ED. [He this autumn visited Lichfield and favourable opinion of my book must give me Ashbourne, where it appears from his let-great delight. Indeed it is impossible for ters to Mrs. Thrale that he was considerably indisposed.] "[Ashbourne,] 27th Nov. 1772. "If you are so kind as to write to me on Saturday, the day on which you will receive this, I shall have it before I leave Ashbourne. I am to go to Lichfield on Wednesday, and purpose to find my way to London through Birmingham and Oxford. "I was yesterday at Chatsworth. It is a very fine house. I wish you had been with me to see it; for then, as we are apt to want matter of talk, we should have gained something new to talk on. They complimented me with playing the fountain, and opening the cascade. But I am of my friend's opinion, that when one has seen the ocean, cascades are but little things."] "MR. BOSWELL TO DR. JOHNSON. "MY DEAR SIR,"I was much disappointed that you did not come to Scotland last autumn. However, I must own that your letter prevents me from complaining; not only because I am sensible that the state of your health was but too good an excuse, but because you write in a strain which shows that you have agreeable views of the scheme which we have so long proposed. "I communicated to Beattie what you said of his book in your last letter to me. He writes to me thus: You judge very righity in supposing that Dr. Johnson's me to say how much I am gratified by it; for there is not a man upon earth whose good opinion I would be more ambitious to cultivate. His talents and his virtues I reverence more than any words can express. The extraordinary civilities (the paternal attentions I should rather say), and the many instructions I have had the honour to receive from him, will to me be a perpetual source of pleasure in the recollection, Dum memor ipse mei, dum spiritus hos reget artus.' "I had still some thoughts, while the summer lasted, of being obliged to go to London on some little business; otherwise I should certainly have troubled him with a letter several months ago, and given some vent to my gratitude and admiration. This I intend to do as soon as I am left a little at leisure. Mean time, if you have occasion to write to him, I beg you will offer him my most respectful compliments, and assure him of the sincerity of my attachment and the warmth of my gratitude,' "I am, &c. "JAMES BOSWELL." In 1773, his only publication was an edition of his folio Dictionary, with additions and corrections; nor did he, so far as is known, furnish any productions of his fertile pen to any of his numerous friends or dependants, except the Preface 1 to his old amanuensis Macbean's "Dictionary of Ancient Geography." His Shakspeare, indeed, which had been received with high approbation by the publick, and gone through several editions, was this year republished by George Steevens, Esq. a gentleman not only deeply skilled in ancient learning, and of very extensive reading in English literature, especially the early writers, but at the same time of acute discernment and elegant taste. It is almost unnecessary to say, that by his great and valuable additions to Dr. Johnson's work, he justly obtained considerable reputation: "Divisum imperium cum Jove Cæsar habet." [He began this year with a fit of the gout. "TO MRS. THRALE. ED. "Tuesday, 26th Jan. 1773. "Last night was very tedious, and this 1 He, however, wrote or partly wrote, an epitaph [see ante, p. 278] on Mrs. Bell, wife of his friend John Bell, Esq. brother of the Rev. Dr. Bell, Prebendary of Westminster, which is printed in his works. It is in English prose, and has so little of his manner, that I did not believe he had any hand in it, till I was satisfied of the fact by the authority of Mr. Bell.-BOSWELL. "TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ. to revise; but having made no preparation, I was able to do very little. Some superfluities I have expunged, and some faults I have corrected, and here and there have scattered a remark; but the main fabrick of the work remains as it was. I have looked very little into it since I wrote it, and, I think, I found it full as often better, as worse, than I expected. "Baretti and Davies have had a furious quarrel; a quarrel, I think, irreconcileable. Dr. Goldsmith has a new comedy, which is expected in the spring. No name is yet given it. The chief diversion arises from a stratagem by which a lover is made to mistake his future father-in-law's house for an inn. This, you see, borders upon farce. The dialogue is quick and gay, and the incidents are so prepared as not to seem improbable. deavour to consolidate in your mind a firm and regular system of law, instead of picking up occasional fragments. "London, 22d Feb. 1773. "I am sorry that you lost your cause of "DEAR SIR,-I have read your kind let- intromission, because I yet think the arguter much more than the elegant Pindar ments on your side unanswerable. But you which it accompanied. I am always glad to seem, I think, to say that you gained repu find myself not forgotten; and to be forgot- tation even by your defeat; and reputation ten by you would give me great uneasiness. you will daily gain, if you keep Lord AuMy northern friends have never been un-chinleck's precept in your mind, and enkind to me; I have from you, dear sir, testimonies of affection, which I have not often been able to excite; and Dr. Beattie rates the testimony which I was desirous of paying to his merit much higher