[1162] Johnson, however, when telling Mrs. Thrale that, in case of her
husband's death, she ought to carry on his business, said:--'Do not be
frighted; trade could not be managed by those who manage it if it had
much difficulty. Their great books are soon understood, and their
language,
"If speech it may be called, that speech is none
Distinguishable in number, mood, or tense,"
is understood with no very laborious application.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii.
91. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 18.
[1163] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. 26.
[1164] See _ante_, iii. 88, note 1.
[1165] The Earl of Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty, with whom she
lived seventeen years, and by whom she had nine children. _Ann. Reg_.
xxii. 206. The Duke of Richmond attacked her in the House of Lords as
one 'who was supposed to sell favours in the Admiralty for money.'
Walpole's _Journal of the Reign of George III_, ii. 248, and _Parl.
Hist_. xix. 993. It so happened that on the day on which Hackman was
hanged 'Fox moved for the removal of Lord Sandwich [from office] but was
beaten by a large majority.' Walpole's _Letters_, vii. 194. One of her
children was Basil Montague, the editor of _Bacon_. Carlyle writes of
him:--'On going to Hinchinbrook, I found he was strikingly like the
dissolute, questionable Earl of Sandwich; who, indeed, had been father
of him in a highly tragic way.' Carlyle's _Reminiscences_, i. 224.
Hackman, who was a clergyman of the Church, had once been in the army.
Cradock's _Memoirs_, i. 140.
[1166] On the following Monday Boswell was present at Hackman's
execution, riding to Tyburn with him in a mourning coach. _London Mag_.
for 1779, p. 189.
[1167] At the Club. CROKER. See _ante_, ii. 345, note 5.
[1168] See _ante_, p. 281, for a previous slight altercation, and p. 195
for a possible cause of unfriendly feeling between the two men. If such
a feeling existed, it passed away, at all events on Johnson's side,
before Beauclerk's death. See _post_, iv. 10.
[1169] This gentleman who loved buttered muffins reappears in _Pickwick_
(ch. 44), as 'the man who killed himself on principle,' after eating
three-shillings' worth of crumpets. Mr. Croker says that Mr. Fitzherbert
is meant; but he hanged himself. _Ante_, ii. 228, note 3.
[1170] 'It is not impossible that this restless desire of novelty, which
gives so much trouble to the teacher, may be often the struggle of the
understanding starting from that to which it is not by nature adapted,
and travelling in search of something on which it may fix with greater
satisfaction. For, without supposing each man particularly marked out by
his genius for particular performances, it may be easily conceived that
when a numerous class of boys is confined indiscriminately to the same
forms of composition, the repetition of the same words, or the
explication of the same sentiments, the employment must, either by
nature or accident, be less suitable to some than others.... Weariness
looks out for relief, and leisure for employment, and surely it is
rational to indulge the wanderings of both.' Johnson's _Works_, v. 232.
See _post_, iv. 21.
[1171] 'See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept 10, and Johnson's _Works_,
viii. 466. Mallet had the impudence to write to Hume that the book was
ready for the press; 'which,' adds Hume, 'is more than I or most people
expected.' J.H. Burton's _Hume_, ii. 139.
[1172] The name is not given in the first two editions. See _ante_,
i. 82.
[1173] See p. 289 of this vol., and vol. i. p. 207. BOSWELL. The saying
is from Diogenes Laertius, bk. v. ch. I, and is attributed to Aristotle
--[Greek: _ho philoi oudeis philos_.]
[1174]
'Love, the most generous passion of the mind,
The softest refuge innocence can find;
The safe director of unguided youth,
Fraught with kind wishes, and secured by truth;
That cordial drop Heaven in our cup has thrown,
To make the nauseous draught of life go down.'
Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, _A Letter from Artemisia_, Chalmers's
_Poets_, viii. 242. Pope (_Imitations of Horace_, _Epist_. I. vi. 126)
refers to these lines:--
'If, after all, we must with Wilmot own,
The cordial drop of life is love alone.'
[1175] Garrick wrote in 1776:--'Gout, stone, and sore throat! Yet I am
in spirits.' _Garrick Corres_, ii. 138.
[1176] See ante, p. 70.
[1177] In _The Life of Edmund Smith_ (_Works_, vii. 380). See _ante_,
i. 81.
[1178] Johnson wrote of Foote's death:--'The world is really
impoverished by his sinking glories.' Piozzi _Letters_, i. 396. See
_ante_, p. 185, note 1.
[1179] 'Allowance must be made for some degree of exaggerated praise,'
he said in speaking of epitaphs. 'In lapidary inscriptions a man is not
upon oath.' _Ante_, ii. 407.
[1180] Garrick retired in January 1776, three years before his death.
He visited Ireland in 1742, and again in 1743. Davies's _Garrick_,
i. 57, 91.
[1181] In the original _impoverished_.
[1182] Certainly not Horace Walpole, as had been suggested to Mr.
Croker. He and Johnson can scarcely be said to have known each other
(_post_, under June 19, 1784, note). A sentence in one of Walpole's
_Letters_ (iv. 407) shews that he was very unlike the French wit. On
Sept. 22, 1765, he wrote from Paris:--'The French affect philosophy,
literature, and free-thinking: the first never did, and never will
possess me; of the two others I have long been tired. _Free-thinking is
for one's self, surely not for society_.' Perhaps Richard Fitzpatrick is
meant, who later on joined in writing _The Rolliad_, and who was the
cousin and 'sworn brother' of Charles Fox. Walpole describes him as 'an
agreeable young man of parts,' and mentions his 'genteel irony and
badinage.' _Journal of the Reign of George III_, i. 167 and ii. 560. He
was Lord Shelburne's brother-in-law, at whose house Johnson might have
met him, as well as in Fox's company. There are one or two lines in _The
Rolliad_ which border on profanity. Rogers (_Table-Talk_, p. 104) said
that 'Fitzpatrick was at one time nearly as famous for his wit as Hare.'
Tickell in his _Epistle from the Hon. Charles Fox to the Hon. John
Townshend_, p. 13, writes:--
'Oft shall Fitzpatrick's wit and Stanhope's ease,
And Burgoyne's manly sense unite to please.'
[1183] See ante, i. 379, note 2.
[1184] According to Mr. Wright (Croker's _Boswell_, p. 630), this
physician was Dr. James. I have examined, however, the 2nd, 3rd, 5th,
and 7th editions of his _Dissertation on Fevers_, but can find no
mention of this. In the 7th edition, published in 1770, he complains (p.
111) of 'the virulence and rancour with which the fever-powder and its
inventor have been traduced and persecuted by the vendors of medicines
and their abettors.'
[1185] According to Mr. Croker this was Andrew Millar, but I doubt it.
See ante, i. 287, note 3.
[1186] 'The Chevalier Taylor, Ophthalmiator Pontifical, Imperial, and
Royal,' as he styled himself. _Gent. Mag_. xxxi. 226. Lord Eldon said
that--'Taylor, dining with the barristers upon the Oxford circuit,
having related many wonderful things which he had done, was asked by
Bearcroft, "Pray, Chevalier, as you have told us of a great many things
which you have done and can do, will you be so good as to try to tell us
anything which you cannot do?" "Nothing so easy," replied Taylor, "I
cannot pay my share of the dinner bill: and that, Sir, I must beg of you
to do."' Twiss's _Eldon_, i 321.
