The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.
James Boswell, born on October 18, 1740, was the son of
Alexander Boswell of Auchinleck, better known as Lord
Auchinleck, one of the senators of the College of Justice, or
Supreme Court, of Scotland. Boswell was educated at Edinburgh
and Utrecht universities, and was called both to the Scots and
the English Bar. He was early interested in letters, and while
still a student, published some poems and magazine articles.
Boswell was introduced to Dr. Johnson on May 16, 1763. The
friendship rapidly ripened, and from 1772 to the death of the
illustrious moralist, was unbroken. As an introduction to "The
Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D."--perhaps the greatest of all
biographies--we can hardly do better than use the words of the
biographer himself. "To write the life of him who excelled all
mankind in writing the lives of others, and who, whether we
consider his extraordinary endowments or his various works,
has been equalled by few in any age, is an arduous, and may be
reckoned in me a presumptuous, task. But as I had the honour
and happiness of enjoying Dr. Johnson's friendship for upwards
of twenty years; as I had the scheme of writing his life
constantly in view; as he was well apprised of this
circumstance, and from time to time obligingly satisfied my
inquiries by communicating to me the incidents of his early
years; and as I have spared no pains in obtaining materials
concerning him, I flatter myself that few biographers have
entered upon such a work as this with more advantages,
independent of literary abilities, in which I am not vain
enough to compare myself with some great names who have gone
before me in this kind of writing." The "Life" was a signal
success at the time of its publication, and even yet is
unrivalled in the field of biography. Boswell latterly resided
permanently in London, and was proprietor of, and principal
contributor to, the "London Magazine". He died in his house in
Great Portland Street on May 19, 1795.
_I.--Parentage and Education_
Samuel Johnson was born at Lichfield, in Staffordshire, on September
18,1709, and was baptised on the day of his birth. His father was
Michael Johnson, a native of Derbyshire, of obscure extraction, who
settled in Lichfield as a bookseller and stationer. His mother was Sarah
Ford, descended of an ancient race of substantial yeomanry in
Warwickshire. They were well advanced in years when they were married,
and never had more than two children, both sons--Samuel, their first
born, whose various excellences I am to endeavour to record, and
Nathaniel, who died in his twenty-fifth year.
Mr. Michael Johnson was a man of a large and robust body, and of a
strong and active mind; yet there was in him a mixture of that disease
the nature of which eludes the most minute inquiry, though the effects
are well known to be a weariness of life, an unconcern about those
things which agitate the greater part of mankind, and a general
sensation of gloomy wretchedness. From him, then, his son inherited,
with some other qualities, "a vile melancholy," which, in his too strong
expression of any disturbance of the mind, "made him mad all his
life--at least, not sober." Old Mr. Johnson was a pretty good Latin
scholar, and a citizen so creditable as to be made one of the
magistrates of Lichfield; and, being a man of good sense and skill in
his trade, he acquired a reasonable share of wealth, of which, however,
he afterwards lost the greatest part, by engaging unsuccessfully in a
manufacture of parchment.
Young Johnson had the misfortune to be much afflicted with the scrofula,
or king's evil, which disfigured a countenance naturally well formed,
and hurt his visual nerves so much that he did not see at all with one
of his eyes, though its appearance was little different from that of the
other. Yet, when he and I were travelling in the Highlands of Scotland,
and I pointed out to him a mountain, which, I observed, resembled a
cone, he corrected my inaccuracy by showing me that it was indeed
pointed at the top, but that one side of it was larger than the other.
And the ladies with whom he was acquainted agree that no man was more
nicely and minutely critical in the elegance of female dress.
He was first taught to read English by Dame Oliver, a widow, who kept a
school for young children in Lichfield. He began to learn Latin with Mr.
Hawkins, usher, or under-master, of Lichfield School. Then he rose to be
under the care of Mr. Hunter, the head-master, who, according to his
account "was very severe, and wrong-headedly severe. He used," said he,
"to beat us unmercifully, and he did not distinguish between ignorance
and negligence." Yet Johnson was very sensible how much he owed to Mr.
Hunter. Mr. Langton one day asked him how he had acquired so accurate a
knowledge of Latin, in which, I believe, he was exceeded by no man of
his time. He said, "My master whipped me very well. Without that, sir, I
should have done nothing." Indeed, upon all occasions, he expressed his
approbation of enforcing instruction by means of the rod. "The rod,"
said he, "produces an effect which terminates in itself. A child is
afraid of being whipped, and gets his task, and there's an end on't;
whereas, by exciting emulation and comparisons of superiority, you lay
the foundation of lasting mischief."
From his earliest years Johnson's superiority was perceived and
acknowledged. He was from the beginning a king of men. His schoolfellow,
Mr. Hector, has assured me that he never knew him corrected at school
but for talking and diverting other boys from their business. He seemed
to learn by intuition; for though indolence and procrastination were
inherent in his constitution, whenever he made an exertion he did more
than anyone else. He was uncommonly inquisitive; and his memory was so
tenacious that he never forgot anything that he either heard or read.
Mr. Hector remembers having recited to him eighteen verses, which, after
a little pause, he repeated _verbatim_.
He never joined with the other boys in their ordinary diversions, for
his defective sight prevented him from enjoying them; and he once
pleasantly remarked to me "how wonderfully well he had contrived to be
idle without them." Of this inertness of disposition Johnson had all his
life too great a share.
After having resided for some time at the house of his uncle, Cornelius
Ford, Johnson was, at the age of fifteen, removed to the school of
Stourbridge, in Worcestershire, of which Mr. Wentworth was then master.
At this school he did not receive so much benefit as was expected, and
remaining there little more than a year, returned home, where he may be
said to have loitered for two years. He had no settled plan of life, and
though he read a great deal in a desultory manner, he read only as
chance and inclination directed him. "What I read," he told me, "were
not voyages and travels, but all literature, sir, all ancient writers,
all manly; though but little Greek, only some of Anacreon and Hesiod.
