it not be forgotten that much likewise is performed; and though
no book was ever spared out of tenderness to the authour, and
the world is little solicitous to know whence proceeded the
faults of that which it condemns; yet it may gratify curiosity
to inform it that the _English Dictionary_ was written with
little assistance of the learned, and without any patronage
of the great; not in the soft obscurities of retirement, or
under the shelter of academick bowers, but amidst inconvenience
and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may repress
the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our
language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an
attempt which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the
lexicons of ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and comprised
in a few volumes, be yet, after the toil of successive ages,
inadequate and delusive; if the aggregated knowledge, and
co-operating diligence of the _Italian_ academicians, did
not secure them from the censure of _Beni_; if the embodied
criticks of _France_, when fifty years had been spent upon
their work, were obliged to change its oeconomy, and give their
second edition another form, I may surely be contented without
the praise of perfection, which, if I could obtain, in this
gloom of solitude, what would it avail me? I have protracted
my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk
into the grave, and success and miscarriage are empty sounds: I
therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to
fear or hope from censure or from praise.
This extract is taken from the fourth edition, London, MDCCLXXIII,
the last to receive Johnson's corrections. If you possibly can get
the opportunity, turn these volumes over enough to find a few of the
whimsical definitions, such, for example, as that of lexicographer,
according to Johnson "a writer of dictionaries, a _harmless drudge_."
Other words worth looking up are _excise_, _oats_, and _networks_.
=21= 6. =Junius and Skinner.= Johnson frankly admitted that for
etymologies he turned to the shelf which contained the etymological
dictionaries of these seventeenth-century students of the Teutonic
languages. This phase of dictionary making was not considered so deeply
then as it is now.
=21= 13. =spunging-houses.= Johnson's _Dictionary_ says:
"Spunging-house. A house to which debtors are taken before commitment
to prison, where the bailiffs sponge upon them, or riot at their cost."
=21= 26. =Jenyns.= This writer, who, according to Boswell, "could very
happily play with a light subject," ventured so far beyond his depth
that it was easy for Johnson to expose him.
=22= 10. =Rasselas.= Had Johnson written nothing else, says Boswell,
_Rasselas_ "would have rendered his name immortal in the world of
literature.... It has been translated into most, if not all, of the
modern languages."
=22= 12. =Miss Lydia Languish.= Of course plays are not necessarily
written to be read, but Sheridan's well-known comedy, _The Rivals_, is
decidedly readable. Every one should be familiar with Miss Languish and
Mrs. Malaprop.
=23= 8. =Bruce.= The _Dictionary of National Biography_ says that
James Bruce--whose _Travels to Discover the Sources of the Nile_, five
volumes, appeared in 1790--"will always remain the poet, and his work
the epic, of African travel."
=23= 13. =Mrs. Lennox.= A woman whose literary efforts Johnson
encouraged so much as he did Mrs. Lennox's is certainly worth looking
up in the index to Boswell's _Johnson_.--=Mrs. Sheridan=, the
dramatist's mother, gave Johnson many an entertaining evening in her
home. She and her son entered heartily into the lively, stimulating
conversations he loved.
=23= 25. =Hector ... Aristotle.= The sacking of Troy is generally
assigned to the twelfth century B.C. Aristotle lived eight centuries
later.--=Julio Romano.= An Italian painter of the fifteenth century.
=24= 5. =the Lord Privy Seal.= Some documents require only the privy
seal; others must have the great seal too. For Johnson's admission that
the printer was wise in striking out the reference alluded to, see the
index to Boswell's _Johnson_, under _Gower_.
=24= 14. =Oxford.= By recalling what Macaulay said in the early part of
the essay (=10= 26, 27) about Oxford, and by bearing in mind what House
[of Stuart? of Hanover?] George the Third belonged to, one sees point
to "was becoming loyal."
=24= 14-18. Study these four short sentences in connection with the
preceding sentence beginning "George the Third." To what extent are
they a repetition? To what extent an explanation?
=24= 22. =accepted.= When, in answer to Johnson's question to Lord
Bute, "Pray, my Lord, what am I expected to do for this pension?" he
received the ready reply, "It is not given you for anything you are to
do, but for what you have done," he hesitated no longer.
Three hundred a year was a large sum in Johnson's eyes at that time.
