And when he talked of authors, his praise went spontaneously to such
passages as are sure in his own phrase to leave something behind them
useful on common occasions, or observant of common manners. For example,
it was not the two _last_, but the two _first_ volumes of "Clarissa" that
he prized; "for give me a sick-bed and a dying lady," said he, "and I'll
be pathetic myself. But Richardson had picked the kernel of life," he
said, "while Fielding was contented with the husk." It was not King Lear
cursing his daughters, or deprecating the storm, that I remember his
commendations of; but Iago's ingenious malice and subtle revenge; or
Prince Hal's gay compliance with the vices of Falstaff, whom he all along
despised. Those plays had indeed no rivals in Johnson's favour: "No man
but Shakespeare," he said, "could have drawn Sir John."
His manner of criticising and commending Addison's prose was the same in
conversation as we read it in the printed strictures, and many of the
expressions used have been heard to fall from him on common occasions. It
was notwithstanding observable enough (or I fancied so) that he did never
like, though he always thought fit to praise it; and his praises
resembled those of a man who extols the superior elegance of high painted
porcelain, while he himself always chooses to eat off _plate_. I told
him so one day, and he neither denied it nor appeared displeased.
Of the pathetic in poetry he never liked to speak, and the only passage I
ever heard him applaud as particularly tender in any common book was Jane
Shore's exclamation in the last act--
"Forgive me! _but_ forgive me!"
It was not, however, from the want of a susceptible heart that he hated
to cite tender expressions, for he was more strongly and more violently
affected by the force of words representing ideas capable of affecting
him at all than any other man in the world, I believe: and when he would
try to repeat the celebrated Prosa Ecclesiastica pro Mortuis, as it is
called, beginning "Dies irae, Dies illa," he could never pass the stanza
ending thus, "Tantus labor non sit cassus," without bursting into a flood
of tears; which sensibility I used to quote against him when he would
inveigh against devotional poetry, and protest that all religious verses
were cold and feeble, and unworthy the subject, which ought to be treated
with higher reverence, he said, than either poets or painters could
presume to excite or bestow. Nor can anything be a stronger proof of Dr.
Johnson's piety than such an expression; for his idea of poetry was
magnificent indeed, and very fully was he persuaded of its superiority
over every other talent bestowed by heaven on man. His chapter upon that
particular subject in his "Rasselas" is really written from the fulness
of his heart, and quite in his best manner, I think. I am not so sure
that this is the proper place to mention his writing that surprising
little volume in a week or ten days' time, in order to obtain money for
his journey to Lichfield when his mother lay upon her last sick-bed.
Promptitude of thought, indeed, and quickness of expression, were among
the peculiar felicities of Johnson; his notions rose up like the dragon's
teeth sowed by Cadmus all ready clothed, and in bright armour too, fit
for immediate battle. He was therefore (as somebody is said to have
expressed it) a tremendous converser, and few people ventured to try
their skill against an antagonist with whom contention was so hopeless.
One gentleman, however, who dined at a nobleman's house in his company,
and that of Mr. Thrale, to whom I was obliged for the anecdote, was
willing to enter the lists in defence of King William's character, and
having opposed and contradicted Johnson two or three times petulantly
enough, the master of the house began to feel uneasy, and expect
disagreeable consequences; to avoid which he said, loud enough for the
Doctor to hear, "Our friend here has no meaning now in all this, except
just to relate at club to-morrow how he teased Johnson at dinner
to-day--this is all to do himself _honour_." "No, upon my word," replied
the other, "I see no _honour_ in it, whatever you may do." "Well, sir!"
returned Mr. Johnson, sternly, "if you do not _see_ the _honour_, I am
sure I _feel_ the _disgrace_."
A young fellow, less confident of his own abilities, lamenting one day
that he had lost all his Greek--"I believe it happened at the same time,
sir," said Johnson, "that I lost all my large estate in Yorkshire."