than I should have thought it reasonable to expect. "I have heard of your masquerade 2. What says your synod to such innovations? I am not studiously scrupulous, nor do I think a masquerade either evil in itself, or very likely to be the occasion of evil; yet as the world thinks it a very licentious relaxation of manners, I would not have been one of the first masquers, in a country where no masquerade had ever been before". "A new edition of my great Dictionary is printed, from a copy which I was persuaded 1 1 [Dr. Johnson's early friend, Mr. Edmond Southwell, third son of the first Lord Southwell, born in 1705, had died in the preceding November, aged 67: the Mr. Southwell, here mentioned, was probably Thomas Arthur, afterwards the fourth lord and second viscount (see ante, p. 158). The two ladies mentioned were probably daughters of the first lord: Frances born in 1708, and Lucy born in 1710.-ED.] Given by a lady at Edinburgh.-BOSWELL. There had been masquerades in Scotland; but not for a very long time.-BOSWELL. [This masquerade was given on the 1st January, by the Dowager Countess of Fife; Johnson had no doubt seen an account of it in the Gentleman's Magazine for January, where it is said to have been the only masquerade ever seen in Scotland. Mr. Boswell himself appeared in the character of a Dumb Conjuror.—En.] "My health seems in general to improve; but I have been troubled many weeks with vexatious catarrh, which is sometimes sufficiently distressful. I have not found any great effects from bleeding and physick; and am afraid that I must expect help from brighter days and softer air. "Write to me now and then; and whenever any good befalls you, make haste to let me know it, for no one will rejoice at it more than, dear sir, your most humble servant, "SAM. JOHNSON. "You continue to stand very high in the favour of Mrs. Thrale.” While a former edition of my work was passing through the press, I was unexpect edly favoured with a packet from Philadel phia, from Mr. James Abercrombie, a gentleman of that country, who is pleased to honour me with very high praise of my "Life of Dr. Johnson." To have the fame of my illustrious friend, and his faithful biographer, echoed from the New World is extremely flattering; and my grateful acknowledgments shall be wafted across the Atlantick. Mr. Abercrombie has politely conferred on me a considerable additional obligation, by transmitting to me copies of two letters from Dr. Johnson to American gentlemen. "Gladly, sir (says he), would I have sent you the originals: but being the only relicks of the kind in America, they are considered by the possessors of such inestimable value, that no possible consideration would induce papers. Opposition seems to despond; and them to part with them. In some future the dissenters, though they have taken adpublication of yours relative to that great vantage of unsettled times, and a governand good man, they may perhaps be thought|ment much enfeebled, seem not likely to worthy of insertion." gain any immunities. "Dr. Goldsmith has a new comedy 3 in rehearsal at Covent Garden, to which the manager predicts ill success. I hope he will be mistaken. I think it deserves a very kind reception. "SIR,-That in the hurry of a sudden departure you should yet find leisure to consult my convenience, is a degree of kind- "I shall soon publish a new edition of my ness, and an instance of regard, not only large Dictionary; I have been persuaded to beyond my claims, but above my expecta-revise it, and have mended some faults, but tion. You are not mistaken in supposing added little to its usefulness. that I set a high value on my American friends, and that you should confer a very valuable favour upon me by giving me an opportunity of keeping myself in their mem "TO THE REVEREND MR, WHITE 2. "DEAR SIR,-Your kindness for your friends accompanies you across the Atlantick. It was long since observed by Horace, that no ship could leave care behind: you have been attended in your voyage by other powers,-by benevolence and constancy: and I hope care did not often show her face in their company. "I received the copy of Rasselas. The impression is not magnificent, but it flatters an authour, because the printer seems to have expected that it would be scattered among the people. The little book has been well received, and is translated into Italian, French, German, and Dutch. It has now one honour more by an American edition. "No book has been published since your departure, of which much notice is taken. Faction only fills the town with pamphlets, and greater subjects are forgotten in the noise of discord. "Did not I tell you that I had written to Boswell? he has answered my letter 4. "I am going this evening to put young Otway to school with Mr. Elphinston. "C. 5 is so distressed with abuse about his play, that he has solicited Goldsmith to take him off the rack of the newspapers. 6 is preparing a whole pamphlet against G- 6, and G- is, I suppose, collecting materials to confute M. M "I know not that much has happened since "Jennens has published Hamlet, but your departure that can engage your curi- without a preface, and S-8 declares his uity, Of all publick transactions the intention of letting him pass the rest of his whole world is now informed by the news-life in peace. Here is news." 3 [She stoops to conquer.-ED.] 4 [But has not published his answer.