But in this irregular manner I had looked into many books which were not
known at the universities, where they seldom read any books but what are
put into their hands by their tutors; so that when I came to Oxford, Dr.
Adams, now Master of Pembroke College, told me I was the best qualified
for the university that he had ever known come there."
_II--Marriage and Settlement in London_
Compelled by his father's straitened circumstances, Johnson left
Pembroke College in the autumn of 1731, without taking a degree, having
been a member of it little more than three years. In December of this
year his father died.
In this forlorn state of his circumstances, he accepted an offer to be
employed as usher in the school of Market Bosworth, in Leicestershire.
But he was strongly averse to the painful drudgery of teaching, and,
having quarrelled with Sir Wolstan Dixie, the patron of the school, he
relinquished after a few months a situation which all his life
afterwards he recollected with the strongest aversion and even a degree
of horror. Among the acquaintances he made at this period was Mr.
Porter, a mercer at Birmingham, whose widow he afterwards married. In
what manner he employed his pen in 1733 I have not been able to
ascertain. He probably got a little money for occasional work, and it is
certain that he was occupied about this time in the translation of
Lobo's "Voyage to Abyssinia," which was published in 1735, and brought
him five guineas from this same bookseller. It is reasonable to suppose
that his rendering of Lobo's work was the remote occasion of his
writing, many years after, his admirable philosophical tale, "Rasselas,
Prince of Abyssinia."
Miss Porter told me that when Mr. Johnson was first introduced to her
mother his appearance was very forbidding; he was then lean and lank, so
that his immense structure of bones was hideously striking to the eye,
and the scars of the scrofula were deeply visible. He also wore his
hair, which was straight and stiff, and separated behind; and he often
had, seemingly, convulsive starts and odd gesticulations, which tended
to excite at once surprise and ridicule. Mrs. Porter was so much engaged
by his conversation that she overlooked all these external
disadvantages, and said to her daughter, "This is the most sensible man
that I ever saw in my life."
Though Mrs. Porter, now a widow, was double the age of Johnson, and her
person and manner, as described to me by the late Mr. Garrick, were by
no means pleasing to others, she must have had a superiority of
understanding and talents, as she certainly inspired him with a more
than ordinary passion. The marriage took place at Derby, on July 9,
1736.
He now set up a private academy, for which purpose he hired a large
house well situated near his native city. In the "Gentleman's Magazine"
for 1736 there is the following advertisement:
"At Edial, near Lichfield, in Staffordshire, young gentlemen are boarded
and taught the Latin and Greek languages, by SAMUEL JOHNSON."
But the only pupils that were put under his care were the celebrated
David Garrick and his brother George, and a Mr. Offely, a young
gentleman of fortune, who died early.
Johnson, indeed, was not more satisfied with his situation as the master
of an academy than with that of the usher of a school; we need not
wonder, therefore, that he did not keep his academy more than a year and
a half. From Mr. Garrick's account he did not appear to have been
profoundly reverenced by his pupils. His oddities of manner and uncouth
gesticulations could not but be the subject of merriment to them; and in
particular, the young rogues used to turn into ridicule his awkward
fondness for Mrs. Johnson, whom he used to name by the familiar
appellation of Tetty or Tetsey, which, like Betty or Betsey, is
provincially used as a contraction for Elizabeth, her Christian name,
but which to us seems ludicrous when applied to a woman of her age and
appearance. Mr. Garrick described her to me as very fat, with swelled
cheeks of a florid red produced by thick painting, and increased by the
liberal use of cordials; flaring and fantastic in her dress, and
affected both in her speech and her general behaviour.
While Johnson kept his academy, I have not discovered that he wrote
anything except a great portion of his tragedy of "Irene." When he had
finished some part of it, he read what he had done to his friend, Mr.
Gilbert Walmsley, Registrar of the Prerogative Court of Lichfield, who
was so well pleased with this proof of Johnson's abilities as a dramatic
writer that he advised him to finish the tragedy and produce it on the
stage. Accordingly, Johnson and his friend and pupil, David Garrick,
went to try their fortunes in London in 1737, the former with the hopes
of getting work as a translator and of turning out a fine
tragedy-writer, the latter with the intention of completing his
education, and of following the profession of the law. How, indeed,
Johnson employed himself upon his first coming to London is not
particularly known. His tragedy, of which he had entertained such hopes,
was submitted to Mr. Fleetwood, the patentee of Drury Lane Theatre, and
rejected.
_III.--Poverty Stricken in London_
Johnson's first performance in the "Gentleman's Magazine," which for
many years was his principal source of employment and support, was a
copy of Latin verses, in March, 1738, addressed to the editor. He was
now enlisted by Mr. Cave, as a regular coadjutor in his magazine, by
which he probably obtained a tolerable livelihood. What we certainly
know to have been done by him in this way were the debates in both
Houses of Parliament, under the name of "The Senate of Lilliput."
Thus was Johnson employed during some of the best years of his life,
solely to obtain an honest support. But what first displayed his
transcendent powers, and "gave the world assurance of the Man," was his
"London, a Poem in Imitation of the Third Satire of Juvenal," which came
out in May this year (1738), and burst forth with a splendour the rays
of which will forever encircle his name.
But though thus elevated into fame, Johnson could not expect to produce
many such works as his "London," and he felt the hardships of writing
for bread. He was therefore willing to resume the office of a
schoolmaster, and, an offer being made to him of the mastership of a
school, provided he could obtain the degree of Master of Arts, Dr. Adams
was applied to by a common friend to know whether that could be granted
to him as a favour from the university of Oxford. But it was then
thought too great a favour to be asked.
