of success to supply whatever had been hitherto suppressed. I never indeed found a hint of any such defalcation, but I regretted it; for though the story is long, every letter is short. "I wish you would add an index rerum, that when the reader recollects any incident, he may easily find it, which at present he cannot do, unless he knows in which volume it is told; for Clarissa is not a performance to be read with eagerness, and laid aside forever; but will be occasionally consulted by the busy, the aged, and the studious; and therefore I beg that this edition, by which I suppose posterity is to abide, may want nothing that can facilitate its use.-I am, sir, yours, &c. "S. JOHNSON."] Life of p. 46. [This proposition of an index Ed. rerum to a novel will appear extraordinary, but Johnson at this time appears to have been very anxious to cultivate the acquaintance of Richardson 1, who lived in an atmosphere of flattery, and Johnson found it necessary to fall into the fashion of the society.] [Mr. Northcote relates that Johnson introduced Reynolds, Sir Joshua Reynolds and his sister to Richardson, but hinted to them, at the same time, that if they wished to see the latter in good humour, they must expatiate on the excellencies of Clarissa 2]; [and Mrs. Piozzi tells us, that when talking of Richardson, he once said, "You think I love flattery-and so I do; but a little too much always disgusts me: that fellow, Richardson, on the contrary, could not be contented to sail quietly down the stream of reputation without longing to taste the froth from every stroke of the oar."] Piozzi, P 142 In 1752 he was almost entirely occupied with his Dictionary. The last paper of his Rambler was published March 23, this 1 [See post, 18th Ap. 1778.-ED.] 2 [See Mr. Langton's testimony to the same effect, post, 1780.-ED.] 3 Here the authour's memory failed him, for, according to the account given in a former page (see p. 81), we should here read March 17; but, in truth, as has been already observed, the Rambler closed on Saturday the fourteenth of March; at which time Mrs. Johnson was near her end, for she died on the following Tuesday, March 17. Had the concluding paper of that work been written on the day of her death, it would have been still more extraordinary than it is, considering the extreme grief into which the authour was plunged by that event. The melancholy cast of that concluding essay is sufliciently accounted for by the situation of Mrs. Johnson at the time it was written; and her death three days afterwards put an end to the paper.-MALONE. [Mr. Malone seems also to have fallen into some errors, from not adverting to the change of style. Johnson, at this period, used the old style; year; after which there was a cessation some time of any exertion of his talent an essayist. But, in the same year, Hawkesworth, who was his warm adm and a studious imitator of his style, then lived in great intimacy with him. gan a periodical paper, entitled "THE VENTURER," in connexion with other tlemen, one of whom was Johnson's m loved friend, Dr. Bathurst; and, with doubt, they received many valuable from his conversation, most of his fri having been so assisted in the cours their works. H P 3 [The curiosity of the reader [as to the several writers of the Adventurer] is, to a small degree, gratified by the last paper, which assigns to Dr. Joseph Warton such as have signature Z., and leaves to Dr. Haw worth himself the praise of such as without any. To the information t given, Sir John Hawkins adds, that papers marked A. which are said to come from a source that soon failed, supplied by Dr. Bathurst, an original ciate in the work, and those distingui by the letter T. [the first of which is d 3d March, 1753,] by Johnson, who re ed two guineas for every number tha wrote; a rate of payment which he before adjusted in his stipulation for Rambler, and was probably the measu reward to his fellow-labourers.] That there should be a suspension o literary labours during a part of the 1752, will not seem strange, when it is sidered that soon after closing his Ram he suffered a loss which, there can b doubt, affected him with the deepest tress. For on the 17th of March, ( his wife died. Why Sir John Hav should unwarrantably take upon him to suppose that Johnson's fondness for was dissembled (meaning simulated sumed 4), and to assert, that if it was so that Mr. Boswell may have copied from MS. note the date of the 2d of March as th which the last Rambler was written, tho was published next day, viz. the 3d, O. 14th, N. S.; and as Mrs. Johnson's death v the 17th, O. S., or 28th, N. S., the Rambl concluded a fortnight before that event was concluded because, as Dr. Johnson exp says in the last number, having suppo for two years, and multiplied his essays volumes, he determined to desist." It therefore a natural death, though it is very that the loss of Mrs. Johnson would have st it, had it not been already terminated.-Er 4 [Mr. Boswell is a little unlucky in this cism, as Johnson himself has in his Dict given to the word "dissembled" the meaning in which it is here used by Ha He adds, however, very justly, that such of it is erroneous.