In 1764 and 1765 it should seem that Dr. Johnson was so busily employed
with his edition of Shakspeare, as to have had little leisure for any
other literary exertion, or, indeed, even for private correspondence[1].
He did not favour me with a single letter for more than two years, for
which it will appear that he afterwards apologised.
He was, however, at all times ready to give assistance to his friends,
and others, in revising their works, and in writing for them, or greatly
improving their Dedications. In that courtly species of composition no
man excelled Dr. Johnson. Though the loftiness of his mind prevented him
from ever dedicating in his own person[2], he wrote a very great number
of Dedications for others. Some of these, the persons who were favoured
with them are unwilling should be mentioned, from a too anxious
apprehension, as I think, that they might be suspected of having
received larger assistance[3]; and some, after all the diligence I have
bestowed, have escaped my enquiries. He told me, a great many years ago,
'he believed he had dedicated to all the Royal Family round[4];' and it
was indifferent to him what was the subject of the work dedicated,
provided it were innocent. He once dedicated some Musick for the German
Flute to Edward, Duke of York. In writing Dedications for others, he
considered himself as by no means speaking his own sentiments.
Notwithstanding his long silence, I never omitted to write to him when I
had any thing worthy of communicating. I generally kept copies of my
letters to him, that I might have a full view of our correspondence, and
never be at a loss to understand any reference in his letters[5]. He
kept the greater part of mine very carefully; and a short time before
his death was attentive enough to seal them up in bundles, and order
them to be delivered to me, which was accordingly done. Amongst them I
found one, of which I had not made a copy, and which I own I read with
pleasure at the distance of almost twenty years. It is dated November,
1765, at the palace of Pascal Paoli, in Corte, the capital of Corsica,
and is full of generous enthusiasm[6]. After giving a sketch of what I
had seen and heard in that island, it proceeded thus: 'I dare to call
this a spirited tour. I dare, to challenge your approbation.'
This letter produced the following answer, which I found on my arrival
at Paris.
A Mr. Mr. BOSWELL, chez Mr. WATERS, Banquier, A Paris.
'DEAR SIR,
'Apologies are seldom of any use. We will delay till your arrival the
reasons, good or bad, which have made me such a sparing and ungrateful
correspondent. Be assured, for the present, that nothing has lessened
either the esteem or love with which I dismissed you at Harwich. Both
have been increased by all that I have been told of you by yourself or
others; and[7] when you return, you will return to an unaltered, and, I
hope, unalterable friend.
'All that you have to fear from me is the vexation of disappointing me.
No man loves to frustrate expectations which have been formed in his
favour; and the pleasure which I promise myself from your journals and
remarks is so great, that perhaps no degree of attention or discernment
will be sufficient to afford it.
'Come home, however, and take your chance. I long to see you, and to
hear you; and hope that we shall not be so long separated again. Come
home, and expect such a welcome as is due to him whom a wise and noble
curiosity has led, where perhaps no native of this country ever was
before[8].
'I have no news to tell you that can deserve your notice; nor would I
willingly lessen the pleasure that any novelty may give you at your
return. I am afraid we shall find it difficult to keep among us a mind
which has been so long feasted with variety. But let us try what esteem
and kindness can effect.
'As your father's liberality has indulged you with so long a ramble, I
doubt not but you will think his sickness, or even his desire to see
you, a sufficient reason for hastening your return. The longer we live,
and the more we think, the higher value we learn to put on the
friendship and tenderness of parents and of friends. Parents we can have
but once; and he promises himself too much, who enters life with the
expectation of finding many friends. Upon some motive, I hope, that you
will be here soon; and am willing to think that it will be an inducement
to your return, that it is sincerely desired by, dear Sir,
'Your affectionate humble servant,
'SAM. JOHNSON.'
'Johnson's Court, Fleet-street,
January 14, 1766.'
I returned to London in February, and found Dr. Johnson in a good house
in Johnson's Court, Fleet-street[9], in which he had accommodated Miss
Williams with an apartment on the ground floor, while Mr. Levett
occupied his post in the garret: his faithful Francis was still
attending upon him. He received me with much kindness. The fragments of
our first conversation, which I have preserved, are these: I told him
that Voltaire, in a conversation with me, had distinguished Pope and
Dryden thus:--'Pope drives a handsome chariot, with a couple of neat
trim nags; Dryden a coach, and six stately horses.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir,
the truth is, they both drive coaches and six; but Dryden's horses are
either galloping or stumbling: Pope's go at a steady even trot[10].' He
said of Goldsmith's _Traveller_, which had been published in my absence,
'There has not been so fine a poem since Pope's time.'