Whether he wrote less than he would have written without it may be
questioned, says Mr. Hill, but he adds that probably "without the
pension he would not have lived to write the second greatest of his
works--the _Lives of the Poets_."
=25= 19. =a ghost ... Cock Lane.= If you will read Boswell's account of
the affair, you will probably conclude that Johnson was not quite so
"weak" as Macaulay implies.
=25= 26. =Churchill.= One of the reigning wits of the day, Boswell says.
=26= 3. =The preface.= Other critics speak with more enthusiasm of the
good sense and the clear expression of the preface, and find that these
qualities are not altogether lacking in the notes.
=26= 8. =Wilhelm Meister.= The hero of Goethe's novel of the same name.
You may have read this passage on _Hamlet_ in Rolfe's edition (p. 14),
quoted from Furness's _Hamlet_, Vol. II, pp. 272 ff. Sprague also
quotes it in his edition, p. 13.
=26= 26. =Ben.= The eighteenth-century Johnson has been followed by
the nineteenth-century critics in putting a high estimate on the Jonson
who wrote _Every Man in His Humor_. We are told that Shakspere took
one of the parts in this play, acted in 1598. If you are not satisfied
with the account in _The Century Dictionary_, or with any encyclopædia
article, see _The English Poets_, edited by T. H. Ward, Vol. II (The
Macmillan Company).
=26= 33-34. =Æschylus, Euripides, Sophocles.= Three great contemporary
Greek tragedians.
=27= 3. =Fletcher.= Point out why an editor of Shakspere's plays should
be familiar with the work of this group of Elizabethan dramatists.
=27= 11. =Royal Academy.= "His Majesty having the preceding year [1768]
instituted the Royal Academy of Arts in London, Johnson had won the
honour of being appointed Professor in Ancient Literature."--Boswell.
Goldsmith was Professor in Ancient History in the same institution, and
Boswell was Secretary for Foreign Correspondence. Look in _The Century
Dictionary_ under _academy_, the third meaning, and recall whatever you
may have heard or read about the French Academy.
=27= 12. =the King.= "His Majesty expressed a desire to have the
literary biography of this country ably executed, and proposed to Dr.
Johnson to undertake it."--Boswell. Read Boswell's account of the
interview. In consulting the index look under _George III._
=27= 22. =colloquial talents.= Madame d'Arblay once said that Johnson
had about him more "fun, and comical humour, and love of nonsense" than
almost anybody else she ever saw.
=28= 23. =Goldsmith.= Macaulay's article on Goldsmith in _The
Encyclopædia Britannica_ is short, and so thoroughly readable that
there is no excuse for not being familiar with it. Boswell is
continually giving interesting glimpses of Dr. Oliver Goldsmith, and
by taking advantage of the index in the _Life of Johnson_ one may in
half an hour learn a great deal about this remarkable man. According
to Boswell, "he had sagacity enough to cultivate assiduously the
acquaintance of Johnson, and his faculties were gradually enlarged by
the contemplation of such a model."
=28= 24. =Reynolds.= We can learn from short articles about Sir
Joshua's career, but the index to Boswell's _Johnson_ will introduce
us to the good times the great portrait painter had with the great
conversationalist whom we are studying. Reynolds was the first proposer
of the Club, and "there seems to have been hardly a day," says Robina
Napier, "when these friends did not meet in the painting room or in
general society." Ruskin says, "Titian paints nobler pictures and
Vandyke had nobler subjects, but neither of them entered so subtly as
Sir Joshua did into the minor varieties of human heart and temper."
The business of his art "was not to criticise, but to observe," and
for this purpose the hours he spent at the Club might be as profitable
as those spent in his painting room. It will be interesting to make a
list of some of the most notable "subjects" Reynolds painted.--=Burke.=
Be sure to read Boswell's account of the famous Round Robin. It
will make you feel better acquainted with Burke, Johnson, Reynolds,
and Goldsmith. The student will find valuable material in Professor
Lamont's edition of Burke's _Speech on Conciliation with America_,
published by Ginn & Company.
=28= 25. =Gibbon.= You noticed on the _Round Robin_ the autograph of
the author of _The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_?
=28= 26. =Jones.= Sir William Henry Rich Jones was "the first English
scholar to master Sanskrit, and to recognize its importance for
comparative philology," says _The Century Dictionary_.
=29= 9. =Johnson's Club.= The Club still flourishes. Both Scott and
Macaulay belonged to it.