But however roughly he might be suddenly provoked to treat a harmless
exertion of vanity, he did not wish to inflict the pain he gave, and was
sometimes very sorry when he perceived the people to smart more than they
deserved. "How harshly you treated that man to-day," said I once, "who
harangued us so about gardening." "I am sorry," said he, "if I vexed the
creature, for there is certainly no harm in a fellow's rattling a rattle-
box, only don't let him think that he thunders." The Lincolnshire lady
who showed him a grotto she had been making, came off no better, as I
remember. "Would it not be a pretty cool habitation in summer," said
she, "Mr. Johnson?" "I think it would, madam," replied he, "for a toad."
All desire of distinction, indeed, had a sure enemy in Mr. Johnson. We
met a friend driving six very small ponies, and stopped to admire them.
"Why does nobody," said our Doctor, "begin the fashion of driving six
spavined horses, all spavined of the same leg? It would have a mighty
pretty effect, and produce the distinction of doing something worse than
the common way."
When Mr. Johnson had a mind to compliment any one he did it with more
dignity to himself, and better effect upon the company, than any man. I
can recollect but few instances, indeed, though perhaps that may be more
my fault than his. When Sir Joshua Reynolds left the room one day, he
said, "There goes a man not to be spoilt by prosperity." And when Mrs.
Montague showed him some China plates which had once belonged to Queen
Elizabeth, he told her "that they had no reason to be ashamed of their
present possessor, who was so little inferior to the first." I likewise
remember that he pronounced one day at my house a most lofty panegyric
upon Jones the Orientalist, who seemed little pleased with the praise,
for what cause I know not. He was not at all offended when, comparing
all our acquaintance to some animal or other, we pitched upon the
elephant for his resemblance, adding that the proboscis of that creature
was like his mind most exactly, strong to buffet even the tiger, and
pliable to pick up even the pin. The truth is, Mr. Johnson was often
good humouredly willing to join in childish amusements, and hated to be
left out of any innocent merriment that was going forward. Mr. Murphy
always said he was incomparable at buffoonery; and I verily think, if he
had had good eyes, and a form less inflexible, he would have made an
admirable mimic.
He certainly rode on Mr. Thrale's old hunter with a good firmness, and
though he would follow the hounds fifty miles on end sometimes, would
never own himself either tired or amused. "I have now learned," said he,
"by hunting, to perceive that it is no diversion at all, nor ever takes a
man out of himself for a moment: the dogs have less sagacity than I could
have prevailed on myself to suppose; and the gentlemen often call to me
not to ride over them. It is very strange, and very melancholy, that the
paucity of human pleasure should persuade us ever to call hunting one of
them." He was, however, proud to be amongst the sportsmen; and I think
no praise ever went so close to his heart as when Mr. Hamilton called out
one day upon Brighthelmstone Downs, "Why, Johnson rides as well, for
aught I see, as the most illiterate fellow in England."
Though Dr. Johnson owed his very life to air and exercise, given him when
his organs of respiration could scarcely play, in the year 1766, yet he
ever persisted in the notion that neither of them had anything to do with
health. "People live as long," said he, "in Pepper Alley as on Salisbury
Plain; and they live so much happier, that an inhabitant of the first
would, if he turned cottager, starve his understanding for want of
conversation, and perish in a state of mental inferiority."
Mr. Johnson, indeed, as he was a very talking man himself, had an idea
that nothing promoted happiness so much as conversation. A friend's
erudition was commended one day as equally deep and strong. "He will not
talk, sir," was the reply, "so his learning does no good, and his wit, if
he has it, gives us no pleasure. Out of all his boasted stores I never
heard him force but one word, and that word was _Richard_." With a
contempt not inferior he received the praises of a pretty lady's face and
behaviour. "She says nothing, sir," answers Johnson; "a talking
blackamoor were better than a white creature who adds nothing to life,
and by sitting down before one thus desperately silent, takes away the
confidence one should have in the company of her chair if she were once
out of it." No one was, however, less willing to begin any discourse
than himself. His friend, Mr. Thomas Tyers, said he was like the ghosts,
who never speak till they are spoken to: and he liked the expression so
well, that he often repeated it. He had, indeed, no necessity to lead
the stream of chat to a favourite channel, that his fulness on the
subject might be shown more clearly whatever was the topic; and he
usually left the choice to others. His information best enlightened, his
argument strengthened, and his wit made it ever remembered. Of him it
might have been said, as he often delighted to say of Edmund Burke, "that
you could not stand five minutes with that man beneath a shed while it
rained, but you must be convinced you had been standing with the greatest
man you had ever yet seen."