And here it is proper to settle, with authentick precision, what has
long floated in publick report, as to Johnson's being himself the
authour of a considerable part of that poem. Much, no doubt, both of the
sentiments and expression, were derived from conversation with him; and
it was certainly submitted to his friendly revision: but in the year
1783, he, at my request, marked with a pencil the lines which he had
furnished, which are only line 420th,
'To stop too fearful, and too faint to go;'
and the concluding ten lines, except the last couplet but one, which I
distinguish by the Italick character:
'How small of all that human hearts endure,
That part which kings or laws[11] can cause or cure.
Still to ourselves in every place consign'd,
Our own felicity we make or find[12];
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestick joy:
_The lifted axe, the agonizing wheel,
Luke's iron crown, and Damien's bed of steel_,
To men remote from power, but rarely known,
Leave reason, faith, and conscience, all our own.'
He added, 'These are all of which I can be sure[13].' They bear a small
proportion to the whole, which consists of four hundred and thirty-eight
verses. Goldsmith, in the couplet which he inserted, mentions Luke as a
person well known, and superficial readers have passed it over quite
smoothly; while those of more attention have been as much perplexed by
_Luke_, as by _Lydiat_[14], in _The Vanity of Human Wishes_. The truth
is, that Goldsmith himself was in a mistake. In the _Respublica
Hungarian_[15], there is an account of a desperate rebellion in the year
1514, headed by two brothers, of the name of _Zeck_, George and Luke.
When it was quelled, _George_, not _Luke_, was punished by his head
being encircled with a red-hot iron crown: '_coronAc candescente ferreAc
coronatur_[16].' The same severity of torture was exercised on the Earl
of Athol, one of the murderers of King James I. of Scotland.
Dr. Johnson at the same time favoured me by marking the lines which he
furnished to Goldsmith's _Deserted Village_, which are only the last
four:
'That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay,
As ocean sweeps the labour'd mole away:
While self-dependent power can time defy,
As rocks resist the billows and the sky.'
Talking of education, 'People have now a days, (said he,) got a strange
opinion that every thing should be taught by lectures. Now, I cannot see
that lectures can do so much good as reading the books from which the
lectures are taken. I know nothing that can be best taught by
lectures[17], except where experiments are to be shewn. You may teach
chymistry by lectures.--You might teach making of shoes by lectures[18]!'
At night I supped with him at the Mitre tavern, that we might renew our
social intimacy at the original place of meeting. But there was now a
considerable difference in his way of living. Having had an illness, in
which he was advised to leave off wine, he had, from that period,
continued to abstain from it, and drank only water, or lemonade[19].
I told him that a foreign friend of his[20], whom I had met with abroad,
was so wretchedly perverted to infidelity, that he treated the hopes of
immortality with brutal levity; and said, 'As man dies like a dog, let
him lie like a dog.' JOHNSON. '_If_ he dies like a dog, _let_ him lie
like a dog.' I added, that this man said to me, 'I hate mankind, for I
think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.' JOHNSON.
'Sir, he must be very singular in his opinion, if he thinks himself one
of the best of men; for none of his friends think him so.'--He said, 'no
honest man could be a Deist; for no man could be so after a fair
examination of the proofs of Christianity.' I named Hume[21]. JOHNSON.
'No, Sir; Hume owned to a clergyman in the bishoprick of Durham, that he
had never read the New Testament with attention.' I mentioned Hume's
notion[22], that all who are happy are equally happy; a little miss with
a new gown at a dancing school ball, a general at the head of a
victorious army, and an orator, after having made an eloquent speech in
a great assembly. JOHNSON. 'Sir, that all who are happy, are equally
happy, is not true. A peasant and a philosopher may be equally
_satisfied_, but not equally _happy_. Happiness consists in the
multiplicity of agreeable consciousness. A peasant has not capacity for
having equal happiness with a philosopher.' I remember this very
question very happily illustrated in opposition to Hume, by the Reverend
Mr. Robert Brown[23], at Utrecht. 'A small drinking-glass and a large
one, (said he,) may be equally full; but the large one holds more than
the small.'