During the next five years, 1739-1743, Johnson wrote largely for the
"Gentleman's Magazine," and supplied the account of the Parliamentary
Debates from November 19, 1740, to February 23, 1743, inclusive. It does
not appear that he wrote anything of importance for the magazine in
1744. But he produced one work this year, fully sufficient to maintain
the high reputation which he had acquired. This was "The Life of Richard
Savage," a man of whom it is difficult to speak impartially without
wondering that he was for some time the intimate companion of Johnson;
for his character was marked by profligacy, insolence, and ingratitude;
yet, as he undoubtedly had a warm and vigorous, though unregulated mind,
had seen life in all its varieties, and been much in the company of the
statesmen and wits of his time, he could communicate to Johnson an
abundant supply of such materials as his philosophical curiosity most
eagerly desired; and so his visits to St. John's Gate--the office of the
"Gentleman's Magazine"--naturally brought Johnson and him together.
_IV.--Preparation of the "Dictionary"_
It is somewhat curious that Johnson's literary career appears to have
been almost totally suspended in 1745 and 1746. But the year 1747 is
distinguished as the epoch when Johnson's arduous and important work,
his "Dictionary of the English Language," was announced to the world, by
the publication of its "Plan or Prospectus."
The booksellers who contracted with Johnson, single and unaided, for the
execution of a work which in other countries has not been effected but
by the co-operating exertions of many, were Mr. Robert Dodsley, Mr.
Charles Hitch, Mr. Andrew Millar, the two Messieurs Longman, and the two
Messieurs Knapton. The price stipulated was fifteen hundred and
seventy-five pounds. The "Plan" was addressed to Philip Dormer, Earl of
Chesterfield, then one of his majesty's principal secretaries of state,
a nobleman who was very ambitious of literary distinction, and who, upon
being informed of the design, had expressed himself in terms very
favourable to its success. The plan had been put before him in
manuscript For the mechanical part of the work Johnson employed, as he
told me, six amanuenses.
In the "Gentleman's Magazine" for May, 1748, he-wrote a "Life of
Roscommon," with notes, which he afterwards much improved and inserted
amongst his "Lives of the English Poets." And this same year he formed a
club in Ivy Lane, Paternoster Row, with a view to enjoy literary
discussion.
In January, 1749, he published "Vanity of Human Wishes, being the Tenth
Satire of Juvenal Imitated"; and on February 6 Garrick brought out his
tragedy at Drury Lane. Dr. Adams was present at the first night of the
representation of "Irene," and gave me the following account. "Before
the curtain drew up, there were catcalls and whistling, which alarmed
Johnson's friends. The prologue, which was 'written by himself in a
manly strain, soothed the audience, and the play went off tolerably till
it came to the conclusion, when Mrs. Pritchard, the heroine of the
piece, was to be strangled on the stage, and was to speak two lines with
the bow-string around her neck. The audience cried out 'Murder! Murder!'
She several times attempted to speak, but in vain. At last she was
obliged to go off the stage alive." This passage was afterwards struck
out, and she was carried off to be put to death behind the scenes, as
the play now has it.
Notwithstanding all the support of such performers as Garrick, Barry,
Mrs. Pritchard, and every advantage of dress and decoration, the tragedy
of "Irene" did not please the public. Mr. Garrick's zeal carried it
through for nine nights, so that the author had his three nights'
profit; and from a receipt signed by him it appears that his friend Mr.
Robert Dodsley gave him one hundred pounds for the copy, with his usual
reservation of the right of one edition.
On occasion of his play being brought upon the stage, Johnson had a
fancy that as a dramatic author his dress should be more gay than he
ordinarily wore; he therefore appeared behind the scenes, and even in
one of the side boxes, in a scarlet waistcoat, with rich gold lace and a
gold laced hat. His necessary attendance while his play was in
rehearsal, and during its performance, brought him acquainted with many
of the performers of both sexes, which produced a more favourable
opinion of their profession than he had harshly expressed in his "Life
of Savage." With some of them he kept up an acquaintance as long as he
and they lived, and was ever ready to show them acts of kindness. He for
a considerable time used to visit the green room, and seemed to take
delight in dissipating his gloom by mixing in the sprightly chit-chat of
the motley circle then to be found there. But at last--as Mr. David Hume
related to me from Mr. Garrick--he denied himself this amusement from
considerations of rigid virtue.
_V.--"The Rambler" and New Acquaintance_
In 1750 Johnson came forth in the character for which he was eminently
qualified, a majestic teacher of moral and religious wisdom. The vehicle
he chose was that of a periodical paper, which he knew had, upon former
occasions--those of the "Tattler," "Spectator," and "Guardian"--been
employed with great success.
The first paper of "The Rambler" was published on Tuesday, March 20,
1750, and its author was enabled to continue it without interruption,
every Tuesday and Friday, till Saturday, March 17, 1752, on which day it
closed. During all this time he received assistance on four occasions
only.
Posterity will be astonished when they are told, upon the authority of
Johnson himself, that many of these discourses, which we should suppose
had been laboured with all the slow attention of literary leisure, were
written in haste as the moments pressed, without even being read over by
him before they were printed. Such was his peculiar promptitude of mind.
He was wont to say, "A man may write at any time if he will set himself
doggedly to it."
Though Johnson's circumstances were at this time--1751--far from being
easy, his humane and charitable disposition was constantly exerting
itself. Mrs. Anna Williams, daughter of a very ingenious Welsh
physician, and a woman of more than ordinary talents in literature,
having come to London in hopes of being cured of a cataract in both her
eyes, which afterwards ended in total blindness, was kindly received as
a constant visitor at his house while Mrs. Johnson lived; and after her
death, having come under his roof in order to have an operation upon her
eyes performed with more comfort to her than in lodgings, she had an
apartment from him until the rest of her life at all times when he had a
house.
In 1752 he wrote the last papers of "The Rambler," but he was now mainly
occupied with his "Dictionary." This year, soon after closing his
periodical paper, he suffered a loss which affected him with the deepest
distress. For on March 17 his wife died. That his sufferings upon her
death were severe, beyond what are commonly endured, I have no doubt,
from the information of many who were then about him.
