The method we have been examining has revealed, in a sense, a second
aspect of Boswell as the biographer, the natural complement of that
scientific spirit which inspired the acute observation, the delicate
experiments, the methodical accuracy; for he brought to the work of
recording not merely the faculty for stating truthfully what he
had seen, but the power of expressing his feelings; and it was
particularly this feeling--an interest at the same time full-blooded,
comprehensive and minute--that insisted upon expression.
The emotion which compels a man to bind himself to an ideal,
and, having determined that something must be done under certain
conditions, compels the doing of it without capitulation, is one which
enters into many kinds of work and is to be found no doubt very often
among scientists; but it is in a peculiar degree the possession of the
artist. To him indeed it seems to be essential; for his value depends
certainly not more on the quality of what he has to express than on
the completeness with which he expresses it. And so perhaps we ought
to connect the consistency, the truth, the faith of Boswell, and
his disregard for obstacles, with his artistic rather than with his
scientific qualities; so we ought to interpret Boswell's love of his
labour and his conviction that it was good, and so to understand all
the trouble that it cost to his mind and to the more sensitive part of
him. The refusal to depart from his ideal which he made to Hannah More
('I would not cut off his claws, nor make my tiger a cat, to please
anybody'),[1] and again to Bishop Percy when he declined, for the sake
of 'authenticity,' to suppress the bishop's name,[2] is an indication
of the need he had to express himself as an artist.[3]
But how was it that he came so to express himself? And what is it that
he succeeded in expressing?
Of the impulse to expression and what it meant in Boswell's case
something has been said already in these pages. We cannot understand
the engine if we forget the power that drives it, and we must
emphasise once again the force that Boswell obeyed. His passion for
truth was not comprehensive: and it was for the truth of the realist,
not the truth of the idealist. It did not include the whole of life;
it did not attempt to view the entire scene in correct perspective;
and Boswell was decidedly not a philosopher. He did not greatly need
explanations of the universe; he tended to accept such as seemed
convenient. He had no logic about abstract theories, and only a very
limited power of criticising evidence. One who cares for truth with
respect to every fact and deduction is inclined to reject his first
impressions, because experience has taught him that 'all men are
liars.' The face of things is so often false! But Boswell was content
to look no further; he sometimes deliberately disregarded the facts
of existence; he lived one half his life in a glitter of his own
creation. Nevertheless, the passion for truth was vivid and vital. It
lived apart to work out its own consummation; and it was all the more
vehement for being confined. It is perhaps for this reason--that the
truth inherent in Boswell was confined within such strict limits--that
it required expression. In these circumstances Boswell's buoyant
nature had need of a safety-valve. Truth for him was concerned
entirely with an external view of people. He was rarely analytical; he
did not care for subtle states of mind and the feelings that composed
them; he looked directly at actions and their primary motives. The
vision was so clear and strong that Boswell by its very insistence was
obliged to create an imperishable image.
The reasons that made it certain from the beginning that Johnson would
become the vehicle for this expression extend beyond those qualities
which made Boswell prefer and admire him above all other men; they
depend upon Boswell's attitude towards mankind. We have seen that
he apologises and justifies himself for relating the weaknesses and
absurdities of Johnson. And yet he sometimes seems to have a peculiar
delight in them. These shades in Johnson's character are dealt with
not as an unpleasant but necessary task, to be despatched with a light
touch as though it ill became him to speak of them, but with a full
flavour of rich and lasting enjoyment.
They were in fact to Boswell the most striking and salient qualities
of his great hero, and it was necessary therefore that they should be
well and completely related. But in the story as we read it, we do not
merely observe that the rude victories and uneven justice of Johnson
were supremely significant in the eyes of the author. To Boswell the
whole personality of Johnson was a source of the keenest pleasure.
He took an insatiable delight in it. He loved to imitate the curious
gestures and manner of the Doctor. He became, to use his own word,
'Johnsonised'; and no doubt he reached that state which he desired
his readers to attain, and both 'talked and thought' Johnson. He was
'strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian æther'; and when he had
drunk his fill and it had all soaked in, it was reproduced with a
relish of the joyous moments it had given him. The picture of Johnson,
as he saw it, was a source of deep and satisfying enjoyment to
Boswell: he overflowed with mere pleasure in the contemplation of a
man, and expressed himself, as an artist, out of the abundance of this
sympathy, in terms of 'Johnson.'