=29= 14. =James Boswell.= "Out of the fifteen millions that then lived,
and had bed and board, in the British Islands, this man has provided us
a greater _pleasure_ than any other individual, at whose cost we now
enjoy ourselves; perhaps has done us a greater _service_ than can be
specially attributed to more than two or three: yet, ungrateful that
we are, no written or spoken eulogy of James Boswell anywhere exists;
his recompense in solid pudding (so far as copyright went) was not
excessive; and as for the empty praise, it has altogether been denied
him. Men are unwiser than children; they do not know the hand that
feeds."
So Carlyle writes of the man; the book, he says, is "beyond any other
product of the eighteenth century"; it draws aside the curtains of the
Past and gives us a picture which changeful Time cannot harm or hide.
The picture charms generation after generation because it is true. "It
is not speaking with exaggeration, but with strict measured sobriety,
to say that this Book of Boswell's will give us more real insight into
the _History of England_ during those days than twenty other Books,
falsely entitled 'Histories,' which take to themselves that special
aim.... The thing I want to see is not Redbook Lists, and Court
Calendars, and Parliamentary Registers, but the LIFE OF MAN in England:
what men did, thought, suffered, enjoyed; the form, especially the
spirit, of their terrestrial existence, its outward environment, its
inward principle; _how_ and _what_ it was; whence it proceeded, whither
it was tending....
"Hence, indeed, comes it that History, which should be 'the essence of
innumerable Biographies,' will tell us, question it as we like, less
than one genuine Biography may do, pleasantly and of its own accord!"
Mr. Leslie Stephen says that "Macaulay's graphic description of
his absurdities, and Carlyle's more penetrating appreciation of his
higher qualities, contain all that can be said"; but the more recent
testimony of Dr. George B. Hill, in _Dr. Johnson, His Friends and His
Critics_, should count for something. Dr. Hill points out that while
Macaulay grants Boswell immortality he refuses him greatness, and calls
attention to what he considers elements of greatness. In regard to the
accuracy of a biographer who would "run half over London, in order to
fix a date correctly," he says: "That love, I might almost say that
passion for accuracy, that distinguished Boswell in so high a degree
does not belong to a mind that is either mean or feeble. Mean minds are
indifferent to truth, and feeble minds can see no importance in a date."
=29= 27. =Wilkes.= John Wilkes, a notorious politician, was imprisoned
for writing an article in which he attacked George the Third. The
liberty of the press was involved and Wilkes was released, much to
the delight of the people. For a brief summary of the Bill of Rights,
see Brewer's _Historic Note-book_ or _A Handbook of English Political
History_, by Acland and Ransome.
=29= 29. =Whitfield.= Macaulay's short sentence implies, does it not,
that Whitfield (or Whitefield) was a noisy, open-air preacher among the
Calvinistic Methodists? In testing the accuracy of this inference in
_The Encyclopædia Britannica_ or in Franklin's _Autobiography_, note in
what countries Whitefield preached, and where he died. Boswell quotes
Johnson's opinion of Whitefield in two places.
=29= 30. =In a happy hour.= May 16, 1763. By all means read Boswell's
account of the rough reception he received and the persistence
necessary to secure the fastening.
=31= 14. =pity ... esteem.= The Thrales were not alone in overlooking
these oddities. "His tricks and contortions, a subject for pity not
ridicule," says Mr. Hoste, "were ignored by the celebrated wits and
beauties who visited him in his gloomy 'den,' and by the duchesses and
other distinguished ladies who gathered 'four and five deep' around him
at fashionable assemblies, hanging on his sentences, and contended for
the nearest places to his chair."
=31= 15. =Southwark.= South of the commercial center of London and
across the Thames.
=31= 16. =Streatham.= About five miles southwest of London City.
The Southwark apartment was in a commercial district; the Streatham
apartment in a thinly settled residential suburb.
=31= 34. =Maccaroni.= See _The Century Dictionary_ or Brewer's
_Handbook of Phrase and Fable_.
=32= 21. =Levett.= Of Levett, Goldsmith said to Boswell, "He is poor
and honest, which is recommendation enough to Johnson."
