise abounds in beauties; it displays a mean appetence to detraction; and a mind void of sensibility. Yet as much indiscriminate praise has been lavished on this poem of Johnson's, and has even been preferred by some to his Vanity of Human Wishes, and as its faults have been hitherto unnoticed, a few remarks may be offered without any disingenuous imputation. I am far from wishing to detract in the smallest degree from the great fame of Johnson, and I am besides aware, that no examination of his poetry can do it, however severe it may be. He has been read, and praised, and imitated, as a philosopher, a moralist, and an elegant prose writer; but none yet ever did, or ever can, confer upon him the appellation of poet. I therefore only propose to myself, in exposing a few trifling errors, to give confidence to unambitious modesty, and to instruct the blind admirers of this stupendous genius that even he is not infallible. It It is always deemed unlucky to stumble upon the threshold. In the third couplet however, Johnson has fallen into a manifest tautology. "Resolved at length from vice and London far "To breathe in distant fields a purer air.” This indeed was hardly to have been expected from the usual correctness of his language, which was in general scrupulous of the words adopted, even to a fault. Yet we have the same impropriety again, a few lines afterwards. With slavish tenets taint our poisoned youth. It is impossible to taint a body already poisoned. If there be a weaker line in the namby pamby verses of Philips, or the dull page of Tate, I will confess my inability to discover it. It is indeed surprizing, that the perspicuity of Johnson's mind, which could so readily detect the deviations of other poets, should have been incapable of correcting his own*. But * He did not often conform himself to his own precepts. In his Essay on Pope's Epitaphs, (which is indeed an invidious piece of criticism,) he says, "I think it may be obseved But the fondness of a parent, rarely beholds the imperfections of his offspring. The concluding line of this poem is remarkably weak, and the last part is indeed a mere languid iteration of the former. These are a few of the faults of this imitation, and these are sufficient to answer my purpose. I now hasten to the more agreeable task of pointing out some of its most striking beauties, which I trust will be more agreeable to my reader. The description of London is spirited and just; for who can deny but that "Here malice, rapine, accident, conspire, Here observed that the particle O! used at the beginning of a sentence, always offends." Yet, in his translation of the dialogue between Hector and Andromache, he himself uses it. Ex. "How would the Trojans brand great Hector's name, Acquired by wounds and battles bravely fought ! And in many other of his pieces, as his "Lines to a Friend," "To a Young Lady on her birth-day," &c. &c. |