The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.

“ Dictionary of Ancient History and Mythology. I leaves, of a translation into English of Sallost,

" Treatise on the Study of Polite Literature, De Bello Catilinario. When it was done i containing the history of learning, directions for have no notion ; but it seems to have po very editions, commentaries, &c.

superiour merit to mark it as bis. Besides the “ Maxims, Characters, and Sentiments, after publications heretofore mentioned, I am satisfied, the manner of Bruyere, collected out of ancient from internal evidence, lo admit also as genuine authours, particularly the Greek, with Apoph- the following, which, notwithstanding al my thegms.

chronological care, escaped me in the course of « Classical Miscellanies, Select Translations this work : from ancient Greek and Latin authours.

“ Considerations on the Case of Dr. Trapp's - Lives of Illustrious Persons, as well of the Sermons,” t published in 1739, in the “ (eatieactive as the learned, in imitation of Plutarch. man's Magazine.” It is a very ingenious defence

“ Judgınent of the learned upon English Au- of the right of abridging an authour's work, witbthours.

ont being held as infringing his property. This “ Poetical Dictionary of the English tongue. is one of the nicest questions in the Law of Lit

“ Consideration upon the present State of Lon- erature; and I cannot help thinking, that the don.

indulgeuce of abridging is often exceedingly in 3“ Collection of Epigrams, with notes and ob- rious to authours and booksellers, and should in servations.

very few cases be permitted. At any rate, tə “ Observations on the English Language, rela- prevent difficult and uncertain discussion, and give ting to words, phrases, and modes of speech. an absolute security to authours in the property of

* Minutiæ, Literariæ, Miscellaneous Reflections, their labours, no abridgement whatever should be Criticisms, Emendations, Notes.

permitted till after the expiration of such a pos“ History of the Constitution.

ber of years as the legislature may be pleased " Comparison of Philosophical and Christian to fix. Morality, by sentences collecied from the moralists But, though it has been confidently ascribed to and fathers.

him, I cannot allow that he wrote a dedication to “ Plutarch's Lives in English, with notes. both houses of parliament of a book entitled

“ The Evangelical History Harmonized." He “ POETRY AND WORKS OF IMAGINATION.

was no croaker, no declaimer against the times. “ Hymn to Ignorance.

He would not have written “ 'That we are falea “ The Palace of Sloth,- a vision.

upon an age in which corruption is not barely eas. “ Coluthus, to be translated.

versal, is universally confessed.” Nor, “ Rapune « Prejudice,-a poetical essay.

preys on the publick without opposition, and pere « The Palace of Nonsense,-a vision." jury betrays it without inquiry.” Nor woad be,

to excite a speedy reformation, have conjured op Johnson's extraordinary facility of composition, such phantoms of terrour as these : “ A few years when he shook off his constitutional indolence, longer, and perhaps all endeavours will be in and resolutely sat down to write, is admirably vain. We may be swallowed by an eartbzuake ; described by Mr. Courtenay, in his “ Poetical we may be delivered to our enemies." This is Review," which I have several times quoted: not Johnsonian. " While through life's maze he sent a piercing view,

There are, indeed, in this dedication sereral His mind expansive to the object grew.

sentences constructed upon the model of those of With various stores of erudition fraught,

Johnson. But the imitation of the form, without The lively iinage, the deep-searching thought, Slept in repose ;—but when the moment pressid,

the spirit of his style, has been so general, that The bright idens stood at once confess'd;

this of itself is not sufficient evidence. Even Instant his genius sped its vigorous rays,

our newspaper writers aspire to it. To an account And o'er the letter'd world diffused a blaze.

of the funeral of Edwin, the comedian, in "The As womb'd with fire the cloud electrick flies, And calmly o'er th' horizon seems to rise :

Diary" of Nov. 9, 1790, that son of drallery i Touch'd by the pointed steel, the lightning fiows, thus described : “A man who had so oftea And all th' expanse with rich effulgence glows cheered the sullenness of vacancy, and suspended

