While thus with Dr. Johnson, the most reverenced of Dr. Burney’s
connexions, all intercourse was shaken in gaiety and happiness, with
Sir Joshua Reynolds, save from grief for Dr. Johnson, gaiety and
happiness still seemed almost stationary.
Sir Joshua Reynolds had a suavity of disposition that set every
body at their ease in his society; though neither that, nor what Dr.
Johnson called his “_inoffensiveness_,” bore the character of a tame
insipidity that never differed from a neighbour; or that knew not how
to support an opposing opinion with firmness and independence. On the
contrary, Sir Joshua was even peculiar in thinking for himself: and
frequently, after a silent rumination, to which he was unavoidably
led by not following up, from his deafness, the various stages of any
given question, he would surprise the whole company by starting some
new and unexpected idea on the subject in discussion, in a manner so
imaginative and so original, that it either drew the attention of the
interlocutors into a quite different mode of argument to that with
which they had set out; or it incited them to come forth, in battle
array, against the novelty of his assertions. In the first case, he was
frankly gratified, but never moved to triumph; in the second, he met
the opposition with candour; but was never brow-beaten from defending
his cause with courage, even by the most eminent antagonist.
Both father and daughter shared his favour alike; and both returned it
with an always augmenting attachment.