-ED.] "March 28, 1753. I kept this day as the anniversary of my Tetty's death, with prayer and tears in the morning. In the evening I prayed for her conditionally, if it were lawful." the case," it was a lesson he had learned | as well as from other memorials, two of by rote," I cannot conceive; unless it pro- which I select, as strongly marking the tencoded from a want of similar feelings in derness and sensibility of his mind. his own breast. To argue from her being much older than Johnson, or any other circumstances, that he could not really love ber, is absurd; for love is not a subject of reasoning, but of feeling, and therefore there are no common principles upon which "April 23, 1753. I know not whether I one can persuade another concerning it. do not too much indulge the vain longings Every man feels for himself, and knows of affection; but I hope they intenerate my how he is affected by particular qual-heart, and that when I die like my Tetty, ities in the person he admires, the impressions of which are too minute and delicate to be substantiated in language. this affection will be acknowledged in a hap py interview, and that in the mean time I am incited by it to piety. I will, however, The following very solemn and affecting not deviate too much from common and reprayer was found after Dr. Johnson's de-ceived methods of devotion2" cease, by his servant, Mr. Francis Barber, who delivered it to my worthy friend the Reverend Mr. Strahan, vicar of Islington, who at my earnest request has obligingly favoured me with a copy of it, which he and I compared with the original. I present it to the world as an undoubted proof of a circumstance in the character of my illustrious friend, which, though some, whose hard minds I never shall envy, may attack as superstitious, will I am sure endear him more to numbers of good men. bave an additional, and that a personal motive for presenting it, because it sanctions what I myself have always maintained and am fond to indulge: #April 26, 1752, being after 12 at night of the 25th. I O Lord! Governour of heaven and earth, in whose hands are embodied and departed Spirits, if thou hast ordained the Souls of the Dead to minister to the Living, and appointed my departed Wife to have care of me, grant that I may enjoy the good effects of her attention and ministration, whether exercised by appearance, impulses, dreams, or in any other manner agreeable to thy government. Forgive my presumption, enlighten my ignorance, and however meaner agents are employed, grant me the blessed influences of thy holy Spirit, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen." served that they consist of a few little memorandum books, and a great number of separate scraps of paper, and bear no marks of having been arranged or intended for publication by Dr. Johnson. Each prayer is on a separate piece of paper, generally a sheet (but sometimes a fragment) of note paper. The memoranda and observations are generally in little books of a few leaves hereafter; but it is even now important that the sewed together. This subject will be referred to reader should recollect that Mr. Strahan's publiself, but formed by the reverend gentleman out of cation was not prepared by Dr. Johnson himthe loose materials above mentioned.-ED.] 2 [Miss Seward, with equal truth and taste, thus expresses herself concerning these and similar passages: "Those pharisaic meditations, with their popish prayers for old Tetty's soul; their contrite parade about lying in bed on a morning; drinking creamed tea on a fast day; snoring_at sermons; and having omitted to ponder well Bel and the Dragon, and Tobit and his Dog." And in another letter she does not scruple to say that Mr. Boswell confessed to her his idea that Johnson was "a Roman Catholic in his heart." Miss Seward's credit is by this time so low that it is hardly necessary to observe how improbable it is that Mr. Boswell could have made any such confession. Dr. Johnson thought charitably of the Roman Catholics, and defended their religion which call it impious and idolatrous (post, 26th from the coarse language of our political tests, Oct. 1769); but he strenuously disclaimed all participation in the doctrines of that church (see post, 3d May, 1773; 5th April, 1776; 10th Oct. 1779; 10th June, 1784). Lady Knight (the mother of Miss Cornelia Knight, the accomplished author of Marcus Flaminius and other ingenious works) made the following communication to Mr. Hoole, which may be properly quoted on this point: "Dr. Johnson's political principles ran high, both in church and state he wished power to the king and to the heads of the church, as the laws of England have established; but I know he disliked absolute power; and I am very sure of his disapprobation of the doctrines of the church of Rome; because about three weeks before we came abroad, he said to my Cornelia, 'you are going where the ostentatious pomp of church ceremonies attracts the imagina Her wedding-ring, when she became his wife, was, after her death, preserved by him, as long as he lived, with an affectionate care, in a little round wooden box, in the inside of which he pasted a slip of paper, thus inscribed by him in fair characters, as follows: "Eheu! Mart. 17°. 