The circle of Johnson's friends, indeed, at this time was extensive and
various, far beyond what has been generally imagined. To trace his
acquaintance with each particular person were unprofitable. But
exceptions are to be made, one of which must be a friend so eminent as
Sir Joshua Reynolds, with whom he maintained an uninterrupted intimacy
to the last hour of his life.
When Johnson lived in Castle Street, Cavendish Square, he used
frequently to visit two ladies who lived opposite to him--Miss
Cotterells, daughters of Admiral Cotterell. Reynolds used also to visit
there, and thus they met. Mr. Reynolds had, from the first reading of
his "Life of Savage," conceived a very high admiration of Johnson's
powers of writing. His conversation no less delighted him, and he
cultivated his acquaintance with the laudable zeal of one who was
ambitious of general improvement.
His acquaintance with Bennet Langton, Esq., of Langton, in Lincolnshire,
another much valued friend, commenced soon after the conclusion of the
"Rambler," which that gentleman, then a youth, had read with so much
admiration that he came to London chiefly with the view of endeavouring
to be introduced to its author. By a fortunate chance he happened to
take lodgings in a house where Mr. Levett frequently visited, who
readily obtained Johnson's permission to bring Mr. Langton to him; as
indeed, Johnson, during the whole course of his life, had no shyness,
real or affected, but was easy of access to all who were properly
recommended, and even wished to see numbers at his _levée_, as his
morning circle of company might, with strict propriety, be called, for
he received his friends when he got up from bed, which rarely happened
before noon.
_VI.--Lord Chesterfield and the "Dictionary"_
In 1753 and 1754 Johnson relieved the drudgery of his "Dictionary" by
taking an active part in the composition of "The Adventurer," a new
periodical paper which his friends Dr. Hawkesworth and Dr. Bathurst had
commenced.
Towards the end of the latter year, when the "Dictionary" was on the eve
of publication, Lord Chesterfield, who, ever since the plan of this
great work had been addressed to him, had treated its author with cold
indifference, attempted to conciliate him by writing to papers in "The
World" in recommendation of the undertaking. This courtly device failed
of its effect, and Johnson, indignant that Lord Chesterfield should, for
a moment, imagine that he could be the dupe of such an artifice, wrote
him that famous letter, dated February 7, 1755, which I have already
given to the public. I will quote one paragraph.
"Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man
struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground,
encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased to take
of my labours, had it been early, had been kind; but it has been delayed
till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary, and
cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. I hope it is no
very cynical asperity not to confess obligations where no benefit has
been received, or to be unwilling that the public should consider me as
owing that to a patron which Providence has enabled me to do for
myself."
Thinking it desirable that the two letters intimating possession of the
master's degree should, for the credit both of Oxford and of Johnson,
appear after his name on the title page of his "Dictionary," his friends
obtained for him from his university this mark of distinction by diploma
dated February 20, 1755; and the "Dictionary" was published on April 15
in two volumes folio.
It won him much honour at home and abroad; the Academy of Florence sent
him their "Vocabulario," and the French Academy their "Dictionnaire."
But it had not set him above the necessity of "making provision for the
day that was passing over him," for he had spent during the progress of
the work all the money which it had brought him.
He was compelled, therefore, to contribute to the monthly periodicals,
and during 1756 he wrote a few essays for "The Universal Visitor," and
superintended and contributed largely to another publication entitled
"The Literary Magazine, or Universal Review." Among the articles he
wrote for the magazine was a review of Mr. Jonas Hanway's "Essay on
Tea," to which the author made an angry answer. Johnson, after a full
and deliberate pause, made a reply to it, the only instance, I believe,
in the whole course of his life, when he condescended to oppose anything
that was written against him.
His defence of tea was indeed made _con amore_. I suppose no person ever
enjoyed with more relish the infusion of that fragrant leaf than
Johnson. The quantities which he drank of it at all hours were so great
that his nerves must have been uncommonly strong not to have been
extremely relaxed by such an intemperate use of it.
This year Johnson resumed the scheme, first proposed eleven years
previously, of giving an edition of Shakespeare with notes. He issued
proposals of considerable length, but his indolence prevented him from
pursuing the undertaking, and nine years more elapsed before it saw the
light.
On April 15, 1758, he began a new periodical paper entitled "The Idler,"
which came out every Saturday in a weekly newspaper called "The
Universal Chronicle, or Weekly Gazette." These essays were continued
till April 5, 1760, and of the total of one hundred and three, twelve
were contributed by his friends, including Reynolds, Langton, and Thomas
Warton. "The Idler" has less body and more spirit than "The Rambler,"
and has more variety of real life, and greater facility of language. It
was often written as hastily as it predecessor.
In 1759, in the month of January, Johnson's mother died, at the great
age of ninety, an event which deeply affected him, for his reverential
affection for her was not abated by years. Soon after, he wrote his
"Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia," in order that with the profits he might
defray the expenses of her funeral, and pay some little debts which she
had left. He told Sir Joshua Reynolds that he composed it in the
evenings of one week, and sent it to the press in portions, as it was
written. Mr. Strahan, Mr. Johnston, and Mr. Dodsley purchased it for
£100, but afterwards paid him £25 more when it came to a second edition.
Though Johnson had written nothing else this admirable performance would
have rendered his name immortal in the world of literature. None of his
writings has been so extensively diffused over Europe; for it has been
translated into most, if not all, of the modern languages. Voltaire's
"Candide," written to refute the system of optimism, which it has
accomplished with brilliant success, is wonderfully similar in its plan
and conduct to Johnson's "Rasselas."
Early in 1762, having been represented to the king as a very learned and
good person, without any certain provision, his majesty was pleased to
grant him a pension of £300 a year. The prime movers in suggesting that
Johnson ought to have a pension were Mr. Thomas Sheridan and Mr. Murphy.