We shall in vain endeavour to know with ex- the approaches of sorrow.” And in "The Los act precision every production of Johnson's pen. lin Evening Post,” August 16, 1791, there is the He owned to me that he had written about forty following paragraph : " It is a singular cirestre sermons ; but as I understood that he had given stance, that in a city like this, containing 200,000 or sold them to different persons, who were to people, there are three months in the year during preach them as their own, he did not consider which no place of publick amusenient is opez himself at liberty to acknowledge then.. Would Long vacation is here a vacation from pleasure, as those who were thus aided by him, who are still well as business ; nor is there any mode of puss. alive, and the friends of those who are dead, fair- ing the listless evenings of declining sunder, ly inform the world, it would be obligingly grati- but in the riots of a tavern, or the stupidity of a fying a reasonable curiosity, to which there should, coffee-house." I think, now be no objection. Two volumes of I have not thought it necessary to specify every them, published since his death, are sufficiently copy of verses written by Johnson, it being ny ascertained. Ante, p. 124. I have before mc intention to publish an authentick edition of al in his handwriting a fragment of twenty quarto his poetry, with notes.

No. X. [Dr. Johnson's portraits,-referred to in

page 450.

.

The note on Dr. Johnson's portraits bcing in

complete, the Editor is obliged to Mr. John Murray, junior, for consilerable additions to the list, which are distinguished by bracke!s.) Date of

Engraver's name. Date or painting.

engraving Prior lo A miniature, painter unknown, which belong1752. ed to Mrs. Johnsou, now in the possession of

Dr. Harwood. See preface, p. viii. n.

Firsi engraved for this edition, size of the original

E. Finnen

1330 A three-quarter face to the left (in an oval); he is dressed in wliat was styled a seven story wig, and holde n pen up to his eye. The likeness apparently taken before any ot Sir Joshua's portrails

No artist's name or date] BY SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. (1756. 1. Mr. Boswell's picture; sold at James Bos

Ahout
1781.

Ditto, 12mo. for Cooke's Poets
Granger

1793
Prefixed to his works, 1823
W. T. Fry

1816 V. Duke of Dorset's picture at Knole, now Lord Plymouth's; a copy of No. II.]

[BY BARRY. Full fice, finished only as far as the shoulders, and copied into one of the large pictures now in the room of the Society of Arts in the Adelphi. The original sketch was sold at Barry's sale lo Mr. Malisou for 30 guilts. Engraved in line 410. size Anker Smith

1 808 Ditto, 8vo. with specimens of Dr. Johnson's signature at different periods of his life Audinet

1829) BY OPIE. Three-quarter face, to the left. Engraved in an oval, prefixed to Dictionary folio J. Heath

1786 (Do. 4to.

Davenport.)
Folio mezzotint C. Townley * 1792

BY NORTHCOTE.
(Three-quarter face, to right, holding a book

1. J. De Claussiu 1813)
BY MISS REYNOLDS.
A miniature. This portrait did not please Dr
J., who styled it “ Johnsou’s grimly ghost.")

BY MR. ZOFFANIJ.

BY O. HUMPHREY.
A miniature.

(1783.

1773.

nane.

well's sale for seventy guineas. Dr. Johnson in
an arm chair, seated at a table with writing ma-
terials; pen in his hand.)
410. for first edition of Boswell's Life
J. Heath

1791
Ditto 8vo. for evo. edition of ditto
J. Baker

1791
(This picture has been repeatedly engraved for

various editions of this work.
Before 11. Now in the Marquis of Stafford's collec-
1770. tion. Side Ouce, to right, eyes almost closed,

without wigi showing the nervous habit to
which lie wits addicted, when unemployed, of
moving his hands up and down before hun, with
the fingers extenderl. It was of this picture that
he said, "It is hot friendly to find uuwi lu peso
terity the imperfections of any man."

Sir Joshua is said to have liad in his mind this
attitude and the abstracted expression of Dr.
Johnson's countenance, when he painted the
Soothsayer Tiresías in his large picture of the
lofut Hercules.
Folio, mezzolint, very fine

Jimes Watson 1770
8vo. mezzotint for Sir Joshua's works

S. W. Reynolds.
1773. An etching of the head only, from a copy of
this picture by Ozias Humphrey

Mrs. D. Turner.)
III. Mr. Langton's piclure, now at Gunly,
near Spilsby, Lincolnshire, the seat ci Peregrine
Massingberd, Esq. Mr. Langton's second son.
Shcel mezzolint, very fine

W. Doughty 1724
Line, prefired to Dictionary folio
T. Cook

1787
Ditto to Dictionary 4to

Ditto.

1787 (Small ditto to Bell's Poets

Ditto.