[1187] Pope mentions Ward in the Imitations of Horace_, 2 Epistle,
i. 180:--
'He serv'd a 'prenticeship who sets up shop;
Ward try'd on puppies, and the poor, his drop.'
Fielding, in _Tom Jones_, bk. viii. ch. 9, says that 'interest is indeed
a most excellent medicine, and, like Ward's pill, flies at once to the
particular part of the body on which you desire to operate.' In the
introduction to the _Voyage to Lisbon_ he speaks very highly of Ward's
remedies and of Ward himself, who 'endeavoured, he says, 'to serve me
without any expectation or desire of fee or reward.'
[1188] 'Every thing,' said Johnson, 'comes from Beauclerk so easily. It
appears to me that I labour, when I say a good thing.' Boswell's
_Hebrides_, Aug. 21. See _post_, under May 2, 1780. Dr. A. Carlyle
(_Auto_. p. 219) mentions another great-grandson of Charles II.
(Commissioner Cardonnel) who was 'the most agreeable companion that ever
was. He excelled in story-telling, like his great-grandfather, Charles
II., but he seldom or ever repeated them.'
[1189] No doubt Burke. _Ante_, ii. 222, note 4.
[1190] General Paoli's house, where for some years Boswell was 'a
constant guest while he was in London.' _Ante_, p. 35
[1191] Allan Ramsay's residence: No. 67, Harley-street. P. CUNNINGHAM.
[1192] It is strange that he does not mention their visit in a
letter in which he tells Temple that he is lame, and that his 'spirits
sank to dreary dejection;' and utters what the editor justly calls an
ambiguous prayer:--'Let us hope for gleams of joy here, and a _blaze_
hereafter.' This letter, by the way, and the one that follows it, are
both wrongly dated. _Letters of Boswell_, p. 237.
[1193] See p. 344 of this Volume. BOSWELL.
[1194] 'Johnson's first question was, "What kind of a man was Mr. Pope
in his conversation?" His Lordship answered, that if the conversation
did not take something of a lively or epigrammatic turn, he fell asleep,
or perhaps pretended to do so.' Johnson's _Works_ (1787), xi. 200.
Johnson in his _Life of Pope (Works_, viii. 309) says that 'when he
wanted to sleep he "nodded in company."'
[1195] Boswell wrote to Temple late on this day, 'Let us not dispute any
more about political notions. It is now night. Dr. Johnson has dined,
drunk tea, and supped with only Mr. Charles Dilly and me, and I am
confirmed in my Toryism.' _Letters of Boswell_, p. 238.
[1196] In the original _or_. Boswell quotes the line correctly, _ante_,
p. 220.
[1197] 'I do not (says Mr. Malone) see any difficulty in this passage,
and wonder that Dr. Johnson should have acknowledged it to be
_inaccurate_. The Hermit, it should be observed, had no actual
experience of the world whatsoever: all his knowledge concerning it had
been obtained in two ways; from _books_, and from the _relations_ of
those country swains, who had seen a little of it. The plain meaning,
therefore, is, "To clear his doubts concerning Providence, and to obtain
some knowledge of the world by actual experience; to see whether the
accounts furnished by books, or by the oral communications of swains,
were just representations of it; [I say, _swains_,] for his oral or
_vivá voce_ information had been obtained from that part of mankind
_alone_, &c." The word _alone_ here does not relate to the whole of the
preceding line, as has been supposed, but, by a common licence, to the
words,--_of all mankind_, which are understood, and of which it is
restrictive.'
Mr. Malone, it must be owned, has shewn much critical ingenuity in the
explanation of this passage. His interpretation, however, seems to me
much too recondite. The _meaning_ of the passage may be certain enough;
but surely the _expression_ is confused, and one part of it
contradictory to the other. BOSWELL. This note is first given in the
third edition.
[1198] See ante, p. 297.
[1199] State is used for statement. 'He sate down to examine Mr. Owen's
states.' Rob Roy, ed. 1860, viii. 101.
[1200] Johnson started for Lichfield and Ashbourne about May 20, and
returned to London towards the end of June. _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 44,
55. 'It is good,' he wrote, 'to wander a little, lest one should dream
that all the world was Streatham, of which one may venture to say,
_none but itself can be its parallel_.' _Ib_. p. 47. 'None but thyself
can be thy parallel' is from Theobald's _Double Falsehood_. Pope calls
it 'a marvellous line,' and thus introduces it in _The Dunciad_, first
edition, iii. 271:--'For works like these let deathless Journals tell,
"None but thyself can be thy parallel."'
[1201] See _post_, Boswell's letter of Aug. 24, 1780, and Johnson's
letter of Dec. 7, 1782.
[1202] Boswell, on his way to Scotland, wrote to Temple from this
house:--'I am now at Southill, to which place Mr. Charles Dilly has
accompanied; it is the house of Squire John Dilly, his elder brother.
The family of Dilly have been land-proprietors in this county for two
hundred years.... I am quite the great man here, and am to go forward on
the North road to-morrow morning. Poor Mr. Edward Dilly is fast a-dying;
he cried with affection at seeing me here; he is in as agreeable a frame
as any Christian can be.... I am edified here.' _Letters of Boswell_,
p. 239.
[1203] On June 18 in the following year he recorded:--'In the morning of
this day last year I perceived the remission of those convulsions in my
breast, which had distressed me for more than twenty years. I returned
thanks at church for the mercy granted me, which has now continued a
year.' _Pr. and Med_. p. 183. Three days later he wrote:--'It was a
twelvemonth last Sunday since the convulsions in my breast left me. I
hope I was thankful when I recollected it; by removing that disorder a
great improvement was made in the enjoyment of life. I am now as well
as men at my age can expect to be, and I yet think I shall be better.'
_Piozzi Letters_, ii. 163.
[1204] From a stroke of apoplexy. Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale:--'You
really do not use me well in thinking that I am in less pain on this
occasion than I ought to be. There is nobody left for me to care about
but you and my master, and I have now for many years known the value of
his friendship, and the importance of his life, too well not to have
him very near my heart.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 56. To him he wrote
shortly after the attack, no doubt with a view to give the sick man
confidence:--'To shew you how well I think of your health, I have sent
you an hundred pounds to keep for me.' _Ib_. p. 54. Miss Burney wrote
very soon after the attack:--'At dinner everybody tried to be cheerful,
but a dark and gloomy cloud hangs over the head of poor Mr. Thrale which
no flashes of merriment or beams of wit can pierce through; yet he seems
pleased that everybody should be gay.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 220.
The attack was in June. _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 47. On Aug. 3, Johnson
wrote to Dr. Taylor:--'Mr. Thrale has perfectly recovered all his
faculties and all his vigour.' _Notes and Queries_, 6th S. v. 461.
[1205] Which I communicated to him from his Lordship, but it has not yet
been published. I have a copy of it. BOSWELL. The few notices concerning
Dryden, which Lord Hailes had collected, the authour afterwards gave to
Mr. Malone. MALONE. Malone published a _Life of Dryden_.
[1206] He recorded of his birth-day this year:--'On the 17th Mr. Chamier
(_ante_, i. 478) took me away with him from Streatham. I left the
servants a guinea for my health, and was content enough to escape
into a house where my birth-day not being known could not be mentioned.
I sat up till midnight was past, and the day of a new year, a very awful
day, began.' _Pr. and Med_. pp. 181, 225.