Having, in his "Dictionary," defined _pension_ as "generally understood
to mean pay given to a state hireling for treason to his country,"
Johnson at first doubted the propriety of his accepting this mark of the
royal favour. But Sir Joshua having given his opinion that there could
be no objection to his receiving from the king a reward for literary
merit, and Lord Bute having told him expressly, "It is not given you for
anything you are to do, but for what you have done," his scruples about
accepting it were soon removed.
_VII.--Boswell's First Meeting with Johnson_
Johnson, who thought slightingly of Sheridan's art, and perhaps resented
that a player should be rewarded in the same manner with him, upon
hearing that a pension of £200 a year had been given to Sheridan,
exclaimed, "What! Have they given _him_ a pension? Then it's time for me
to give up mine."
A man who disliked Johnson repeated his sarcasm to Mr. Sheridan, who
could never forgive this hasty, contemptuous expression, and ever after
positively declined Johnson's repeated offers of reconciliation.
It was Mr. Thomas Davies, the actor, turned bookseller, who introduced
me to Johnson. On Monday, May 16, 1763. I was sitting in Mr. Davies's
back parlour at 8 Russell Street, Covent Garden, after having drunk tea
with him and Mrs. Davies, when Johnson unexpectedly came into the shop.
Mr. Davies mentioned my name, and respectfully introduced me to him. I
was much agitated at my long-wished-for introduction to the sage, and
recollecting his prejudice against the Scotch, of which I had heard
much, I said to Davies, "Don't tell where I come from----" "From
Scotland!" cried Davies roguishly. "Mr. Johnson," said I, "I do, indeed,
come from Scotland, but I cannot help it"--meaning this as light
pleasantry to reconciliate him. But with that quickness of wit for which
he was so remarkable he seized the expression "come from Scotland," and
as if I had said that I had come away from it, or left it, remarked,
"That, sir, I find, is what a very great many of your countrymen cannot
help." This stroke, and another check which I subsequently received,
stunned me a good deal; but eight days later I boldly repaired to his
chambers on the first floor of No. 1, Inner Temple Lane, and he received
me very courteously. His morning dress was sufficiently uncouth; his
brown suit of clothes looked very rusty. He had on a little, old,
shrivelled, unpowdered wig, which was too small for his head; his
shirt-neck and knees of his breeches were loose; his black worsted
stockings ill-drawn up; and he had a pair of unbuckled shoes by way of
slippers. But all these slovenly particularities were forgotten the
moment that he began to talk.
In February of the following year was founded that club which existed
long without a name, but at Mr. Garrick's funeral became distinguished
by the title of "The Literary Club." Sir Joshua Reynolds had the merit
of being the first proposer of it, to which Johnson acceded, and the
original members were Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Johnson, Mr. Edmund
Burke, Dr. Nugent (Mr. Burke's father-in-law), Mr. Beauclerk, Mr.
Langton, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. Chamier, and Sir John Hawkins. They met at
the Turk's Head in Gerard Street, Soho, one evening in every week at
seven, and generally continued their conversation till a very late hour.
After about ten years, instead of supping weekly, it was resolved to
dine together once a fortnight during the meeting of parliament, and,
their original tavern having been converted into a private house, they
moved first to Prince's in Sackville Street, then to Le Telier's in
Dover Street, and now meet at Parsloe's, St. James's Street. Between the
time of its formation and the time at which the second edition of this
work is passing through the press (June 1792), its numbers have been
raised to thirty-five, and the following persons have belonged to it:
Mr. Dunning (afterwards Lord Ashburton), Mr. Garrick, Dr. Shepley
(Bishop of St. Asaph), Mr. Thomas Warton, Mr. Joseph Warton, Dr. Adam
Smith, Lord Charlemont, Sir Robert Chambers, Dr. Percy (Bishop of
Dromore), Dr. Barnard (Bishop of Killaloe), Mr. Charles James Fox, Mr.
Gibbon, Mr. R.B. Sheridan, Mr. Colman, Mr. Windham, of Norfolk, Dr.
Burney, and the writer of this account.
This year Johnson was receiving his "Shakespeare," but he published a
review of Grainger's "Sugar Cane: A Poem" in the "London Chronicle," and
also wrote in "The Critical Review" an account of Goldsmith's excellent
poem, "The Traveller." In July 1765, Trinity College, Dublin, surprised
him with a spontaneous compliment of the highest academical honours, by
creating him Doctor of Laws, and in October he at length gave to the
world his edition of Shakespeare. This year was also distinguished by
his being introduced into the family of Mr. Thrale, an eminent brewer,
who was member for Southwark. The Thrales were so much pleased with him
that his invitations to their house were more and more frequent, till at
last he became one of the family, and an apartment was appropriated to
him, both in their house in Southwark and at Streatham.
_VIII.--Tours in the Hebrides and in Wales_
His friend, the Rev. Dr. Maxwell, speaks as follows on Johnson's general
mode of life: "About twelve o'clock I commonly visited him, and
frequently found him in bed, or declaiming over his tea, which he drank
very plentifully. He generally had a _levée_ of morning visitors,
chiefly men of letters--Hawkesworth, Goldsmith, Murphy, Langton,
Stevens, Beauclerk, etc., etc., and sometimes learned ladies,
particularly I remember a French lady of wit and fashion doing him the
honour of a visit. He seemed to me to be considered as a kind of public
oracle, whom everybody thought they had a right to visit and to consult;
and doubtless they were well rewarded. I never could discover how he
found time for his compositions. He declaimed all the morning, then went
to dinner at a tavern, where he commonly stayed late, and then drank his
tea at some friend's house, over which he loitered a great while, but
seldom took supper. I fancy he must have read and wrote chiefly in the
night, for I can scarcely recollect that he ever refused going with me
to a tavern, and he often went to Ranelagh, which he deemed a place of
innocent recreation."