1752'." After his death, Mr. Francis Barber, his faithful servant, and residuary legatee, offered this memorial of tenderness to Mrs. Lucy Porter, Mrs. Johnson's daughter; but she having declined2 to accept of it, he had it enamelled as a mourning ring for his old master, and presented it to his wife, Mrs. Barber, who now has it. | for sometime with Mrs. Johnson at F The state of mind in which a man must be upon the death of a woman whom he sincerely loves, had been in his contemplation many years before. In his IRENE, we find the following fervent and tender speech of Demetrius, addressed to his As-ny people have, of setting the miser pasia: "From those bright regions of eternal day, tion; but if they want to persuade you to change, 66 [Offended perhaps, and not unreasonably, that she was not mentioned in Johnson's will.ED.] their neighbours half unintentionally wantonly, before their eyes, showing the bad side of their profession, situ &c. He said, "she would lament t pendence of pupilage to a young hei and once told a waterman who rowe along the Thames in a wherry, that H no happier than a galley-slave, one chained to the oar by authority, the by want. I had, however (said he, ing), the wit to get her daughter side always before we began the dispu F his fondness for her, especially whe 3 [This must have referred to some stances of early life, for it does not app Miss Porter ever resided with Dr. and Mr son after they left Edial in 1787.—ED.] pretty, and her daughter, Mrs. Lucy Porter, said it was like. The intelligence Mrs. Piozzi gained of her from Mr. Levett was only perpetual illness and perpetual opium1.j a fortnight after the dismal event. These sufferings were aggravated by the melancholy inherent in his constitution; and although he probably was not oftener in the wrong than she was, in the little disagreements which sometimes troubled his married the gloomy irritability of his existence was more painful to him than ever, he might very naturally, after her death, be tenderly disposed to charge himself with slight omissions and offences, the sense of which would give him much uneasiness4. Accordingly we find, about a year after her decease, that he thus addressed the Supreme Being: The dreadful shock of separation took place in the night; and Dr. Johnson imme-state, during which, he owned to me, that diately despatched a letter to his friend, the Rev. Dr. Taylor, which, as Taylor told me, expressed grief in the strongest manner he had ever read; so that it is much to be regretted it has not been preserved 2. The letter was brought to Dr. Taylor, at his house in the Cloysters, Westminster, about three in the morning; and as it signified an earnest desire to see him, he got up, and "O Lord, who givest the grace of repentwent to Johnson as soon as he was dressed, ance, and hearest the prayers of the peniand found him in tears and in extreme agi- tent, grant that by true contrition I may tation. After being a little while together, obtain forgiveness of all the sins committed, Johnson requested him to join with him in and of all duties neglected, in my union prayer. He then prayed extempore, as did with the wife whom thou hast taken from Dr. Taylor; and thus by means of that pie-me; for the neglect of joint devotion, patient ty which was ever his primary object, his troubled mind was, in some degree, soothed and composed. The next day he wrote as follows: "TO THE REV. DR. TAYLOR. "DEAR SIR,-Let me have your company and instruction. Do not live away from me. My distress is great. "Pray desire Mrs. Taylor to inform me what mourning I should buy for my mother and Miss Porter, and bring a note in writing with you. "Remember me in your prayers, for vain is the help of man. I am, dear sir, &c. “Karch 12, 1752.” "SAM. JOHNSON. That his sufferings upon the death of his wife were severe, beyond what are commonly endured, I have no doubt, from the information of many who were then about hun, to none of whom I give more credit than to Mr. Francis Barber, his faithful negro servant, who came into his family about [Levett did not know Mrs. Johnson till the year 1746, when she was fiftyseven or eight years fage, and in very ill health.-ED.] In the Gentleman's Magazine for Februa17, 1794 (p. 100), was printed a letter pretendg to be that written by Johnson on the death of the wife Bat it is merely a transcript of the 41st number of "The Idler," on the death of a fra A fictitious date, March 17, 1751, O. S. was added by some person, previously to this paper's being sent to the publisher of that miscellaBy, to give a colour to this deception-MALONE. The date is 1752-the year of Mrs. Johnson's docesse-Ev.] Francis Barber was born in Jamaica, and beought to England in 1750 by colonel Bast, father of Johnson's very intimate friend, Dr. Bathurs. He was sent, for some time, to the exhortation, and mild instruction." Hawk. p. 316. The kindness of his heart, notwithstand- Rev. Mr. Jackson's school, at Barton, in York- It does not appear that Johnson was fully persuaded that there was a middle state his prayers being only conditional, i. e. if such a state existed.