-ED.] 5 [Richard Cumberland. The play in question was the Choleric Man, which he afterwards published with a "Dedication to Detraction." He was very sensible to such attacks, as Sheridan more than hints in the character of Sir Fretful Plagiary, which was intended for him.-ED.] These initials, no doubt, mean Mickle and Garrick, (see Garrick's letter to Boswell, post, sub 23d Oct. 1773): the quarrel was on the subject of the Siege of Marseilles." See Mickle's Life in Anderson's British Poets.-ED ] 7 [Soame Jenyns.-ED.] [George Steevens.-ED.] On Saturday, April 3, the day after my arrival in London this year, I went to his house late in the evening, and sat with Mrs. Williams till he came home. I found in the London Chronicle, Dr. Goldsmith's apology to the publick for beating Evans, a bookseller, on account of a paragraph in a newspaper published by him, which Goldsmith thought impertinent to him and to a lady of his acquaintance. The apology was written so much in Dr. Johnson's manner, that both Mrs. Williams and I supposed it to be his; but when he came home, he soon undeceived us. When he said to Mrs. Williams, "Well, Dr. Goldsmith's manifesto has got into your paper;" I asked him if Dr. Goldsmith had written it, with an air that made him see I suspected it was his, though subscribed by Goldsmith. JOHNSON. "Sir, Dr. Goldsmith would no more have asked me to write such a thing as that for him, than he would have asked me to feed him with a spoon, or to do any thing else that denoted his imbecility. I as much believe that he wrote it, as if I had seen him do it. Sir, had he shown it to any one friend, he would not have been allowed to publish it. He has, indeed, done it very well; but it is a foolish thing well done. I suppose he has been so much elated with the success of his new comedy, that he has thought every thing that concerned him must be of importance to the publick." BOSWELL. "Ifancy, sir, this is the first time he has been engaged in such an adventure." JOHNSON. Why, sir, I believe it is the first time he has beat; he may have been beaten before. This, sir, is a new plume to him." 66 I mentioned Sir John Dalrymple's "Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland," and his discoveries to the prejudice of Lord Russel and Algernon Sidney. JOHNSON. "Why, sir, every body who had just notions of government thought them rascals before. It is well that all mankind now see them to be rascals." BOSWELL. "But, sir, may not those discoveries be true without their being rascals?" JOHNSON. "Consider, sir, would any of them have been willing to have had it known that they intrigued with France? Depend upon it, sir, he who does [The offence given was a long abusive letter in the London Packet. A particular account of this transaction, and Goldsmith's Vindication (for such it was, rather than an apology), may be found in the new Life of that poet, prefixed to his Miscellaneous Works, in 4 vols. 8vo. pp. 105-108. -MALONE. 2 [Mr. Chalmers, in the article Goldsmith, in the Biog. Dict., states, on the authority of Evans, that he had beaten Goldsmith, and not Goldsmith him; but surely, in such a case, the authority of Evans would be suspicious, even if it were not opposed to the whole current of contemporary evidence.--ED.] what he is afraid should be known, has something rotten about him. This Dalrymple seems to be an honest fellow; for he tells equally what makes against both sides. But nothing can be poorer than his mode of writing, it is the mere bouncing of a schoolboy: Great He3, but greater She! and such stuff." I could not agree with him in this criticism; for though Sir John Dalrymple's style is not regularly formed in any respect, and one cannot help smiling sometimes at his affected grandiloquence, there is in his writing a pointed vivacity, and much of a gentlemanly spirit. At Mr. Thrale's, in the evening, he repeated his usual paradoxical declamation against action in publick speaking. "Action can have no effect upon reasonable minds. It may augment noise, but it never can enforce argument. If you speak to a dog, you use action; you hold up your hand thus, because he is a brute; and in proportion as men are removed from brutes, action will have the less influence upon them." MRS. THRALE. "What then, sir, becomes of Demosthenes's saying? 'Action, action, action!" JOHNSON. "Demosthenes, madam, spoke to an assembly of brutes; to a barbarous people." I thought it extraordinary, that he should deny the power of rhetorical action upon human nature, when it is proved by innumerable facts in all stages of society. Rea Sonable beings are not solely reasonable. They have fancies which may be pleased, passions which may be roused. Lord Chesterfield being mentioned, Johnson remarked, that almost all of that celecrated nobleman's witty sayings were puns. He, however, allowed the merit of good wit to his lordship's saying of Lord Tyrawley and himself, when both very old and infirm: "Tyrawley and I have been dead these two years; but we don't choose to have it known." He talked with approbation of an intended edition of "The Spectator," with notes: two volumes of which had been prepared by a gentleman eminent in the literary world, and the materials which he had collected for the remainder had been transferred to an 3 A bombastic ode of Oldham's on Ben Johnson begins thus: "GREAT THOU !" which per haps his namesake remembered.