In 1773 Johnson's only publication was an edition of his folio
"Dictionary," with additions and corrections, and the preface to his old
amanuensis, Machean's "Dictionary of Ancient Geography." His
"Shakespeare," indeed, was republished this year by George Stevens,
Esq., a gentleman of acute discernment and elegant taste.
On April 23, 1773, I was nominated by Johnson for membership of the
Literary Club, and a week later I was elected to the society. There I
saw for the first time Mr. Edmund Burke, whose splendid talents had made
me ardently wish for his acquaintance.
This same year Johnson made, in my company, his visit to Scotland, which
lasted from August 14, on which day he arrived, till November 22, when
he set out on his return to London; and I believe one hundred days were
never passed by any men in a more vigorous exertion. His various
adventures, and the force and vivacity of his mind, as exercised during
this peregrination, upon innumerable topics, have been faithfully, and
to the best of my ability, displayed in my "Journal of a Tour to the
Hebrides."
On his return to London his humane, forgiving dispositions were put to a
pretty strong test by a liberty which Mr. Thomas Davies had taken, which
was to publish two volumes, entitled "Miscellaneous and Fugitive
Pieces," which he advertised in the newspapers, "By the Author of the
Rambler." In some of these Johnson had no concern whatever. He was at
first very angry, but, upon consideration of his poor friend's narrow
circumstances, and that he meant no harm, he soon relented.
Dr. Goldsmith died on April 4 of the following year, a year in which I
was unable to pay my usual spring visit to London, and in which Johnson
made a long autumn tour in Wales with Mr. and Mrs. Thrale. In response
to some inquiries of mine about poor Goldsmith, he wrote: "Of poor, dear
Goldsmith there is little to be told more than the papers have made
public. He died of a fever, made, I am afraid, more violent by
uneasiness of mind. His debts began to be heavy, and all his resources
were exhausted. Sir Joshua is of the opinion that he owed not less than
£2,000. Was ever poet so trusted before?"
This year, too, my great friend again came out as a politician, for
parliament having been dissolved in September, and Mr. Thrale, who was a
steady supporter of government, having again to encounter the storm of a
contested election in Southwark, Johnson published a short political
pamphlet, entitled "The Patriot," addressed to the electors of Great
Britain. It was written with energetic vivacity; and except those
passages in which it endeavours to vindicate the glaring outrage of the
House of Commons in the case of the Middlesex election and to justify
the attempt to reduce our fellow-subjects in America to unconditional
submission, it contained an admirable display of the properties of a
real patriot, in the original and genuine sense.
_IX.--Johnson's Physical Courage and Fear of Death_
The "Rambler's" own account of our tour in the Hebrides was published in
1775 under the title of "A journey to the Western Islands of Scotland,"
and soon involved its author, who had expressed his disbelief in the
authenticity of Ossian's poems, in a controversy with Mr. Macpherson.
Johnson called for the production of the old manuscripts from which Mr.
Macpherson said that he had copied the poems. He wrote to me: "I am
surprised that, knowing as you do the disposition of your countrymen to
tell lies in favour of each other, you can be at all affected by any
reports that circulate among them." And when Mr. Macpherson, exasperated
by this scepticism, replied in words that are generally said to have
been of a nature very different from the language of literary contest,
Johnson answered him in a letter that opened: "I received your foolish
and impudent letter. Any violence offered me I shall do my best to
repel, and what I cannot do for myself the law shall do for me. I hope I
shall never be deterred from detecting what I think a cheat by the
menaces of a ruffian."
Mr. Macpherson knew little the character of Dr. Johnson if he supposed
that he could be easily intimidated, for no man was ever more remarkable
for personal courage. He had, indeed, an awful dread of death, or,
rather, "of something after death"; and he once said to me, "The fear of
death is so much natural to man that the whole of life is but keeping
away the thoughts of it," and confessed that "he had never had a moment
in which death was not terrible to him." But his fear was from
reflection, his courage natural. Many instances of his resolution may be
mentioned. One day, at Mr. Beauclerk's house in the country, when two
large dogs were fighting, he went up to them and beat them till they
separated.
At another time, when Foote threatened to _take him off_ on the stage,
he sent out for an extra large oak stick; and this mere threat, repeated
by Davies to Foote, effectually checked the wantonness of the mimic. On
yet another occasion, in the playhouse at Lichfield, as Mr. Garrick
informed me, Johnson having for a moment quitted a chair which was
placed for him between the side scenes, a gentleman took possession of
it, and when Johnson on his return civilly demanded his seat, rudely
refused to give it up; upon which Johnson laid hold of it, and tossed
him and the chair into the pit.
My revered friend had long before indulged most unfavourable sentiments
of our fellow-subjects in America. As early as 1769 he had said to them:
"Sir, they are a race of convicts, and ought to be grateful for anything
we allow them short of hanging." He had recently published, at the
desire of those in power, a pamphlet entitled "Taxation no Tyranny; an
Answer to the Resolutions and Address of the American Congress." Of this
performance I avoided to talk with him, having formed a clear and
settled opinion against the doctrine of its title.
In the autumn Dr. Johnson went to Ashbourne to France with Mr. and Mrs.
Thrale and Mr. Baretti, which lasted about two months. But he did not
get into any higher acquaintance; and Foote, who was at Paris at the
time with him, used to give a description of my friend while there and
of French astonishment at his figure, manner, and dress, which was
abundantly ludicrous. He was now a Doctor of Laws of Oxford, his
university having conferred that degree on him by diploma in the spring.
_X.--Johnson's "Seraglio"_
A circumstance which could not fail to be very pleasing to Johnson
occurred in 1777. The tragedy of "Sir Thomas Overbury," written by his
early companion in London, Richard Savage, was brought out, with
alterations, at Covent Garden Theatre, on February 1; and the prologue
to it, written by Mr. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, introduced an elegant
compliment to Johnson on his "Dictionary." Johnson was pleased with
young Mr. Sheridan's liberality of sentiment, and willing to show that
though estranged from the father he could acknowledge the brilliant
merit of the son, he proposed him, and secured his election, as a member
of the Literary Club, observing that "he who has written the two best
comedies of his age ["The Rivals" and "The Duenna"] is surely a
considerable man."