Dr. Johnson was very kind this evening, and said to me, 'You have now
lived five-and-twenty years, and you have employed them well.' 'Alas,
Sir, (said I,) I fear not. Do I know history? Do I know mathematicks? Do
I know law?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, though you may know no science so well
as to be able to teach it, and no profession so well as to be able to
follow it, your general mass of knowledge of books and men renders you
very capable to make yourself master of any science, or fit yourself for
any profession.' I mentioned that a gay friend had advised me against
being a lawyer, because I should be excelled by plodding block-heads.
JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, in the formulary and statutory part of law, a
plodding block-head may excel; but in the ingenious and rational part of
it a plodding block-head can never excel.'
I talked of the mode adopted by some to rise in the world, by courting
great men, and asked him whether he had ever submitted to it. JOHNSON.
'Why, Sir, I never was near enough to great men, to court them. You may
be prudently attached to great men and yet independent. You are not to
do what you think wrong; and, Sir, you are to calculate, and not pay too
dear for what you get. You must not give a shilling's worth of court for
six-pence worth of good. But if you can get a shilling's worth of good
for six-pence worth of court, you are a fool if you do not pay
court[24].'
He said, 'If convents should be allowed at all, they should only be
retreats for persons unable to serve the publick, or who have served it.
It is our first duty to serve society, and, after we have done that, we
may attend wholly to the salvation of our own souls. A youthful passion
for abstracted devotion should not be encouraged[25].'
I introduced the subject of second sight, and other mysterious
manifestations; the fulfilment of which, I suggested, might happen by
chance. JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir; but they have happened so often, that
mankind have agreed to think them not fortuitous[26].'
I talked to him a great deal of what I had seen in Corsica, and of my
intention to publish an account of it. He encouraged me by saying, 'You
cannot go to the bottom of the subject; but all that you tell us will be
new to us. Give us as many anecdotes as you can[27].'
Our next meeting at the Mitre was on Saturday the 15th of February, when
I presented to him my old and most intimate friend, the Reverend Mr.
Temple[28], then of Cambridge. I having mentioned that I had passed some
time with Rousseau in his wild retreat[29], and having quoted some remark
made by Mr. Wilkes, with whom I had spent many pleasant hours in Italy,
Johnson said (sarcastically,) 'It seems, Sir, you have kept very good
company abroad, Rousseau and Wilkes!' Thinking it enough to defend one
at a time, I said nothing as to my gay friend, but answered with a
smile, 'My dear Sir, you don't call Rousseau bad company. Do you really
think him a bad man?' JOHNSON. 'Sir, if you are talking jestingly of
this, I don't talk with you. If you mean to be serious, I think him one
of the worst of men; a rascal who ought to be hunted out of society, as
he has been. Three or four nations have expelled him; and it is a shame
that he is protected in this country[30].' BOSWELL. 'I don't deny, Sir,
but that his novel[31] may, perhaps, do harm; but I cannot think his
intention was bad.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, that will not do. We cannot prove any
man's intention to be bad. You may shoot a man through the head, and say
you intended to miss him; but the Judge will order you to be hanged. An
alleged want of intention, when evil is committed, will not be allowed
in a court of justice. Rousseau, Sir, is a very bad man. I would sooner
sign a sentence for his transportation, than that of any felon who has
gone from the Old Bailey these many years. Yes, I should like to have
him work in the plantations[32].' BOSWELL. 'Sir, do you think him as bad
a man as Voltaire?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, it is difficult to settle the
proportion of iniquity between them[33].'
This violence seemed very strange to me, who had read many of Rousseau's
animated writings with great pleasure, and even edification, had been
much pleased with his society[34], and was just come from the Continent,
where he was very generally admired. Nor can I yet allow that he
deserves the very severe censure which Johnson pronounced upon him. His
absurd preference of savage to civilised life[35], and other
singularities, are proofs rather of a defect in his understanding, than
of any depravity in his heart. And notwithstanding the unfavourable
opinion which many worthy men have expressed of his '_Profession de Foi
du Vicaire Savoyard_', I cannot help admiring it as the performance of a
man full of sincere reverential submission to Divine Mystery, though
beset with perplexing doubts; a state of mind to be viewed with pity
rather than with anger.