[1207] See _ante_, ii. 427, note 1.
[1208] In one of his manuscript Diaries, there is the following entry,
which marks his curious minute attention: 'July 26, 1768. I shaved my
nail by accident in whetting the knife, about an eighth of an inch from
the bottom, and about a fourth from the top. This I measure that I may
know the growth of nails; the whole is about five eighths of an inch.'
Another of the same kind appears, 'Aug. 7, 1779, _Partem brachii dextri
carpo proximam et cutem pectoris circa mamillam dextram rasi, ut notum
fieret quanta temporis pili renovarentur_.'
And, 'Aug. 15, 1773. I cut from the vine 41 leaves, which weighed five
oz. and a half, and eight scruples:--I lay them upon my book-case, to
see what weight they will lose by drying.' BOSWELL.
In _The Idler_, No. 31, we have in Mr. Sober a portrait of Johnson drawn
by himself. He writes:--'The art is to fill the day with petty business,
to have always something in hand which may raise curiosity, but not
solicitude, and keep the mind in a state of action, but not of labour.
This art has for many years been practised by my old friend Sober with
wonderful success.... His chief pleasure is conversation; there is no
end of his talk or his attention; to speak or to hear is equally
pleasing; for he still fancies that he is teaching or learning
something, and is free for the time from his own reproaches. But there
is one time at night when he must go home that his friends may sleep;
and another time in the morning when all the world agrees to shut out
interruption. These are the moments of which poor Sober trembles at the
thought. But the misery of these tiresome intervals he has many means of
alleviating.... His daily amusement is chymistry. He has a small furnace
which he employs in distillation, and which has long been the solace of
his life. He draws oils and waters, and essences and spirits, which he
knows to be of no use; sits and counts the drops as they come from his
retort, and forgets that whilst a drop is falling a moment flies away.'
Mrs. Piozzi says (_Anec_. p. 236):--'We made up a sort of laboratory at
Streatham one summer, and diverted ourselves with drawing essences and
colouring liquors. But the danger Mr. Thrale found his friend in one
day, when he got the children and servants round him to see some
experiments performed, put an end to all our entertainment.'
[1209] Afterwards Mr. Stuart Wortley. He was the father of the first
Lord Wharncliffe. CROKER.
[1210] Horace Walpole, in April 1778, wrote:--'It was very remarkable
that on the militia being ordered out, two of Lord Bute's younger sons
offered, as Bedfordshire gentlemen, to take any rank in the militia in
that county. I warned Lord Ossory, the Lord Lieutenant, against so
dangerous a precedent as admitting Scots in the militia. A militia can
only be safe by being officered by men of property in each county.'
_Journal of the Reign of George III_, ii. 252.
[1211] Walpole wrote in Dec. 1778:--'His Majesty complained of the
difficulty of recruiting. General Keppel replied aloud, "It is owing to
the Scots, who raise their clans in and about London." This was very
true; the Master of Lovat had received a Royal gift of £6000 to raise a
regiment of his clan, and had literally picked up boys of fifteen in
London and Westminster.' _Ib_. p. 316.
[1212] He made his will in his wife's life-time, and appointed her and
Sir William Forbes, or the survivor of them, 'tutors and curators' to
his children. _Boswelliana_, p. 186.
[1213] Head gardener at Stowe, and afterwards at Hampton Court and
Windsor. He got his nickname from his habit of saying that grounds which
he was asked to lay out had _capabilities_. Lord Chatham wrote of
him:--'He writes Lancelot Brown Esquire, _en titre d'office_: please to
consider, he shares the private hours of--[the King], dines familiarly
with his neighbour of Sion [the Duke of Northumberland], and sits down
at the tables of all the House of Lords, &c.' _Chatham Corres_. iv. 178,
430.
[1214] See _ante_, pp. 334, 350. Clive, before the Committee of the
House of Commons, exclaimed:--'By God, Mr. Chairman, at this moment I
stand astonished at my own moderation.' Macaulay's _Essays_, iii. 198.
[1215] See _ante_, p. 216.
[1216] Yet, according to Johnson, 'the poor in England were better
provided for than in any other country of the same extent.' _Ante_, ii.
130.
[1217] See _ante_, ii. 119.
[1218] See _ante_, i. 67, note 2.
[1219] The Rev. Dr. Law, Bishop of Carlisle, in the Preface to his
valuable edition of Archbishop King's _Essay on the Origin of Evil_ [ed.
1781, p. xvii], mentions that the principles maintained in it had been
adopted by Pope in his _Essay on Man_; and adds, 'The fact,
notwithstanding such denial (Bishop Warburton's), might have been
strictly verified by an unexceptionable testimony, _viz_ that of the
late Lord Bathurst, who saw the very same system of the [Greek: to
beltion] (taken from the Archbishop) in Lord Bolingbroke's own hand,
lying before Mr. Pope, while he was composing his _Essay_.' This is
respectable evidence; but that of Dr. Blair is more direct from the
fountain-head, as well as more full. Let me add to it that of Dr. Joseph
Warton; 'The late Lord Bathurst repeatedly assured me that he had read
the whole scheme of _The Essay on Man_, in the hand-writing of
Bolingbroke, and drawn up in a series of propositions, which Pope was to
versify and illustrate.' _Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope_,
vol. ii. p. 62. BOSWELL. In the above short quotation from Law are two
parentheses. According to Paley, the Bishop was once impatient at the
slowness of his Carlisle printer. '"Why does not my book make its
appearance?" said he to the printer. "My Lord, I am extremely sorry; but
we have been obliged to send to Glasgow for a pound of parentheses."'
Best's _Memorials_, p. 196.
[1220] Johnson, defining _ascertain_ in its first meaning as
_establish_, quotes from Hooker: 'The divine law _ascertaineth_ the
truth of other laws.'
[1221] 'To those who censured his politicks were added enemies yet more
dangerous, who called in question his knowledge of Greek, and his
qualifications for a translator of Homer. To these he made no publick
opposition; but in one of his letters escapes from them as well as he
can. At an age like his, for he was not more than twenty-five, with an
irregular education, and a course of life of which much seems to have
passed in conversation, it is not very likely that he overflowed with
Greek. But when he felt himself deficient he sought assistance; and what
man of learning would refuse to help him?' Johnson's _Works_, viii. 252.
Johnson refers, I think, to Pope's letter to Addison of Jan. 30,
1713-14.
[1222] 'That those communications had been consolidated into a scheme
regularly drawn and delivered to Pope, from whom it returned only
transformed from prose to verse, has been reported but can hardly be
true. The Essay plainly appears the fabrick of a poet; what Bolingbroke
supplied could be only the first principles; the order, illustration and
embellishments must all be Pope's.' _Works_, viii. 287. Dr. Warton
(_Essay on Pope_, ii. 58) says that he had repeatedly heard from Lord
Bathurst the statement recorded by Dr. Blair.
[1223] 'In defiance of censure and contempt truth is frequently
violated; and scarcely the most vigilant and unremitted circumspection
will secure him that mixes with mankind from being hourly deceived by
men, of whom it can scarcely be imagined that they mean any injury to
him or profit to themselves.' _Works_, iv. 22.
[1224] See _ante_, pp. 226, 243.
[1225] Gibbon wrote of Lord Hailes:--'In his _Annals of Scotland_ he
has shewn himself a diligent collector and an accurate critic.' Gibbon's
_Misc. Works_, i. 233.