And the enjoyment, one may say, depending as it did very largely
upon a certain dramatic quality of that curious figure, was concerned
necessarily very much with the oddities and weaknesses of the man,
and particularly with that greatest weakness of all, the abuse of
strength.
When it is said that Boswell is an artist, it is not meant that the
whole of the 'Life of Johnson' was treated artistically. It exhibits,
no doubt, a certain elegance of proportion; it is a good composition,
well arranged, well spaced; and in as far as it has those qualities
we may consider that it belongs to art. But it is not chiefly because,
having recorded what happened in a perfectly straightforward manner,
he then fitted together the fragments to make as it were a complete
model of a man--it is not for the design--that we call Boswell an
artist. It is because he did not very often, as we have seen, relate
the facts quite simply, but related them in such a manner that
the whole atmosphere of the scene, all that is most human and most
humorous, strikes upon us. It is in what have been called his comedy
scenes that we see the supreme art of Boswell.
A characteristic passage relates an attempt to make fun of Johnson by
inquiring if he took dancing lessons:
I ventured to mention a ludicrous passage in the newspapers,
that Dr. Johnson was learning to dance of Vestris. Lord
Charlemont, wishing to excite him to talk, proposed in a
whisper, that he should be asked whether it was true. 'Shall I
ask him?' said his Lordship. We were by a great majority clear
for the experiment.
In these few words Boswell has recalled the spirit of the scene.
We have a vision of Johnson sitting terrible in the midst, and his
hearers feeling and behaving like schoolboys in the presence of some
bearish pedagogue. Some one proposes an audacious jest, and all await
with eagerness the crucial moment. You may sit upon the edge of a
volcano, or you may fire the train which shall explode a planet, but
no expectancy is so keen as this.
His Lordship very gravely and with a courteous air said,
'Pray, sir, is it true that you are taking lessons of
Vestris?' ... This was risking a good deal, and required the
boldness of a General of Irish Volunteers to make the attempt.
The explosion unerringly follows, but the rumble dies away in rippling
laughter:
Johnson was at first startled and in some heat answered, 'How
can your Lordship ask so simple a question?' But immediately
recovering himself, whether from unwillingness to be deceived
or to appear deceived, or whether from real good-humour, he
kept up the joke....
Johnson in these scenes of comedy is always the dictator; the elements
of the ridiculous are constantly present when someone who behaves with
a pompous manner is rarely willing to be laughed at, and Boswell's
sense of what was incongruous was near the surface and ready to make
merry.
The company on one occasion were greatly tickled by a word applied in
Johnson's most majestic manner to a rather laughable female character,
and the incident furnishes Boswell with material for one of his best
descriptions of this kind. Johnson had remarked 'The woman had a
bottom of good sense.'
The word _bottom_ [says Boswell] thus introduced, was so
ludicrous when contrasted with his gravity, that most of us
could not forbear tittering and laughing; though I recollect
that the Bishop of Killaloe kept his countenance with perfect
steadiness, while Miss Hannah More slyly hid her face behind
a lady's back who sat on the same settee with her. His pride
could not bear that any expression of his should excite
ridicule, when he did not intend it; he therefore resolved to
assume and exercise despotick power, glanced sternly around,
and called out in a strong tone, 'Where's the merriment?' Then
collecting himself, and looking aweful, to make us feel how he
could impose restraint, and as it were searching his mind for
a still more ludicrous word, he slowly pronounced, 'I say
the _woman_ was _fundamentally_ sensible'; as if he had said,
'Hear this now, and laugh if you dare.' We all sat composed as
at a funeral.
This, like the other scene, is extremely dramatic. Neither would have
been so had not the writer himself realised the full humour of the
situation. Perhaps the most remarkable quality of the descriptions
is the amount left out.[4] The few details which Boswell gives us
are sufficient to reveal the secret of everybody's feelings, and then
Johnson strikes in with the characteristic remark. It is difficult
to appreciate to the full the merit of these scenes without comparing
them with those supplied by less talented pens; when we read the
accounts of Mrs. Piozzi and Sir John Hawkins, and even of Miss Burney,
we realise the immeasurable superiority of Boswell's. They have the
elusive quality of all impressionist[5] art; they might be ranked with
the nocturnes of Whistler: if they were produced, as it almost seems
they were, with as little apparent care, they were produced, however,
only by the experience of a lifetime. By continually thinking
'Johnson,' Boswell was able to give the few necessary touches which
expressed the inward vision.