1787
Oval Bromley,
For the Rambler, oval, small size
John Hul

1779
Oval, prefixed to first ed. of Lives of the Poets
T. Trotter

1779
4to. prcaxed to Dictionary
J. Henth

1799
In stipple
Schavionetti

1809
4to, prefixed to Dictionary
W. Holl

1814
A very ercellent live engraving for the Dict
published by Robinson

W.C. Edwards 1829
Ditto, smaller

Ditto

1823 8vo. mezzotint for the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds

S. W. Reynolds.) 1779.

IV, Mrs. Piozzi's picture, now in the posses-
sim of Watson Taylor, Esq. Three-quarter
face, to len, holding a book up to his eye
In an oval 8vo., for Murphy's cd. of his works
J. Hull

1787
Ditto

Audinet.
Ditto

1. Filller.
Ditto, face to the right

Heath.

Drawn by Engraver's

Date of

engraving.
(Head in a small oval
T. Trotter T. Trotter

1782)
Profile in oval, to the len, without wig
Do.
Do.

1784
Whole length, in the dress worn by hiin on
the journey to the Hebrides, with his slick, folio
Do.
Do.

1786 [Side-face, to right, the countenance haggard, and exhibiting marks of Jecay. This was proba ably the last portrait for which Dr. Johnsoli sat; it was finished a short time before his death T. Trotter T. Trotter

17961 (Do. prefixed to Harding's Shakspeare; draw. ing belonged to Dr. Farmer Do. Do.

1792) Side-face, to right J. Rarding Do.

1782 Medullion, profile to left, with wig, predxed to the Di. tionary F. Bartolozzi Bartolozzi

1785 Ditto for Sharpe's Johnsoniana Do. G. Murray

1820 A wood-cut, on the title page of Sharpe's edition of this work, in 1 vol. Do. Thompson

1830 (A small oval, protile to right N. Gardiner N. Gardiner

1786 Svo. profile to right

P.S. Lambour P. S. Lambourn 1791] Profile to lell, prefixed to Johnsoniana Unknown J. Taylor

1756 For “ Lavater's Essays on Physiognomy," in which Johnson's countenance is analysed upon the principles of that fanciful writer.

A view of Tunbridge Wells, in which Dr. and Mrs. Johnson are introduced; the ligures very small. See vol. i. p. 36. Loggan.

1804

1749.

* Brother of Mr. Townley, of the Commons, an ingenious artist, who resided some time at Derlin, and has The honour of being engraver to his Majesty the King of Prussia. This is one of the finest mezzotintos that ever was executed ; and what renders it of extraordinary value, the plate was destroyed after four or five imprese sions only were taken off. One of them is in the possession of Sir William Scoli.-BosWELL (It is probable that these four or five were merely early impressions taken off from the suine plate, the dedication to Mr. Bos. well, which distinguishes them, having been erased after they were printed.-J. MURRAY, JUN.)

A whole-length, in a cocked bat, ruffles on the hands, holding a stick behind his back

Not known.

There is a whole-length figure in Cambridge's wo: ks, 4to., drawn and engraved by Besland.)

BUST BY NOLLEKENS, (1781. Never cut in marble; the first cast from the

mould is now the property of Hon. Agar Ellis.
Without the wig; the flowing hair which hangs
down the neck copled from a beggar, whom
Mr. Smith states to have been called from the
street to serve as model.
After a drawing from the ahore Ab. Wivell

W. T. Fry 1815)
STATUE BY BACON
In St. Paul's; the first monument ever placed
in that building.

Repeatedly engraved.
There are also several seals with his head cut
on them, particularly a very Ine one by that
einincul artist, Edward Burch, Esq., R. A. ; in

the possession of the younger Dr. Chas. Bernet. (Copied and engraved by

Richter Richter Let me add, as a proof of the popularity of his character, that there are copper betra struck at Birmingham, with his head impra o them, which pass current as halike 'betes and in the neighbouring parts of the city,

[In this list are enumerated, it is leheted, the original portraits of Dr. Johnson, but als the most remarkable of the engrar dos talen from them. The valuable and interesting like lection of Henry Smedley, Esq. in which will be found almost every print or hin which less been published, contains more than one hundred distinct plates, which have been circule at different times.

Au illustrated copy of Boswell's Life, beledig. ing to Mr. Smith, of the British Mastuin, in de dition to numerous rare impressions of portrag of Dr. Johnson, is embellished with viena od 21 the houses in which he resided ; many of them drawu by Mr. Smith himself.-J. MUBBAY, des.