[1226] See _ante_, ii. 237.
[1227] See _ante_, ii. 79.
[1228]
'Versate diu quid ferre recusent,
Quid valeant humeri.'
'Weigh with care
What suits your genius, what your strength can bear.'
FRANCIS. Horace, _Ars Poet_. 1. 39.
[1229] Boswell seems to be afraid of having his head made to ache again,
by the sense that Johnson should put into it. See _ante_, p. 381.
[1230] _The Spleen_, a Poem. BOSWELL. The author was Matthew Green.
Dodsley's _Collection_, i. 145. See _ante_, p. 38.
[1231] See _ante_, i. 182.
[1232] Of Dryden he wrote (_Works_, vii. 250):--'He began even now to
exercise the domination of conscious genius by recommending his own
performance.'
[1233] See _ante_, i. 297.
[1234] Johnson's _Works_, vii. 95. See _ante_, i. 111.
[1235]
1. Exeter-street, off Catherine-street, Strand. [March 1737, _ante_, i.
103.]
2. Greenwich. [July 1737, _ante_, i. 107.]
3. Woodstock-street, near Hanover-square. [End of 1737, _ante_, i. III.]
4. Castle-street, Cavendish-square, No. 6. [Spring and October 1738;
_ante_, i. 120, and 135, note 1. Castle-street is now called
Castle-street East.]
5. Strand.
6. Boswell-Court.
7. Strand, again. [In Croker's _Boswell_, p. 44, is a letter dated, 'At
the Black Boy, over against Durham Yard, Strand, March 31, 1741.']
8. Bow-street.
9. Holborn.
10. Fetter-lane. [Johnson mentions in _Pr. and Med_. p. 73, 'A good
night's rest I once had in Fetter-Lane.']
11. Holborn, again.
12. Gough-square. [In Croker's _Boswell_, p. 62, is a letter dated
'Goff-square, July 12, 1749.' He moved to Staple Inn on March 23,
1759. _Rasselas_ was written when he was living in Gough-square, and
not in Staple Inn, as has been asserted. _Ante_, i. 516.]
13. Staple Inn.
14. Gray's Inn. [In Croker's _Boswell_, p. 118, is a letter dated
'Gray's Inn, Dec. 17, 1759.']
15. Inner Temple-lane, No. 1. [He was here in June 1760, _ante_, i. 350,
note 1; and on Jan. 13, 1761, as is shewn by a letter in Croker's
_Boswell_, p. 122. Johnson Buildings now stand where his house stood.]
16. Johnson's-court, No. 7. [See i. 518 for a letter dated
'Johnson's-court, Oct. 17, 1765.']
17. Bolt-court, No. 8. [He was here on March 15, 1776 (_ante_, ii. 427).
From about 1765 (_ante_, i. 493) to Oct. 7, 1782 (_post_), he had
moreover 'an apartment' at Streatham, and from about 1765 to about
the end of 1780, one at Southwark (_ante_, i. 493). From about the
beginning of 1781 to the spring of 1783 he had a room either in
Grosvenor-square or Argyll-street (_post_, March 20, 1781 and March
21, 1783.)]
[1236] See _ante_, ii. 55.
[1237] If, as seems to be meant, the 'gentleman supposed the case' on
this occasion, he must have been Boswell, for no one else was present
with Johnson.
[1238] A crime that he would have restrained by 'severe laws steadily
enforced.' _Ante_, iii. 18.
[1239] See _ante_, ii. 105.
[1240] Lord Newhaven was one of a creation of eighteen Irish peers in
1776. 'It was a mob of nobility,' wrote Horace Walpole. 'The King in
private laughed much at the eagerness for such insignificant honours.'
_Journal of the Reign of George III_, ii. 58.
[1241] Now the Lady of Sir Henry Dashwood, Bart. BOSWELL.
[1242] See _ante_, ii. 111.
[1243] _The False Alarm_. See _ante_, ii. 111.
[1244] See Collins's _Peerage_, i. 636, and Hume's _England_, ed. 1802,
iv. 451, for an account, how Henry VIII. once threatened to cut off the
head of Edward Montagu, one of the members (not the Speaker as Mr.
Croker says), if he did not get a money bill passed by the next day. The
bill, according to the story, was passed. Mr. P. Cunningham informed Mr.
Croker that Johnson was here guilty of an anachronism, for that heads
were first placed on Temple Bar in William III's time.
[1245] Horace Walpole thus describes public affairs in February of this
year:--'The navy disgusted, insurrections in Scotland, Wales mutinous,
a rebellion ready to break out in Ireland where 15,000 Protestants were
in arms, without authority, for their own defence, many of them
well-wishers to the Americans, and all so ruined that they insisted on
relief from Parliament, or were ready to throw off subjection; Holland
pressed by France to refuse us assistance, and demanding whether we
would or not protect them: uncertainty of the fate of the West Indian
Islands; and dread at least that Spain might take part with France; Lord
North at the same time perplexed to raise money on the loan but at eight
per cent., which was demanded--such a position and such a prospect might
have shaken the stoutest king and the ablest administration. Yet the
king was insensible to his danger. He had attained what pleased him most
--his own will at home. His ministers were nothing but his tools--
everybody called them so, and they proclaimed it themselves.' Walpole's
_Journal of the Reign of George III_, ii. 339. In this melancholy
enumeration he passes over the American War.
[1246] See _ante_, i. 78, note 2.
[1247] Wesley himself recorded in 1739 (_Journal_, i. 177):--'I have
been all my life (till very lately) so tenacious of every point relating
to decency and order, that I should have thought the saving of souls
almost a sin if it had not been done in a church.'
[1248] Horace Walpole (_Letters_, viii. 131) talks of some one 'riding
on three elephants at once like Astley.' On p. 406 he says:--'I can
almost believe that I could dance a minuet on a horse galloping full
speed, like young Astley.'
[1249] See _ante_, i. 458.
[1250] A friend of Wilkes, as Boswell was, might well be supposed to
have got over such scruples.
[1251] Mr. Croker says that the '"celebrated friend" was no doubt
Burke.' Burke, however, is generally described by Boswell as 'eminent.'
Moreover Burke was not in the habit of getting drunk, as seems to have
been the case with 'the celebrated friend.' Boswell (_ante_, p. 245,
note 1) calls Hamilton 'celebrated,' but then Boswell and Hamilton were
not friends, as is shewn, _post_, Nov. 1783.
[1252] _Corinthians_. xv, 33.
[1253] See _ante_, ii. 121.
[1254] 'Prince Gonzaga di Castiglione, when dining in company with Dr.
Johnson, thinking it was a polite as well as gay thing to drink the
Doctor's health with some proof that he had read his works, called out
from the top of the table to the bottom.--_At your health, Mr.
Vagabond_.' Piozzi's _Synonymy_, ii. 358. Mme. D'Arblay (_Memoirs of Dr.
Burney_, ii. 258) says,--'General Paoli diverted us all very much by
begging leave of Mrs. Thrale to give one toast, and then, with smiling
pomposity, pronouncing "The great Vagabond."'
[1255] 'Very near to admiration is the wish to admire. Every man
willingly gives value to the praise which he receives, and considers the
sentence passed in his favour as the sentence of discernment.' Johnson's
_Works_, vii. 396.
[1256] See _ante_, ii. 461.
[1257] See _ante_, ii. 465.
