Mrs. Reynolds also had her coteries, which were occasionally attended
by most of the persons who have been named; equally from consideration
to her brother, and personal respect to herself.
Mrs. Reynolds wrote an essay on Taste, which she submitted, in the year
1781, to the private criticism of her sincere friend, Dr. Johnson.
But it should seem that the work, though full of intrinsic merit, was
warpt in its execution by that perplexity of ideas in which perpetual
ponderings, and endless recurrence to first notions, so subversive
of all progression, cloudily involved the thoughts, as well as the
expressions, of this ingenious lady; for the award of Dr. Johnson,
notwithstanding it contained high praise and encouragement for the
revision of the treatise, frankly avows, “that her notions, though
manifesting a depth of penetration, and a nicety of remark, such
as Locke or Pascal might be proud of, must everywhere be rendered
smoother and plainer; and he doubts whether many of them are very clear
even to her own mind.”
Probably the task which he thus pointed out to her of development and
explanation, was beyond the boundary of her powers; for though she
lived twenty years after the receipt of this counsel, the work never
was published.