=32= 30. =the Mitre Tavern.= "The Mitre Tavern still stands in Fleet
Street: but where now is its Scot-and-lot paying, beef-and-ale
loving, cock-hatted, potbellied Landlord; its rosy-faced, assiduous
Landlady, with all her shining brass-pans, waxed tables, well-filled
larder-shelves; her cooks, and bootjacks, and errand-boys, and
watery-mouthed hangers-on? Gone! Gone! The becking waiter, that with
wreathed smiles was wont to spread for Samuel and Bozzy their 'supper
of the gods,' has long since pocketed his last sixpence; and vanished,
six-pences and all, like a ghost at cockcrowing." Yet, Carlyle goes on
to say, thanks to this book of Boswell's, "they who are gone are still
here; though hidden they are revealed, though dead they yet speak."
=33= 27. =Hebrides.= Locate these picturesque islands on the map.
=34= 10. =Lord Mansfield.= William Murray, chief justice of the King's
Bench from 1756 to 1788, has been called "the founder of English
commercial law."
=34= 23. =Macpherson.= In 1760 James Macpherson published what
purported to be fragments of Gaelic verse with translations. These
were so interesting that he was sent to the Highlands to hunt for
more, and within three years he published the _Poems of Ossian_,
consisting of two epics, "Fingal" and "Temora." Their genuineness has
been discussed ever since. Evidently Johnson settled the matter to his
own satisfaction and to Macaulay's, and you may be interested in what
Boswell has to say. At the same time it seems clear that Johnson went
too far in his charge of forgery. Macpherson probably did not find a
complete epic, yet he undoubtedly found some Gaelic poetry.
=34= 27. =contemptuous terms.= Boswell gives the following letter:
MR. JAMES MACPHERSON,
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 not be
deterred from detecting what I think a cheat, by the menaces of
a ruffian.
What would you have me retract? I thought your book an
imposture; I think it an imposture still. For this opinion I
have given my reasons to the publick, which I here dare you to
refute. Your rage I defy. Your abilities, since your Homer, are
not so formidable; and what I hear of your morals, inclines me
to pay regard not to what you shall say, but to what you shall
prove. You may print this if you will.
SAM. JOHNSON.
=35= 11-12. =The Kenricks, Campbells, MacNicols, and Hendersons.= If
Johnson and Macaulay do not tell enough about these men, Boswell does.
=35= 30. =Bentley.= Richard Bentley (1662-1742), a well-known English
classical scholar and critic.
=36= 13. =Taxation no Tyranny.= The rest of the title is _An Answer to
the Resolutions and Address of the American Congress_.
=37= 6. =Wilson.= Richard Wilson was one of the greatest English
landscape painters, says _The Dictionary of National Biography_.
=37= 14. =Cowley.= The man who wrote
God the first garden made, and the first city Cain.
=37= 18. =Restoration.= The _International Dictionary_ offers a brief
explanation in case you are not absolutely certain of the exact meaning.
=37= 23. =Walmesley.= See note to =5= 32.--=Button's.= Button's
coffeehouse flourished earlier in the century. Do you remember any
other reference to it? to Will's? to Child's?--=Cibber.= Colley Cibber,
actor and dramatist, altered and adapted some of Shakspere's plays.
Both Johnson and Boswell express their opinions of him frankly enough.
He was appointed poet laureate in 1730.
=37= 25. =Orrery.= Orrery did more than enjoy this privilege,--he wrote
a book entitled _Remarks on the Life and Writings of Jonathan Swift_.
Boswell records Johnson's opinion of it. What other great literary men
enjoyed the society of Swift? _The Century Dictionary_ gives a column
to Swift, and Johnson has a sketch in his _Lives of the Poets_.
=37= 26. =services of no very honourable kind.= By supplying Pope with
private intelligence for his _Dunciad_ he "gained the esteem of Pope
and the enmity of his victims."
=38= 32. =Malone.= Edmund Malone was a friend of Johnson, Burke, and
Reynolds. He wrote a supplement to Johnson's edition of Shakspere,
published an edition of Reynolds's works, and after bringing out his
own edition of Shakspere, left material for another edition, which was
published by James Boswell the younger in 1821. Boswell's _Malone_, the
"third variorum" edition, is generally considered the best. To Boswell
the elder, an intimate friend, he was of much assistance in preparing
the _Life of Johnson_, and he edited with valuable notes the third,
fourth, fifth, and sixth reissues of the work.
=40= 21-22. =In a solemn and tender prayer.=
Almighty God, Father of all mercy, help me by thy grace, that
I may, with humble and sincere thankfulness, remember the
comforts and conveniences which I have enjoyed at this place;
and that I may resign them with holy submission, equally
trusting in thy protection when thou givest, and when thou
takest away. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, have mercy upon me.