In the two passages we have quoted, Boswell has revealed the humour of
a situation; those supreme moments of Johnson's dictatorship were
to him a never-failing treasure-house of priceless mirth; and he has
given us a key which enables us to hear with him the magic thunder, to
see each bright flash of the lightning, and with him to laugh the rich
mellow laughter because it is so absurd, and yet so inevitable, and so
good, that men should have been fashioned so.
Boswell delights in showing us the mind of Johnson, how he was
prompted like the rest of us by all the little motives of men. He
enjoys Johnson's humanity. Sometimes he is more solemn. One great
subject is Johnson's tenderness--as in an account of an argument with
Sir Joshua about drinking:
_Johnson_ (who from drinking only water supposed everybody who
drank wine to be elevated): 'I won't argue any more with
you, Sir. You are too far gone.' _Sir Joshua_: 'I should have
thought so indeed, Sir, had I made such a speech as you have
now done.' _Johnson_ (drawing himself in, and I really thought
blushing): 'Nay, don't be angry. I did not mean to offend
you.'
The best instance perhaps of Johnson's compunction after rudeness is
on the occasion of Dr. Percy's defence of Dr. Mounsey:
Mr. Davies, who sat next to Dr. Percy, having after this had
some conversation aside with him, made a discovery which, in
his zeal to pay court to Dr. Johnson, he eagerly proclaimed
aloud from the foot of the table: 'O, Sir, I have found out
a very good reason why Dr. Percy never heard Mounsey swear or
talk bawdy; for he tells me, he never saw him but at the Duke
of Northumberland's table.' 'And so, Sir (said Johnson loudly,
to Dr. Percy), you would shield this man from the charge of
swearing and talking bawdy, because he did not do so at the
Duke of Northumberland's table....' Dr. Percy seemed to be
displeased, and soon afterwards left the company.
Later, in the course of conversation, Johnson denied any merit to
Swift for writing 'The Conduct of the Allies'; then
_recollecting that Mr. Davies, by acting as an informer, had
been the occasion of his talking somewhat too harshly to
his friend Dr. Percy, for which, probably, when the first
ebullition was over, he felt some compunction_,[6] he took an
opportunity to give him a hit; so added, with a preparatory
laugh, 'Why, Sir, Tom Davies might have written "The Conduct
of the Allies."' Poor Tom being thus suddenly dragged into
ludicrous notice in presence of the Scottish doctors, to whom
he was ambitious of appearing to advantage, was grievously
mortified.
The compunction, however, on this occasion seems to have had a short
duration, for Boswell goes on to say:
When I called upon Dr. Johnson next morning, I found him
highly satisfied with his colloquial prowess the preceding
evening: 'Well (said he), we had good talk.' _Boswell_: 'Yes,
Sir, you tossed and gored several persons.'
Boswell seems to have had the power of picking out all that was
characteristic and important, of ruthlessly discarding unnecessary
details and presenting only the salient points, of seeing a scene as a
whole, with its more vivid colours flashing out as it were from a dull
background, so that the whole impression is complete and clear. The
smallest conversations, as we saw, were dealt with in this way. And
as he 'Johnsonised' the talk which he had himself taken down,
and 'Johnsonised' the stories given to him by Mr. Langton, he
'Johnsonised' in the same way these larger scenes. While retaining
most of the words used by Johnson himself, Boswell seems to have added
here and there a characteristic expression to make the whole more
pointed, and to have compressed it all till it preserved nothing but
the true Johnsonian flavour.
* * * * *
In all this, the artistic part of his work, Boswell was expressing
his own conception of Johnson. But it has been doubted by some whether
this is a true view of him, or whether the whole is not overdrawn.