[1258] See _ante_, _ib_. p. 466
[1259] See _ante_, _ib_. p. 467.
[1260] See _ante_, _ib_. p. 470.
[1261] See _ante_, _ib_. p. 469.
[1262] See ante_, p. 405.
[1263] Bishop Porteus. See _ante_, p. 279.
[1264] Miss Letitia Barnston. BOSWELL.
[1265] 'At Chester I passed a fortnight in mortal felicity. I had from
my earliest years a love for the military life, and there is in it an
animation and relish of existence which I have never found amongst any
other set of men, except players, with whom you know I once lived a
great deal. At the mess of Colonel Stuart's regiment I was quite _the
great man_, as we used to say; and I was at the same time all joyous and
gay ... I never found myself so well received anywhere. The young ladies
there were delightful, and many of them with capital fortunes. Had I
been a bachelor, I should have certainly paid my addresses to a Chester
lady.' _Letters of Boswell_, p. 247.
[1266] Mrs. Thrale wrote to Johnson from Brighton in 1778:--'I have lost
what made my happiness in all seasons of the year; but the black dog
shall not make prey of both my master and myself. My master swims now,
and forgets the black dog.' Johnson replied:--'I shall easily forgive my
master his long stay, if he leaves the dog behind him. We will watch, as
well as we can, that the dog shall never be let in again, for when he
comes the first thing he does is to worry my master.' _Piozzi Letters_,
ii. 32, 37.
[1267] See _ante_, ii. 202.
[1268] I have a valuable collection made by my Father, which, with some
additions and illustrations of my own, I intend to publish. I have some
hereditary claim to be an Antiquary; not only from my Father, but as
being descended, by the mother's side, from the able and learned Sir
John Skene, whose merit bids defiance to all the attempts which have
been made to lessen his fame. BOSWELL. See _ante_, i. 225, note 2, for
an imperfect list of Boswell's projected publications, and Boswell's
_Hebrides_, Aug. 23, for a fuller one.
[1269] See _ante_, iii. 162, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov. 11.
[1270] In the first two editions, _we_.
[1271] In chaps, xxiv. and xxv. of his _Siècle de Louis XV_. See _ante_,
i. 498, note 4, for Voltaire's 'catching greedily at wonders.'
[1272] Burton in the last lines of _The Anatomy of Melancholy_, says:--
'Only take this for a corollary and conclusion; as thou tenderest thine
own welfare in this and all other melancholy, thy good health of body
and mind, observe this short precept, give not way to solitariness and
idleness. "Be not solitary, be not idle."'
[1273] Johnson was in better spirits than usual. The following day he
wrote:--'I fancy that I grow light and airy. A man that does not begin
to grow light and airy at seventy is certainly losing time if he intends
ever to be light and airy.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 73.
[1274] Crescit amor nummi quantum ipsa pecunia crescit. _Juvenal_,
xiv. 139.
[1275] He had seen it on his Tour in Wales on July 26, 1774. See _post_,
vol. v.
[1276] Dean Percy, _ante_, p. 365.
[1277] Another son was the first Lord Ellenborough.
[1278] His regiment was afterwards ordered to Jamaica, where he
accompanied it, and almost lost his life by the climate. This impartial
order I should think a sufficient refutation of the idle rumour that
'there was still something behind the throne greater than the throne
itself.' BOSWELL. Lord Shelburne, about the year 1803, likening the
growth of the power of the Crown to a strong building that had been
raised up, said:--'The Earl of Bute had contrived such a lock to it as a
succession of the ablest men have not been able to pick, _nor has he
ever let the key be so much as seen by which he has held it_.'
Fitzmaurice's _Shelburne_, i. 68.
[1279] Boswell, on Jan. 4, wrote to Temple:--'How inconsiderable are
both you and I, in comparison with what we used to hope we should be!
Yet your learning and your memoirs set you far above the common run of
educated men. And _Son pittore anche io_. I too, in several respects,
have attained to superiority. But we both want solidity and force of
mind, such as we observe in those who rise in active life.' _Letters of
Boswell_, p. 249.
[1280]
'For in the mind alone our follies lie,
The mind that never from itself can fly.'
FRANCIS. Horace, _Epistles_, i. 14. 13.
[1281] Requesting me to inquire concerning the family of a gentleman who
was then paying his addresses to Miss Doxy. BOSWELL.
[1282] It is little more than half that distance.
[1283] Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale on Nov. 7:--'My master, I hope,
hunts and walks, and courts the belles, and shakes Brighthelmston. When
he comes back, frolick and active, we will make a feast, and drink his
health, and have a noble day.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 79.
[1284] See page 368. BOSWELL. On Nov. 16 he wrote:--'At home we do not
much quarrel; but perhaps the less we quarrel, the more we hate. There
is as much malignity amongst us as can well subsist without any thought
of daggers or poisons.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 93.
[1285] See _ante_, i. 187.
[1286] See _post_, p. 421, and Feb. 27, 1784.
[1287] See _ante_, i. 260, and _post_, June 4. 1781.
[1288] He wrote to Mrs. Thrale on April 11--'You are at all places of
high resort, and bring home hearts by dozens; while I am seeking for
something to say about men of whom I know nothing but their verses, and
sometimes very little of them. Now I have begun, however, I do not
despair of making an end.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 100.
[1289] See _ante_, ii. 5.
[1290] A writer in _Notes and Queries_ (3rd S., viii. 197) points out
that Johnson, writing to a doctor, uses a doctor's language. 'Until very
lately _solution of continuity_ was a favourite phrase with English
surgeons; where a bone was broken, or the flesh, &c. cut or _lacerated_,
there was a _solution of continuity_.' See _ante_, ii. 106, for
_laceration_.
[1291] He died March 11, 1780, aged 40. _Gent. Mag_. 1780, p. 155.
[1292]
'Animula, vagula, blandula,
Hospes comesque corporis,
Quæ nunc abibis in loca,
Pallidula, rigida, nudula?
Nec, ut soles, dabis joca.'
_Adriani morientis ad animam suam_.
'Poor little, pretty, fluttering thing,
Must we no longer live together?
And dost thou prune thy trembling wing,
To take thy flight thou know'st not whither?
Thy humorous vein, thy pleasing folly
Lies all neglected, all forgot;
And pensive, wavering, melancholy,
Thou dread'st and hop'st thou know'st not what.' _Prior_.
In _The Spectator_, No. 532, is a letter from Pope to Steele on these
'famous verses which the Emperor Adrian spoke on his death-bed.' See in
Pope's _Correspondence_ (Elwin's _Pope_, vi. 394), this letter to Steele
of Nov. 7, 1712, for his version of these lines.
[1293] See _ante_, ii. 246, note 1.
[1294] Mr. Beauclerk's library was sold by publick auction in April and
May 1781, for £5011. MALONE. See _post_, May 8, 1781.
[1295] By a fire in Northumberland-house, where he had an apartment, in
which I have passed many an agreeable hour. BOSWELL.
[1296] See _post_, iv. 31.
[1297] In 1768, on his birthday, Johnson recorded, 'This day it came
into my mind to write the history of my melancholy.' _Ante_, ii. 45,
note 1.
[1298] Johnson had dated his letter, 'London, April 25, 1780,' and added,
'now there is a date; look at it.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 109. In his
reply he wrote:--'London, May 1, 1780. Mark that--you did not put the
year to your last.' _Ib_. p. 112.