To thy fatherly protection, O Lord, I commend this family.
Bless, guide, and defend them, that they may so pass through
this world, as finally to enjoy in thy presence everlasting
happiness, for Jesus Christ's sake, Amen.--Boswell's _Johnson_.
=41= 1. =Italian fiddler.= A violinist of much talent. Piozzi was
the music master from Brescia who, a little over three years after
Mr. Thrale's death, married the widow. After learning what you can
from Boswell, you will enjoy some such account as the _Encyclopædia
Britannica_ offers. While doing your reading it may be well to keep in
mind what two or three critics have said. Mr. Mowbray Morris writes:
"After all the abuse showered on the unfortunate woman it is pleasant
to know that the marriage proved a happy one in every respect. Piozzi,
who was really a well-mannered, amiable man, took every care of his
wife's fortune, and on their return to England her family and friends
were soon reconciled to him." Mr. Leslie Stephen says: "Her love of
Piozzi, which was both warm and permanent, is the most amiable feature
of her character." Mr. Herbert Paul, after praising Macaulay's _Life of
Johnson_, adds, "Yet, if I may say so, I can never forgive Macaulay for
his cruel and unaccountable injustice to Mrs. Thrale."
=41= 3. =the Ephesian matron.= She cared so much for her husband that
she went into the vault to die with him, and there, in the midst of
her violent grief, fell in love with a soldier who was guarding some
dead bodies near by. For the story (told by a Latin writer, Petronius),
see Jeremy Taylor's _The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying_, Chapter V,
section 8.--=the two pictures.= In Act III.
=42= 2. =Burke parted from him.= After twenty-seven years of
uninterrupted friendship with Johnson, says Robina Napier.--=Windham.=
The Right Hon. William Windham, a member of the Club, a friend of
Malone, Burke, Fox, and Pitt; in 1794 Secretary at War (Pitt's
ministry), in 1806 War and Colonial Secretary (Lord Grenville's
ministry); in the words of Macaulay, "the first gentleman of his age,
the ingenious, the chivalrous, the high-souled Windham." Johnson wrote
him appreciative letters in August and October, 1784. See Boswell.
=42= 4. =Frances Burney.= In Macaulay's essay on Madame d'Arblay, he
says: "Her appearance is an important epoch in our literary history.
Evelina was the first tale written by a woman, and purporting to be a
picture of life and manners, that lived or deserved to live." Read this
account of the "timid and obscure girl" who suddenly "found herself on
the highest pinnacle of fame," eulogized by such men as Burke, Windham,
Gibbon, Reynolds, and Sheridan.
=42= 6. =Langton.= See page 30.
=42= 10-11. =his temper.= In connection with this closing sentence let
us remember a paragraph from Boswell (1776):
"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 every one 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."
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Trevelyan, _Life and Letters_, I, 41.
[2] Trevelyan, I, 47.
[3] The entire letter is interesting. See Trevelyan, I, 56. The letters
of this period are particularly attractive.
[4] _Ibid._ I, 91.
[5] Trevelyan, I, 102. The letters from college are well worth reading.
[6] Trevelyan, I, 136.
[7] _Ibid._, 179.
[8] Trevelyan, I, 249-253.
[9] Trevelyan, I, 368.
[10] _Ibid._, II, 68.
[11] Trevelyan, II, 89.
[12] _Carlyle's Essay on Burns_, p. 5, Ginn's edition.
[13] Trevelyan, II. 96.
[14] For Trevelyan's evidence, see II, 191.
[15] Trevelyan, II, 244.
[16] _Ibid._, 321.
[17] Trevelyan, II, 15.
[18] _The Quarterly Review_, July, 1876.
[19] It is proper to observe that this passage bears a very close
resemblance to a passage in the Rambler (No. 20). The resemblance may
possibly be the effect of unconscious plagiarism.--_Macaulay._
Transcriber's Notes:
Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant
preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected.
To preserve line numbers on pages 1-75, each line on those pages is
shown here as it appeared in the original book, with two exceptions: to
make the text searchable, words originally split across two lines have
been made whole by moving them to one or the other of those lines; and
a few words have been moved to adjacent lines so they would not extend
into the area reserved for line numbers.