Dr. Birkbeck Hill says that Johnson was drawn by Boswell as 'too
awful.'[7]
It is indeed, as has been said before, the awfulness of Johnson which
Boswell had in mind when he wrote his 'comedy scenes,' and even in
relating less pungent moments. The humour of it all depended so much
upon that!
It must be remarked, at the outset, that several individuals may have
quite different impressions of one man. Not only do the observers
emphasise different qualities, so that the same person might
be described by one as kind and affectionate, and by another as
sentimental and stupid, without either account being untrue, except
in so far as it is incomplete, but a man's behaviour often varies with
the company. The truth of Boswell, since he expressed quite truthfully
his own impressions, would be in nowise confounded if it were
discovered that the majority did not share his view of Johnson; still
less if he had seen what they saw, while they had not seen what he
revealed.
But the fact is that Boswell's conception of Johnson as being 'awful'
was the common one. The idea that he was not so is probably derived
from Miss Burney's 'Diary.' It will be remembered, however, that
Johnson's behaviour to Miss Burney was quite unlike his behaviour to
the great majority of people: she was chosen to be the special object
of his gallantry. It was extremely pleasant for her; she was
naturally pleased to be continually the recipient of the most charming
compliments; and her 'Diary' tells us all about it. Boswell was well
aware that to her more than to anybody else Johnson showed the gayer
side of his character, and he was anxious, as we have seen, to make
use of her 'stores':
I want to show him as gay Sam, agreeable Sam, pleasant Sam; so you
must help me with some of his beautiful billets to yourself.
Miss Burney indeed can hardly be excused for not giving her assistance
to Boswell, since she afterwards talks of vindicating Johnson to his
King and Queen,[8] which she would hardly have found necessary had she
contributed largely herself to Boswell's 'Life.' And even Miss Burney
alludes to the fear in which Johnson was held by his contemporaries,
and reports a terrible, if deserved, rebuke to Hannah More, when
Johnson, after politely bearing the lady's adulation for some little
time, exclaimed, 'Madam, before you flatter a man so grossly to his
face, you should consider whether or not your flattery is worth his
having.'[9] Mrs. Piozzi, too, in whose house it was that she met Dr.
Johnson, has, in her own account of him, emphasised very much the
other side of the picture.
It must also be remembered that Boswell, though he loves to relate the
roughness of Johnson and his imperiousness, is always at pains to show
that he was a really kind and considerate man, and even seems to
make allowance for the possibility that he has made the harshness
too prominent, and takes care to explain that it was not so common as
might be supposed:
How very false is the notion which has gone round the world of
the rough, and passionate, and harsh manners of this great and
good man. That he had occasional sallies of heat of temper,
and that he was sometimes, perhaps, too 'easily provoked' by
absurdity and folly, and sometimes too desirous of triumph in
colloquial contest, must be allowed. The quickness both of his
perception and sensibility disposed him to sudden explosions
of satire; to which his extraordinary readiness of wit was a
strong and almost irresistible incitement. I admit that the
beadle within him was often so eager to apply the lash, that
the judge had not time to consider the case with sufficient
deliberation.[10]
Boswell is prepared to admit, as he is obliged to do, the dogmatist
and the fighter in Johnson, but not that he was in the ordinary way
disagreeable.
That he was occasionally remarkable for violence of temper may
be granted: but let us ascertain the degree, and not let it be
supposed that he was in a perpetual rage, and never without a
club in his hand, to knock down everyone who approached him.
On the contrary, the truth is, that by much the greatest part
of his time he was civil, obliging, nay, polite in the true
sense of the word; so much so, that many gentlemen, who were
long acquainted with him, never received, or even heard a
strong expression from him.