As we had been saying, one day, that no subject failed of receiving
dignity from the manner in which Mr. Johnson treated it, a lady at my
house said she would make him talk about love, and took her measures
accordingly, deriding the novels of the day because they treated about
love. "It is not," replied our philosopher, "because they treat, as you
call it, about love, but because they treat of nothing, that they are
despicable. We must not ridicule a passion which he who never felt never
was happy, and he who laughs at never deserves to feel--a passion which
has caused the change of empires and the loss of worlds--a passion which
has inspired heroism and subdued avarice." He thought he had already
said too much. "A passion, in short," added he, with an altered tone,
"that consumes me away for my pretty Fanny here, and she is very cruel,"
speaking of another lady in the room. He told us, however, in the course
of the same chat, how his negro Francis had been eminent for his success
among the girls. Seeing us all laugh, "I must have you know, ladies,"
said he, "that Frank has carried the empire of Cupid further than most
men. When I was in Lincolnshire so many years ago he attended me
thither; and when we returned home together, I found that a female
haymaker had followed him to London for love." Francis was indeed no
small favourite with his master, who retained, however, a prodigious
influence over his most violent passions.
On the birthday of our eldest daughter, and that of our friend Dr.
Johnson, the 17th and the 18th of September, we every year made up a
little dance and supper, to divert our servants and their friends,
putting the summer-house into their hands for the two evenings, to fill
with acquaintance and merriment. Francis and his white wife were
invited, of course. She was eminently pretty, and he was jealous, as my
maids told me. On the first of these days' amusements (I know not what
year) Frank took offence at some attentions paid his Desdemona, and
walked away next morning to London in wrath. His master and I driving
the same road an hour after, overtook him. "What is the matter, child,"
says Dr. Johnson, "that you leave Streatham to-day. _Art sick_?" "He is
jealous," whispered I. "Are you jealous of your wife, you stupid
blockhead?" cries out his master in another tone. The fellow hesitated,
and, "_To be sure_, _sir_, _I don't quite approve_, _sir_," was the
stammering reply. "Why, what do they _do_ to her, man? Do the footmen
kiss her?" "No, sir, no! Kiss my _wife_, sir! _I hope not_, sir."
"Why, what _do_ they do to her, my lad?" "Why, nothing, sir, I'm sure,
sir." "Why, then go back directly and dance, you dog, do; and let's hear
no more of such empty lamentations." I believe, however, that Francis
was scarcely as much the object of Mr. Johnson's personal kindness as the
representative of Dr. Bathurst, for whose sake he would have loved
anybody or anything.
When he spoke of negroes, he always appeared to think them of a race
naturally inferior, and made few exceptions in favour of his own; yet
whenever disputes arose in his household among the many odd inhabitants
of which it consisted, he always sided with Francis against the others,
whom he suspected (not unjustly, I believe) of greater malignity. It
seems at once vexatious and comical to reflect that the dissensions those
people chose to live constantly in distressed and mortified him
exceedingly. He really was oftentimes afraid of going home, because he
was so sure to be met at the door with numberless complaints; and he used
to lament pathetically to me, and to Mr. Sastres, the Italian master, who
was much his favourite, that they made his life miserable from the
impossibility he found of making theirs happy, when every favour he
bestowed on one was wormwood to the rest. If, however, I ventured to
blame their ingratitude, and condemn their conduct, he would instantly
set about softening the one and justifying the other; and finished
commonly by telling me, that I knew not how to make allowances for
situations I never experienced.
"To thee no reason who know'st only good,
But evil hast not tried."