-MALONE. [This is not an exact view of the matter; the condition was that it should be lawful to him so to intercede; and in all his prayers of this nature he scrupulously introduces the humble limitation of "as far as it is lawful," or "as far as may be permitted, I recommend," &c. ; but it is also to be observed that he sometimes prays that "the Almighty may have had mercy on the departed, as if he bo are finally received to eternal felicity, appears, I think, unquestionably from his de votions: "And, O Lord, so far as it may be lawful in me, I commend to thy fatherly goodness the soul of my departed wife; beseeching thee to grant her whatever is best in her present state, and finally to receive her to eternal happiness.” But this state has not been looked upon with horrour, but only as less gracious. He deposited the remains of Mrs. Johnson in the church of Bromley in Kent 1, to which he was probably led by the residence of his friend Hawkesworth at that place. The funeral sermon which he composed for her, which was never preached, but, having been given to Dr. Taylor, has been published since his death, is a performance of uncommon excellence, and full of rational and pious comfort to such as are depressed by that severe affliction which Johnson felt when he wrote it. When it is considered that it was written in such an agitation of mind, and in the short interval between her death and burial, it cannot be read without wonder. Though Johnson's circumstances were at this time far from being easy, his humane and charitable disposition was constantly exerting itself. Mrs. Anna Williams, daughter of a very ingenious Welsh physician, and a woman of more than ordinary talents and literature, having come to London in hopes of being cured of a cataract in both her eyes, which afterwards ended in total blindness, was kindly received as a constant visitor at his house while Mrs. Johnson lived; and after her death, having come under his roof in order to have an operation upon her eyes performed with more comfort to her than in lodgings, she had an apartment from him during the rest of her life, at all times when he had a house. Hawk. p. 322327. [Before the calamity of total deprivation of sight befel her, she, with the assistance of her father, had acquired a knowledge of the lieved the sentence to have been already pronounced.-ED.] A few months before his death, Johnson honoured her memory by the following epitaph, which was inscribed on her tombstone, in the church of Bromley : Hic conduntur reliquiæ Obiit Londini, Mense Mart. A. D. MDCCLII.-MALONE. French and Italian languages, and had made great improvements in literature, which, together with the exercise of her needle, at which she was very dexterous, as well after the loss of her sight as before, contributed to support her under her affliction, till a time when it was thought by her friends, that relief might be obtained from the hand of an operating surgeon. At the request of Dr. Johnson, Sir J. Hawkins went with her to a friend of his, Mr. Samuel Sharp, senior surgeon of Guy's hospital, who be fore had given him to understand that he would couch her gratis if the cataract was ripe, but upon making the experiment it was found otherwise, and that the crystalline humour was not sufficiently inspissated for the needle to take effect. She had been almost a constant companion of Mrs. Johnson for some time before her decease, but had never resided in the house; afterwards, for the convenience of performing the intended operation, Johnson took her home, and, upon the failure of that, kept her as the partner of his dwelling till he removed into chambers. Afterward, in 1766, upon his taking a house in Johnson's-court, in Fleet-street, he invited her thither, and in that, and his last house, in Bolt-court, she successively dwelt for the remainder of her life 2. 2 Lady Knight, in a paper already referred to (ante, p. 97), gives the following account of Mrs. Williams: "She was a person extremely interesting. She had an uncommon firmness of mind, a boundless curiosity, retentive memory, She had various powers and strong judgment. fortune she seemed to forget, when she had the of pleasing. Her personal afflictions and slender power of doing an act of kindness: she was social, cheerful, and active, in a state of body that was truly deplorable. Her regard to Dr. Johnson was formed with such strength of judgment and firm esteem, that her voice never hesitated when she repeated his maxims, or recited his good deeds; though upon many other occasions her want of sight had led her to make so much use of her ear, as to affect her speech. Mrs. Williams was blind before she was acquainted with Dr. Johnson.-She had many resources, though none very great. With the Miss Wilkinsons she generally passed a part of the year, and received from them presents, and from the first who died, a legacy of clothes and money. The last of them, Mrs. Jane, left her an annual rent; but from the blundering manner of the will, I fear she never reaped the benefit of it. The lady left money to erect an hospital for ancient maids but the number she had allotted being too great for the donation, the doctor (Johnson) said, it would be better to expunge the word maintain, and put in to starve such a number of old maids. They asked him, what name should be given it? he replied, Let it be called JENNY'S WHIM.' (The name of a well-known tavern near Chelsea, in former days.) 6 |