It will be seen from his lengthy defence of Johnson against what he
considered a common accusation and an unjust one, and it may be seen
also from other passages, that Boswell regards his own life of Johnson
as likely to weaken the prevalent opinions about Johnson's rough
behaviour. Mrs. Piozzi is violently attacked by him for having
exaggerated and maliciously enlarged upon this part of his
character.[11]
It is not to be supposed that the conception of Johnson's 'awfulness'
depended entirely upon his capacity for giving rude blows to his
antagonists in conversation. There is a certain gravity of demeanour,
amounting almost to pompousness, which Boswell loves to depict. It may
seem that the Doctor is not sufficiently good-humoured. No doubt it
was Boswell's particular delight to represent the majesty of the great
man of letters, and the many occasions on which Johnson is jovial and
pleasant are, for him perhaps, the exceptions to a rule. But how many
there are! The 'Tour to the Hebrides' especially (and in considering
Boswell's presentation of Johnson we must consider always the 'Tour'
with the 'Life') is full of instances of this kind of behaviour. It
was indeed a serious departure from Boswell's ideal that the Rambler
should take upon his knee a Highland lady, but it would be difficult
to count the number of times that Johnson is reported quite naturally
to have laughed and to have been good-humoured. He is even reported to
have perverted a line of Shakespeare, with the spontaneous merrymaking
of a schoolboy, to suit his companion. Surely it could be said by no
one that his impression of Johnson after reading Boswell's 'Life' and
the 'Tour to the Hebrides' was that of a cross and grave old man.
Boswell perhaps does not give the picture of affability and even
gaiety which Miss Burney gives; but her account too is qualified.
'Dr. Johnson,' she says, 'has more fun and comical humour, and love of
nonsense about him, than almost anybody I ever saw: I mean when with
those he likes; for otherwise he can be as severe and as bitter
as report relates him.'[12] On another occasion she speaks of 'a
formality that accompanies whatever he says,' which conveys exactly
the impression of 'awfulness' that we get so often from Boswell.[13]
The criticism which could perhaps be made with most justice of the
Johnson whom we know from Boswell is that he is not playful enough.
Miss Burney's Johnson may seem a jollier man. She alludes to his 'love
of nonsense' and 'a turn for burlesque humour.'[14] But it must be
remembered that behaviour of this kind is mentioned very seldom--only
four or five times at the most, even in Miss Burney's 'Diary.' And it
would be not unnatural (from the circumstances mentioned before) that
Miss Burney would see more of this side of his character than other
people.
Boswell, in the preface to the second edition of the 'Life,' tells us
that the book had been received with favour, that he had obtained a
great deal of spontaneous praise, and that Sir Joshua Reynolds lived
to give the strongest testimony to its fidelity. These are expressions
which he could not use, had they been untrue, in that place; for they
would invite a damaging attack from the reviewers. But a book which
upset the popular conception of a figure like Johnson, or even one
which merely overdrew the 'shades' in his character, would hardly have
been received like that. And Boswell in fact was never attacked in
print for these faults, which, considering what a number of enemies he
had, and the disputes in which he was engaged after the publication
of the 'Life,' is almost conclusive evidence that his accounts of
Johnson's 'awfulness' corresponded with the observations of other
people. Courtenay was a good judge when he wrote the following lines
about the 'Tour to the Hebrides':
"With Reynolds' pencil, vivid, bold, and true,
So fervent Boswell gives him to our view:
In every trait we see his mind expand;
The master rises by the pupil's hand.
We love the writer, praise his happy vein,
Grac'd with the _naïveté_ of the sage Montaigne.
Hence not alone are brighter parts display'd,
But e'en the specks of character pourtray'd:
We see the Rambler with fastidious smile...."[15]
[Footnote 1: _Autobiography, Letters, &c., of Mrs. Piozzi_,
ii, 403.]
[Footnote 2: Nichols' _Illustrations_, vii, 313.]
[Footnote 3: Henley, in _Views and Reviews_, speaks of Boswell
as an artist.]
[Footnote 4: Fitzgerald and Birkbeck Hill both say something
of this.]
[Footnote 5: I use this term not in a particular technical
sense (as applied to a school of French painters) but in a
general sense, of all art that neglects details for the sake
of general effect.]
[Footnote 6: The italics are mine.]
[Footnote 7: _Life of Johnson_, ii. 262, n. 2.]
[Footnote 8: _Miss Burney's Diary_, iv, 478.]
[Footnote 9: _Ib._, i, 100.]
[Footnote 10: _Life of Johnson_, iii, 80-1.]
[Footnote 11: _Life of Johnson_, iv, 340 _et seq._]
[Footnote 12: _Miss Burney's Diary_, i, 211.]
[Footnote 13: _Ib._, i, 231.]
[Footnote 14: _Ib._, i, 102.]
[Footnote 15: _Life of Johnson_, ii, 268.]