In the autumn Dr. Johnson went to Ashbourne to stop with his friend, the
Rev. Dr. Taylor, and I joined him there. I was somewhat disappointed in
finding that the edition of the "English Poets" for which he was to
write prefaces and lives was not an undertaking directed by him, but
that he was to furnish a preface and life to any poet the booksellers
pleased. I asked him if he would do this to any dunce's works if they
should ask him. Johnson: "Yes, sir, and _say_ he was a dunce." My friend
seemed now not much to relish talking of this edition; it had been
arranged by the forty chief booksellers of London, and Johnson had named
his own terms for the "Lives," namely, two hundred guineas.
During this visit he put into my hands the whole series of his writings
in behalf of the Rev. Dr. William Dodd, who, having been
chaplain-in-ordinary to his majesty, and celebrated as a very popular
preacher, was this year convicted and executed for forging a bond on his
former pupil, the young Earl of Chesterfield. Johnson certainly made
extraordinary exertions to save Dodd. He wrote several petitions and
letters on the subject, and composed for the unhappy man not only his
"Speech to the Recorder of London," at the Old Bailey, when sentence of
death was about to be pronounced upon him, and "The Convict's Address to
his Unhappy Brethren," a sermon delivered by Dr. Dodd in the chapel of
Newgate, but also "Dr. Dodd's Last Solemn Declaration," which he left
with the sheriff at the place of execution.
In 1778, I arrived in London on March 18, and next day met Dr. Johnson
at his old friend's, in Dean's Yard, for Dr. Taylor was a prebendary of
Westminster. On Friday, March 2d, I found him at his own house, sitting
with Mrs. Williams, and was informed that the room allotted to me three
years previously was now appropriated to a charitable purpose, Mrs.
Desmoulins, daughter of Johnson's godfather Dr. Swinfen, and, I think,
her daughter, and a Miss Carmichael, being all lodged in it. Such was
his humanity, and such his generosity, that Mrs. Desmoulins herself told
me he allowed her half-a-guinea a week.
Unfortunately his "Seraglio," as he sometimes suffered me to call his
group of females, were perpetually jarring with one another. He thus
mentions them, together with honest Levett, in one of his letters to
Mrs. Thrale: "Williams hates everybody; Levett hates Desmoulins, and
does not love Williams--Desmoulins hates them both; Poll (Miss
Carmichael) loves none of them."
On January 20, 1779, Johnson lost his old friend Garrick, and this same
year he gave the world a luminous proof that the vigour of his mind in
all its faculties, whether memory, judgement, and imagination, was not
in the least abated, by publishing the first four volumes of his
"Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, to the Most Eminent of the English
Poets." The remaining volumes came out in 1781.
In 1780 the world was kept in impatience for the completion of his
"Lives of the Poets," upon which he was employed so far as his indolence
allowed him to labour.
This year--on March 11--Johnson lost another old friend in Mr. Topham
Beauclerk, of whom he said: "No man ever was so free when he was going
to say a good thing, from a _look_ that expressed that it was coming;
or, when he had said it, from a look that expressed that it had come."
_XI.--Johnson's Humanity to Children, Servants, and the Poor_
I was disappointed in my hopes of seeing Johnson in 1780, but I was able
to come to London in the spring of 1781, and on Tuesday, March 20, I met
him in Fleet Street, walking, or, rather, indeed, moving along--for his
peculiar march is thus correctly described in a short life of him
published very soon after his death: "When he walked the streets, what
with the constant roll of his head, and the concomitant motion of his
body, he appeared to make his way by that motion, independent of his
feet." That he was often much stared at while he advanced in this manner
may easily be believed, but it was not safe to make sport of one so
robust as he was.
I waited on him next evening, and he gave me a great portion of his
original manuscript of his "Lives of the Poets," which he had preserved
for me.
I found on visiting his friend, Mr. Thrale, that he was now very ill,
and had removed--I suppose by the solicitation of Mrs. Thrale--to a
house in Grosvenor Square. I was sorry to see him sadly changed in his
appearance. He died shortly after.
He told me I might now have the pleasure to see Dr. Johnson drink wine
again, for he had lately returned to it. When I mentioned this to
Johnson, he said: "I drink it now sometimes, but not socially." The
first evening that I was with him at Thrale's, I observed he poured a
large quantity of it into a glass, and swallowed it greedily. Everything
about his character and manners was forcible and violent; there never
was any moderation; many a day did he fast, many a year did he refrain
from wine; but when he did eat, it was voraciously; when he did drink
wine, it was copiously. He could practice abstinence, but not
temperance.
"I am not a severe man," Johnson once said; "as I know more of mankind I
expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man _a good man_ upon
easier terms than I was formerly."
This kind indulgence--extended towards myself when overcome by wine--had
once or twice a pretty difficult trial, but on my making an apology, I
always found Johnson behave to me with the most friendly gentleness. In
fact, Johnson was not severe, but he was pugnacious, and this pugnacity
and roughness he displayed most conspicuously in conversation. He could
not brook appearing to be worsted in argument, even when, to show the
force and dexterity of his talents, he had taken the wrong side. When,
therefore, he perceived that his opponent gained ground, he had recourse
to some sudden mode of robust sophistry. Once when I was pressing upon
him with visible advantage, he stopped me thus: "My dear Boswell, let's
have no more of this. You'll make nothing of it. I'd rather have you
whistle a Scotch tune."
Goldsmith used to say, in the witty words of one of Cibber's comedies,
"There is no arguing with Johnson, for when his pistol misses fire, he
knocks you down with the butt end of it."