[1299] _An Address to the Electors of Southwark. Ib_. p. 106. See _post_,
p. 440.
[1300] The author of the _Fitzosborne Letters (post_, May 5, 1784, note).
Miss Burney thus describes this evening:--'We were appointed to meet the
Bishop of Chester at Mrs. Montagu's. This proved a very gloomy kind of
grandeur; the Bishop waited for Mrs. Thrale to speak, Mrs. Thrale for
the Bishop; so neither of them spoke at all. Mrs. Montagu cared not a
fig, as long as she spoke herself, and so she harangued away. Meanwhile
Mr. Melmoth, the Pliny Melmoth, as he is called, was of the party, and
seemed to think nobody half so great as himself. He seems intolerably
self-sufficient--appears to look upon himself as the first man in Bath,
and has a proud conceit in look and manner, mighty forbidding.' Mme.
D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 348.
[1301] Dr. John Hinchliffe. BOSWELL.
[1302] A kind of nick-name given to Mrs. Thrale's eldest daughter, whose
name being _Esther_, she might be assimilated to a _Queen_. BOSWELL.
[1303] Mr. Thrale. BOSWELL.
[1304] In Johnson's _Dictionary_ is neither _dawling_ nor _dawdling_. He
uses _dawdle, post_, June 3, 1781.
[1305] Miss Burney shews how luxurious a table Mr. Thrale kept. 'We
had,' she records, in May 1779, 'a very grand dinner to-day, _though
nothing to a Streatham dinner_, at the Ship Tavern [Brighton], where the
officers mess, to which we were invited by the major and the captain.'
As the major was a man of at least £8,000 a-year, and the captain of
£4,000 or £5,000, the dinner was likely to be grand enough. Mme.
D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 211. Yet when Mr. Thrale had his first stroke in
1779, Johnson wrote:--'I am the more alarmed by this violent seizure, as
I can impute it to no wrong practices, or intemperance of any kind....
What can he reform? or what can he add to his regularity and temperance?
He can only sleep less.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 49, 51. Baretti, in a MS.
note on p. 51, says:--'Dr. Johnson knew that Thrale would eat like four,
let physicians preach.... May be he did not know it, so little did he
mind what people were doing. Though he sat by Thrale at dinner, he never
noticed whether he eat much or little. A strange man!' Yet in a note on
p. 49, Baretti had said that Thrale's seizure was caused by 'the mere
grief he could not overcome of his only son's loss. Johnson knew it, but
would not tell it.' See _post_, iv. 84, note 4.
[1306] Miss Burney.
[1307] I have taken the liberty to leave out a few lines. BOSWELL. Lines
about diet and physic.
[1308] See _ante_, ii. 61, note 4.
[1309] The author of _Fables for the Female Sex_, and of the tragedy of
_The Gamester_, and editor of _The World_. Goldsmith, in his _Present
State of Polite Learning_ (ch. x.), after describing the sufferings of
authors, continues:--'Let us not then aggravate those natural
inconveniences by neglect; we have had sufficient instances of this kind
already. Sale and Moore will suffice for one age at least. But they are
dead and their sorrows are over.' Mr. Foster (_Life of Goldsmith_, ed.
1871, ii, 484) strangely confounds Edward Moore the fabulist, with Dr.
John More the author of _Zeluco_.
[1310] Line of a song in _The Spectator_, No. 470. CROKER.
[1311] Hannah More, in 1783 (_Memoirs_, i. 286), describes 'Mrs. Vesey's
pleasant parties. It is a select society which meets at her house every
other Tuesday, on the day on which the Turk's Head Club dine together.
In the evening they all meet at Mrs. Vesey's, with the addition of such
other company as it is difficult to find elsewhere.'
[1312] Second Earl Spencer; the First Lord of the Admiralty under Pitt,
and father of Lord Althorp who was leader of the House of Commons under
Earl Grey.
[1313] see _ante_ p. 390.
[1314] Her childhood was celebrated by Prior in the lines beginning:--
'My noble, lovely little Peggy.' CROKER.
[1315] Horace Walpole (_Letters_, vii. 510) wrote on Feb. 5, 1781:--'I
saw Dr. Johnson last night at Lady Lucan's, who had assembled a _blue
stocking_ meeting in imitation of Mrs. Vesey's Babels. It was so blue,
it was quite Mazarine-blue. Mrs. Montagu kept aloof from Johnson, like
the west from the east.' In his letter of Jan. 14 (_ib_. p. 497), the
allusion to Mrs. Vesey's Babels is explained: 'Mrs. Montagu is one of my
principal entertainments at Mrs. Vesey's, who collects all the graduates
and candidates for fame, where they vie with one another, till they are
as unintelligible as the good folks at Babel.' 'Lady Spencer,' said
Samuel Rogers, 'recollected Johnson well, as she used to see him often
in her girlhood. Her mother, Lady Lucan, would say, "Nobody dines with
us to-day; therefore, child, we'll go and get Dr. Johnson." So they
would drive to Bolt Court and bring the doctor home with them.'
_Rogers's Table Talk_, p. 10. 'I told Lady Lucan,' wrote Johnson on
April 25, 1780, 'how long it was since she sent to me; but she said I
must consider how the world rolls about her. She seemed pleased that we
met again.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 107.
[1316] 'I have seen,' wrote Wraxall, 'the Duchess of Devonshire,
then in the first bloom of youth, hanging on the sentences that fell
from Johnson's lips, and contending for the nearest place to his chair.
All the cynic moroseness of the philosopher and the moralist seemed to
dissolve under so flattering an approach.' Wraxall's _Memoirs_, ed.
1815, i. 158.
[1317] In Nichols's _Lit. Anec_. viii. 548, 9, Dr. Barnard is thus
described:--'In powers of conversation I never yet knew his equal. He
saw infinite variety of characters, and like Shakespeare adopted them
all by turns for comic effect. He carried me to London in a hired
chaise; we rose from our seat, and put our heads out of the windows,
while the postboy removed something under us. He supposed himself in the
pillory, and addressed the populace against the government with all the
cant of _No. 45 and Co_. He once told me a little anecdote of the
original Parson Adams, whom he knew. "Oh, Sir!" said he to Barnard,
almost in a whisper, and with a look of horror, "would you believe it,
Sir, he was wicked from a boy;" then going up close to him, "You will be
shocked--you will not believe it,--he wrote God with a little g, when he
was ten years old!"'
[1318] In Mr. Croker's editions, 'had taken a chair' is changed into
'had taken the chair,' and additional emphasis is given by printing
these four words in italics.
[1319] The hostess must have suffered, for, according to Miss Burney,
'Lord Harcourt said, "Mrs. Vesey's fear of ceremony is really
troublesome; for her eagerness to break a circle is such that she
insists upon everybody's sitting with their backs one to another; that
is, the chairs are drawn into little parties of three together, in a
confused manner all over the room."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 184.
Miss Burney thus describes her:--'She has the most wrinkled, sallow,
time-beaten face I ever saw. She is an exceeding well-bred woman, and of
agreeable manners; but all her name in the world must, I think, have
been acquired by her dexterity and skill in selecting parties, and by
her address in rendering them easy with one another.' _Ib_. p. 244. She
heard her say of a gentleman who had lately died:--'It's a very
disagreeable thing, I think, when one has just made acquaintance with
anybody and likes them, to have them die.' _Ib_. ii. 290.