On his favourite subject of subordination, Johnson said, 'So far is it
from being true that men are naturally equal[36], that no two people can
be half an hour together, but one shall acquire an evident superiority
over the other.'
I mentioned the advice given us by philosophers, to console ourselves,
when distressed or embarrassed, by thinking of those who are in a worse
situation than ourselves. This, I observed, could not apply to all, for
there must be some who have nobody worse than they are. JOHNSON. 'Why,
to be sure, Sir, there are; but they don't know it. There is no being so
poor and so contemptible, who does not think there is somebody still
poorer, and still more contemptible.'
As my stay in London at this time was very short, I had not many
opportunities of being with Dr. Johnson; but I felt my veneration for
him in no degree lessened, by my having seen _mullorum hominum mores et
urbes_[37]. On the contrary, by having it in my power to compare him with
many of the most celebrated persons of other countries[38], my admiration
of his extraordinary mind was increased and confirmed.
The roughness, indeed, which sometimes appeared in his manners, was more
striking to me now, from my having been accustomed to the studied smooth
complying habits of the Continent; and I clearly recognised in him, not
without respect for his honest conscientious zeal, the same indignant
and sarcastical mode of treating every attempt to unhinge or weaken good
principles.
One evening when a young gentleman[39] teized him with an account of the
infidelity of his servant, who, he said, would not believe the
scriptures, because he could not read them in the original tongues, and
be sure that they were not invented. 'Why, foolish fellow, (said
Johnson,) has he any better authority for almost every thing that he
believes?' BOSWELL. 'Then the vulgar, Sir, never can know they are
right, but must submit themselves to the learned.' JOHNSON. 'To be sure,
Sir. The vulgar are the children of the State, and must be taught like
children[40].' BOSWELL. 'Then, Sir, a poor Turk must be a Mahometan, just
as a poor Englishman must be a Christian[41]?' JOHNSON. 'Why, yes, Sir;
and what then? This now is such stuff as I used to talk to my mother,
when I first began to think myself a clever fellow; and she ought to
have whipt me for it.'
Another evening Dr. Goldsmith and I called on him, with the hope of
prevailing on him to sup with us at the Mitre. We found him indisposed,
and resolved not to go abroad. 'Come then, (said Goldsmith,) we will not
go to the Mitre to-night, since we cannot have the big man[42] with us.'
Johnson then called for a bottle of port, of which Goldsmith and I
partook, while our friend, now a water-drinker, sat by us. GOLDSMITH. 'I
think, Mr. Johnson, you don't go near the theatres now. You give
yourself no more concern about a new play, than if you had never had any
thing to do with the stage.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, our tastes greatly
alter. The lad does not care for the child's rattle, and the old man
does not care for the young man's whore.' GOLDSMITH. 'Nay, Sir, but your
Muse was not a whore.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, I do not think she was. But as we
advance in the journey of life, we drop some of the things which have
pleased us; whether it be that we are fatigued and don't choose to carry
so many things any farther, or that we find other things which we like
better.' BOSWELL. 'But, Sir, why don't you give us something in some
other way?' GOLDSMITH. 'Ay, Sir, we have a claim upon you[43].' JOHNSON.
'No, Sir, I am not obliged to do any more. No man is obliged to do as
much as he can do. A man is to have part of his life to himself. If a
soldier has fought a good many campaigns, he is not to be blamed if he
retires to ease and tranquillity. A physician, who has practised long in
a great city, may be excused if he retires to a small town, and takes
less practice. Now, Sir, the good I can do by my conversation bears the
same proportion to the good I can do by my writings, that the practice
of a physician, retired to a small town, does to his practice in a great
city[44].' BOSWELL. 'But I wonder, Sir, you have not more pleasure in
writing than in not writing.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, you _may_ wonder.'
He talked of making verses, and observed, 'The great difficulty is to
know when you have made good ones. When composing, I have generally had
them in my mind, perhaps fifty at a time, walking up and down in my
room; and then I have written them down, and often, from laziness, have
written only half lines. I have written a hundred lines in a day. I
remember I wrote a hundred lines of _The Vanity of Human Wishes_ in a
day[45]. Doctor, (turning to Goldsmith,) I am not quite idle; I have one
line t'other day; but I made no more.'
GOLDSMITH. 'Let us hear it; we'll put a bad one to it..