In 1782 his complaints increased, and the history of his life this year
is little more than a mournful recital of the variations of his illness.
In one of his letters to Mr. Hector he says, indeed, "My health has
been, from my twentieth year, such as has seldom afforded me a single
day of ease." At a time, then, when he was less able than he had once
been to sustain a shock, he was suddenly deprived of Mr. Levett, who
died on January 17. But, although his health was tottering, the powers
of his mind were in no ways impaired, as his letters and conversation
showed. Moreover, during the last three or four years of his life he may
be said to have mellowed.
His love of little children, which he discovered upon all occasions,
calling them "pretty dears," and giving them sweetmeats, was an
undoubted proof of the real humanity and gentleness of his disposition.
His uncommon kindness to his servants, and serious concern, not only for
their comfort in this world, but their happiness in the next, was
another unquestionable evidence of what all who were intimately
acquainted with him knew to be true. Nor would it be just, under this
head, to omit the fondness that he showed for animals which he had taken
under his protection. I never shall forget the indulgence with which he
treated Hodge, his cat, for whom he himself used to go out and buy
oysters, lest the servants, having that trouble, should take a dislike
to the poor creature.
_XII.--The Last Year_
In April, 1783, Johnson had a paralytic stroke, which deprived him, for
a time, of the powers of speech. But he recovered so quickly that in
July he was able to make a visit to Mr. Langton, at Rochester, where he
passed about a fortnight, and made little excursions as easily as at any
time of his life. In August he went as far as the neighbourhood of
Salisbury, to Heale, the seat of William Bowles, Esq.; and it was while
he was here that he had a letter from his physician, Dr. Brocklesby,
acquainting him of the death of Mrs. Williams, which affected him a good
deal.
In the end of 1783, in addition to his gout and his catarrhous cough, he
was seized with a spasmodic asthma of such violence that he was confined
to the house in great pain, being sometimes obliged to sit all night in
his chair, a recumbent posture being so hurtful to his respiration that
he could not endure lying in bed; and there came upon him at the same
time that oppressive and fatal disease of dropsy. His cough he used to
cure by taking laudanum and syrup of poppies, and he was a great
believer in the advantages of being bled. But this year the very severe
winter aggravated his complaints, and the asthma confined him to the
house for more than three months; though he got almost complete relief
from the dropsy by natural evacuation in February.
On Wednesday, May 5, 1784--the last year of Dr. Johnson's life--I
arrived in London for my spring visit; and next morning I had the
pleasure to find him greatly recovered. But I was in his company
frequently and particularly remember the fine spirits he was in one
evening at our Essex Head Club. He praised Mr. Burke's constant stream
of conversation, saying, "Yes, sir; if a man were to go by chance at the
same time with Burke under a shed, to shun a shower, he would say, 'This
is an extraordinary man.'"
He had now a great desire to go to Oxford, as his first jaunt after his
illness; we talked of it for some days, and on June 3 the Oxford
post-coach took us up at Bolt Court, and we spent an agreeable fortnight
with Dr. Adams at Pembroke College.
The anxiety of his friends to preserve so estimable a life made them
plan for him a retreat from the severity of a British winter to the mild
climate of Italy; and, after consulting with Sir Joshua Reynolds, I
wrote to Lord Thurlow, the Lord Chancellor, for such an addition to
Johnson's income as would enable him to bear the expense.
Lord Thurlow, who highly valued Johnson, and whom Johnson highly valued,
at first made a very favourable reply, which being communicated to Dr.
Johnson, greatly affected him; but eventually he had to confess that his
application had been unsuccessful, and made a counter proposal, very
gratefully refused by Johnson, that he should draw upon him to the
amount of £500 or £600.
On Wednesday, June 30, I dined with him, for the last time, at Sir
Joshua Reynolds's, no other company being present; and on July 2 I left
London for Scotland.
Soon afterwards he had the mortification of being informed by Mrs.
Thrale that she was actually going to marry Signor Piozzi, a papist, and
her daughter's music-master. He endeavoured to prevent the marriage, but
in vain.
Eleven days after I myself had left town, Johnson set out on a jaunt to
Staffordshire and Derbyshire, flattering himself that he might be, in
some degree, relieved; but towards the end of October he had to confess
that his progress was slight. But there was in him an animated and lofty
spirit, and such was his love of London that he languished when absent
from it. To Dr. Brocklesby he wrote: "I am not afraid either of a
journey to London, or of a residence in it. The town is my element;
there are my friends, there are my books, to which I have not yet bid
farewell, and there are my amusements. Sir Joshua told me long ago that
my vocation was to public life, and I hope still to keep my station,
till God shall bid me 'Go in peace.'"
He arrived in London on November 16. Soon after his return both the
asthma and the dropsy became more violent and distressful, and though he
was attended by Dr. Heberden, Dr. Brocklesby, Dr. Warren, and Dr.
Butter, who all refused fees, and though he himself co-operated with
them, and made deep incisions in his body to draw off the water from it,
he gradually sank. On December 2, he sent directions for inscribing
epitaphs for his father, mother, and brother on a memorial slab in St.
Michael's Church, Lichfield. On December 8 and 9 he made his will; and
on Monday, December 13, he expired about seven o'clock in the evening,
with so little apparent pain that his attendants hardly perceived when
his dissolution took place. A week later he was buried in Westminster
Abbey, his old schoolfellow, Dr. Taylor, reading the service.
I trust I shall not be accused of affectation when I declare that I find
myself unable to express all that I felt upon the loss of such a "Guide,
Philosopher, and Friend." I shall, therefore, not say one word of my
own, but adopt those of an eminent friend, which he uttered with an
abrupt felicity: "He has made a chasm, which not only nothing can fill
up, but which nothing has a tendency to fill up. Johnson is dead. Let us
go to the next best: there is nobody; no man can be said to put you in
mind of Johnson."
* * * * *