—MALONE. [Mr. Malone's note is absurd. Mr. Hallam very justly observes, that Dr. Johnson clearly meant Dalrymple's description of the parting of Lord and Lady Russel. "He great in this last act of his life, but she greater.] [Mr. Chalmers (who, himself, has ably performed this task) informs me, that the first of these gentlemen was Dr. Percy, and the second Dr. John Calder, of whom some account will be found, Gent. Mag. v. 85. p. 564.-ED.] other hand. He observed, that all works | which describe manners, require notes in sixty or seventy years, or less; and told us, he had communicated all he knew that could throw light upon "The Spectator." He said, "Addison had made his Sir Andrew Freeport a true whig, arguing against giving charity to beggars, and throwing out other such ungracious sentiments ; but that he had thought better, and made amends by making him found an hospital for decayed farmers." He called for the volume of "The Spectator," in which that account is contained, and read it aloud to us. He read so well, that every thing acquired additional weight and grace from his utterance. The conversation having turned on modern imitations of ancient ballads, and some one having praised their simplicity, he treated them with that ridicule which he always displayed when that subject was mentioned. He disapproved of introducing scripture phrases into secular discourse. This seemed to me a question of some difficulty. A scripture expression may be used, like a highly classical phrase, to produce an instantaneous strong impression; and it may be done without being at all improper. Yet I own there is danger, that applying the language of our sacred book to ordinary subjects may tend to lessen our reverence for it. If therefore it be introduced at all, it should be with very great caution. On Thursday, April 8, I sat a good part of the evening with him, but he was very silent. He said," Burnet's History of his own Times' is very entertaining. The style, indeed, is mere chit-chat. I do not believe that Burnet intentionally lied; but he was so much prejudiced, that he took no pains to find out the truth. He was like a man who resolves to regulate his time by a certain watch; but will not inquire whether the watch is right or not." Though he was not disposed to talk, he was unwilling that I should leave him; and when I looked at my watch, and told him it was twelve o'clock, he cried, "What's that to you and me?" and ordered Frank to tell Mrs. Williams that we were coming to drink tea with her, which we did. It was settled that we should go to church together next day. On the 9th of April, being Good-Friday, I breakfasted with him on tea and crossbuns: Doctor Levett, as Frank called him, making the tea. He carried me with him to the church of St. Clement Danes, where he had his seat; and his behaviour was, as I had imaged to myself, solemnly devout. I [It probably was this conversation which made Mrs. Piozzi think, that he had used these expressions in his "Life of Addison." p. 163.-ED.] VOL. 1. 39 See ante, never shall forget the tremulous earnestness with which he pronounced the awful petition in the Litany: "In the hour of death, and at the day of judgment, good Lord deliver us." We went to church both in the morning and evening. In the interval between the two services we did not dine: but he read in the Greek New Testament, and I turned over several of his books. In Archbishop Laud's Diary, I found the following passage, which I read to Dr. Johnson: "1623. February 1, Sunday. I stood by the most illustrious Prince Charles 2, at dinner. He was then very merry, and talked occasionally of many things with his attendants. Among other things, he said, that if he were necessitated to take any particular profession of life he could not be a lawyer, adding his reasons: I cannot,' said he, 'defend a bad, nor yield in a good cause."" JOHNSON. "Sir, this is false reasoning; because every cause has a bad side: and a lawyer is not overcome, though the cause which he has endeavoured to support be determined against him." I told him that Goldsmith had said to me a few days before, “As I take my shoes from the shoemaker, and my coat from the tailor, so I take my religion from the priest.” I regretted this loose way of talking. JOHNsON. "Sir, he knows nothing; he has made up his mind about nothing." To my great surprise he asked me to dine with him on Easter-Day. I never supposed that he had a dinner at his house: for I had not then heard of any one of his friends having been entertained at his table. He told me, "I have generally a meat pie on Sunday: it is baked at a public oven, which is very properly allowed, because one man can attend it; and thus the advantage is obtained of not keeping servants from church to dress dinners." April 11, being Easter-Sunday, after having attended divine service at St. Paul's, I repaired to Dr. Johnson's. I had gratified my curiosity much in dining with JEAN JAQUES ROUSSEAU, while he lived in the wilds of Neufchatel: I had as great a curiosity to dine with DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON, in the dusky recess of a court in Fleet-street. I supposed we should scarcely have knives and forks, and only some strange, uncouth, ill-drest dish: but I found every thing in very good order. We had no other company but Mrs. Williams and a young woman whom I did not know. As a dinner here was considered as a singular phenomenon, and as I was frequently interrogated on the subject, my readers may perhaps be desirous to know our bill of fare. Foote, I remember, in allusion to Francis, the negro, 2 Afterwards Charles I.-BoSWELL. |