[1320] Johnson passed over this scene very lightly. 'On Sunday evening I
was at Mrs. Vesey's, and there was inquiry about my master, but I told
them all good. There was Dr. Barnard of Eton, and we made a noise all
the evening; and there was Pepys, and Wraxall till I drove him away.'
_Piozzi Letters,_ ii. 98. Wraxall was perhaps thinking of this evening
when he wrote (_Memoirs_, ed. 1815, i. 147):--'Those whom he could not
always vanquish by the force of his intellect, by the depth and range of
his arguments, and by the compass of his gigantic faculties, he silenced
by rudeness; and I have myself more than once stood in the predicament
which I here describe. Yet no sooner was he withdrawn, and with him had
disappeared these personal imperfections, than the sublime attainments
of his mind left their full effect on the audience: such the whole
assembly might be in some measure esteemed while he was present.'
[1321] Among the provisions thus relaxed was one that subjected Popish
priests, or Papists keeping school, to perpetual imprisonment. Those
only enjoyed the benefit of the act who took a very strict test, in
which, among other things, they denied the Pope's temporal and civil
jurisdiction within this realm. This bill passed both Houses without a
single negative. It applied only to England. Scotland was alarmed by the
report that the Scotch Catholics were in like manner to be relieved. In
Edinburgh and Glasgow the Papists suffered from outrageous acts of
violence and cruelty, and government did not think it advisable to
repress this persecution by force. The success of these Scotch bigots
seems to have given the first rise to the Protestant Association in
England. _Ann. Reg_. xxiii. 254-6. How slight 'the relaxation' was in
England is shewn by Lord Mansfield's charge on Lord George Gordon's
trial, where we learn that the Catholics were still subject to all the
penalties created in the reigns of Elizabeth, James I, Charles II, and
of the first ten years of William III. _Ib_. xxiv. 237. Hannah More
(_Memoirs_, i. 326), four years after the riots, wrote:--'I have had a
great many prints, pamphlets, &c., sent me from Rouen; but, unluckily
for me, the sender happened to have put a popish prayer-book among my
things, which were therefore, by being caught in bad company, all found
guilty of popery at Brighthelmstone, and condemned to be burnt to my
great regret.' They were burnt in accordance with sect. 25 of 3 Jac. I.
c. 4. This act was only repealed in to 1846 (9 and 10. Rep. c. 59. s. i).
[1322] Vol. ii. p. 143, _et seq_. I have selected passages from
several letters, without mentioning dates. BOSWELL.
[1323] June 2. BOSWELL. Johnson wrote on June 9.
[1324] See _post_, p. 435.
[1325] On this day (June 6) Johnson, writing to Mrs. Thrale at Bath, did
not mention the riots. He gives the date very fully--'London, No. 8,
Bolt-court, Fleet-street, June 6, 1780,' and adds:--'Mind this, and tell
Queency [Miss Thrale].' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 141. Miss Burney, who was
with the Thrales, writes:--'Dr. Johnson has written to Mrs. Thrale,
without even mentioning the existence of this mob; perhaps, at this very
moment, he thinks it "a humbug upon the nation," as George Bodens called
the Parliament.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 401. When Johnson wrote,
the mob had not risen to its height of violence. Mrs. Thrale in her
answer, giving the date, 'Bath, 3 o'clock on Saturday morning, June 10,
1780,' asks, 'Oh! my dear Sir, was I ever particular in dating a letter
before? and is this a time to begin to be particular when I have been up
all night in trembling agitation? Miss Burney is frighted, but she says
better times will come; she made me date my letter so, and persists in
hoping that ten years hence we shall all three read it over together and
be merry. But, perhaps, you will ask, "who is _consternated_,"? as you
did about the French invasion.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 146.
[1326] 'Lord Mansfield's house,' wrote Dr. Franklin from Paris
(_Memoirs_, iii. 62), 'is burnt with all his furniture, pictures, books,
and papers. Thus he who approved the burning American houses has had
fire brought home to him.'
[1327] Baretti in a marginal note on _mass-house_, says, 'So illiberal
was Johnson made by religion that he calls here the chapel a
mass-house.... Yet he hated the Presbyterians. That was a nasty blot in
his character.'
[1328] Horace Walpole this night (June 7) wrote:--'Yet I assure your
Ladyship there is no panic. Lady Aylesbury has been at the play in the
Haymarket, and the Duke and my four nieces at Ranelagh this evening.'
_Letters_, vii. 388. The following Monday he wrote:--'Mercy on us! we
seem to be plunging into the horrors of France, in the reigns of
Charles VI. and VII.!--yet, as extremes meet, there is at this moment
amazing insensibility. Within these four days I have received five
applications for tickets to see my house!' _Ib_. p. 395.
[1329] Written on June 10.
[1330] In the original, 'was this day _with a party of soldiers_.'
[1331] In the original, 'We are all _again_.'
[1332] Written on June 12.
[1333] George III told Lord Eldon that at a levee 'he asked Wilkes after
his friend Serjeant Glynne. "_My_ friend, Sir!" says Wilkes to the King;
"he is no friend of mine." "Why," said the King, "he _was_ your friend
and your counsel in all your trials." "Sir," rejoined Wilkes, "he _was_
my _counsel_--one _must_ have a counsel; but he was no _friend_; he
loves sedition and licentiousness which I never delighted in. In fact,
Sir, he was a Wilkite, which I never was." The King said the confidence
and humour of the man made him forget at the moment his impudence.'
Twiss's _Eldon_, ii. 356.
[1334] Lord George Gordon and his followers, during these outrages, wore
blue ribbands in their hats. MALONE.
[1335] Johnson added:--'All danger here is apparently over; but a
little agitation still continues. We frighten one another with a
seventy-thousand Scots to come hither with the Dukes of Gordon and
Argyle, and eat us, and hang us, or drown us.' Two days later Horace
Walpole, after mentioning that Lord George Gordon was in the Tower,
continued:--'What a nation is Scotland; in every reign engendering
traitors to the State, and false and pernicious to the Kings that favour
it the most. National prejudices, I know, are very vulgar; but if there
are national characteristics, can one but dislike the soils and climates
that concur to produce them?' _Letters_, vii. 400.
[1336] He died Nov. 19, 1792, and left 'about, £20,000 accumulated not
parsimoniously, but during a very long possession of a profitable
office.' His father, who was keeper before him, began as a turnkey.
_Gent. Mag_. 1792, p. 1062. Wesley wrote on Jan. 2, 1761:--'Of all the
seats of woe on this side hell, few, I suppose, exceed or even equal
Newgate. If any region of horror could exceed it a few years ago,
Newgate in Bristol did; so great was the filth, the stench, the misery,
and wickedness which shocked all who had a spark of humanity left.' He
described a great change for the better which had lately been made in
the London Newgate. Perhaps it was due to Akerman. Wesley's _Journal_,
iii. 32.
[1337] There were two city prisons so called.
[1338] In the first two editions _will_. Boswell, in the third edition,
corrected most of his Scotticisms.
[1339] In the _Life of Savage_ (_Works_, viii. 183) Johnson wrote of the
keeper of the Bristol gaol:--'Virtue is undoubtedly most laudable in
that state which makes it most difficult; and therefore the humanity of
a gaoler certainly deserves this publick attestation; and the man whose
heart has not been hardened by such an employment may be justly proposed
as a pattern of benevolence. If an inscription was once engraved "to the
honest toll-gatherer," less honours ought not to be paid "to the tender
gaoler."' This keeper, Dagge by name, was one of Whitefield's disciples.
In 1739 Whitefield wrote:--'God having given me great favour in the
gaoler's eyes, I preached a sermon on the Penitent Thief, to the poor
prisoners in Newgate.' He began to read prayers and preach to them every
day, till the Mayor and Sheriffs forbade Mr. Dagge to allow him to
preach again. Tyerman's _Whitefield_, i. 179.
[1340] Vol. ii. p. 163. Mrs. Piozzi has omitted the name, she best knows
why. BOSWELL.
[1341] Now settled in London. BOSWELL.
[1342] I had been five years absent from London. BEATTIE.
[1343] '--sic fata ferebant.' _Æneid, ii. 34_.
[1344] Meaning his entertaining _Memoirs of David Garrick, Esq_., of
which Johnson (as Davies informed me) wrote the first sentence; thus
giving, as it were, the key-note performance. It is, indeed, very
characteristical of its authour, beginning with a maxim, and proceeding
to illustrate.--'All excellence has a right to be recorded. I shall,
therefore, think it superfluous to apologise for writing the life of a
man, who by an uncommon assemblage of private virtues, adorned the
highest eminence in a publick profession.' BOSWELL.
[1345] Davies had become bankrupt. See _ante_, p. 223. Young, in his
first _Epistle to Pope_, says:--
'For bankrupts write when ruined shops are shut
As maggots crawl from out a perished nut.'
Davies's _Memoirs of Garrick_, published this spring, reached its third
edition by the following year.
[1346] I wish he had omitted the suspicion expressed here, though I
believe he meant nothing but jocularity; for though he and I differed
sometimes in opinion, he well knew how much I loved and revered him.
BEATTIE.
[1347] The Thrales fled from Bath where a riot had broken out, and
travelled about the country in alarm for Mr. Thrale's 'personal safety,'
as it had been maliciously asserted in a Bath and Bristol paper that he
was a Papist. Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 399.
[1348] On May 30 he wrote to Mrs. Thrale:--'I have been so idle that I
know not when I shall get either to you, or to any other place; for my
resolution is to stay here till the work is finished.... I hope, however,
to see standing corn in some part of the earth this summer, but I shall
hardly smell hay, or suck clover flowers.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 140.
[1349] It will, no doubt, be remarked how he avoids the _rebellious_
land of America. This puts me in mind of an anecdote, for which I am
obliged to my worthy social friend, Governour Richard Penn: 'At one of
Miss E. Hervey's assemblies, Dr. Johnson was following her up and down
the room; upon which Lord Abingdon observed to her, "Your great friend
is very fond of you; you can go no where without him."--"Ay, (said she),
he would follow me to any part of the world."--"Then (said the Earl),
ask him to go with you to _America_.'" BOSWELL. This lady was the niece
of Johnson's friends the Herveys [_ante_, i. 106]. CROKER.
[1350] _Essays on the History of Mankind_. BOSWELL. Johnson could
scarcely have known that Dunbar was an active opponent of the American
war. Mackintosh, who was his pupil, writes of him:--'I shall ever be
grateful to his memory for having contributed to breathe into my mind a
strong spirit of liberty.' Mackintosh's _Life_, i. 12. The younger
Colman, who attended, or rather neglected to attend his lectures, speaks
of him as 'an acute frosty-faced little Dr. Dunbar, a man of much
erudition, and great goodnature.' _Random Records_, ii. 93.
[1351] Mr. Seward (_Biographiana_, p. 601) says that this clergyman was
'the son of an old and learned friend of his'--the Rev. Mr. Hoole, I
conjecture.
[1352] See _post_, iv. 12, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 19.
[1353] Dr. Percy, now Bishop of Dromore. BOSWELL
[1354] Johnson, in 1764, passed some weeks at Percy's rectory. _Ante_,
i. 486.
[1355] See _ante_, p. 366.
[1356] See _ante,_, i. 458
[1357] 'O præclarum diem quum ad illud divinum animorum concilium
c'tumque profiscar.' Cicero's _De Senectute_, c. 23.
[1358] See _ante_, p. 396.
[1359] See _ante_, ii. 162.
[1360] I had not then seen his letters to Mrs. Thrale. BOSWELL.
[1361] In the _Life of Edmund Smith_. See _ante_, i. 81, and Johnson's
_Works_, vii. 380.
[1362] Unlike Walmsley and Johnson, of whom one was a Whig, the other a
Tory. 'Walmsley was a Whig,' wrote Johnson, 'with all the virulence and
malevolence of his party; yet difference of opinion did not keep us
apart. I honoured him, and he endured me.'
[1363] See _ante_, ii. 169, note 2.
[1364] Miss Burney described an evening spent by Johnson at Dr. Burney's
some weeks earlier:--'He was in high spirits and good humour, talked all
the talk, affronted nobody, and delighted everybody. I never saw him
more sweet, nor better attended to by his audience.' In December she
wrote:--'Dr. Johnson is very gay, and sociable, and comfortable, and
quite as kind to me as ever.' A little later she wrote to Mrs.
Thrale:--'Does Dr. Johnson continue gay and good-humoured, and "valuing
nobody" in a morning?' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 412, 429, 432.
[1365] _Pr. and Med_. p. 185. BOSWELL.
[1366] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 27.
[1367] The Charterhouse.
[1368] Macbean was, on Lord Thurlow's nomination, admitted 'a poor
brother of the Charterhouse.' _Ante_, i. 187. Johnson, on Macbean's
death on June 26, 1784, wrote:--'He was one of those who, as Swift says,
_stood as a screen between me and death_. He has, I hope, made a good
exchange. He was very pious; he was very innocent; he did no ill; and of
doing good a continual tenour of distress allowed him few opportunities;
he was very highly esteemed in the house [the Charterhouse].' _Piozzi
Letters_, ii. 373. The quotation from Swift is found in the lines _On
the Death of Dr. Swift_:--
'The fools, my juniors by a year,
Are tortured with suspense and fear,
Who wisely thought my age a screen,
When death approached, to stand between.'
Swift's _Works_, ed. 1803, xi. 246.
[1369] Johnson, in May, had persuaded Mrs. Thrale to come up from Bath
to canvass for Mr. Thrale. 'My opinion is that you should come for a
week, and show yourself, and talk in high terms. Be brisk, and be
splendid, and be publick. The voters of the Borough are too proud and
too little dependant to be solicited by deputies; they expect the
gratification of seeing the candidate bowing or curtseying before them.
If you are proud, they can be sullen. Mr. Thrale certainly shall not
come, and yet somebody must appear whom the people think it worth the
while to look at.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 114.
[1370] Hawkins's _Johnsons Works_, xi. 206. It is curious that
Psalmanazar, in his _Memoirs_, p. 101, uses the mongrel word
_transmogrify_.
[1371] Taylor's _Life of Reynolds_, ii. 459.
[1372] Boswell, when in the year 1764 he was starting from Berlin for
Geneva, wrote to Mr. Mitchell, the English Minister at Berlin:--'I shall
see Voltaire; I shall also see Switzerland and Rousseau. These two men
are to me greater objects than most statues or pictures.' Nichols's
_Lit. Hist_. ed. 1848, vii. 319.
[1373] See _post,_ iv. 261, note 3 for Boswell's grievance against Pitt.