between what a man may experience by the mere strength of his
imagination, and what imagination cannot possibly produce. Thus, suppose
I should think that I saw a form, and heard a voice cry "Johnson, you
are a very wicked fellow, and unless you repent you will certainly be
punished;" my own unworthiness is so deeply impressed upon my mind, that
I might _imagine_ I thus saw and heard, and therefore I should not
believe that an external communication had been made to me. But if a
form should appear, and a voice should tell me that a particular man had
died at a particular place, and a particular hour, a fact which I had no
apprehension of, nor any means of knowing, and this fact, with all its
circumstances, should afterwards be unquestionably proved, I should, in
that case, be persuaded that I had supernatural intelligence imparted to
me.'
[Page 406: The Cock-lane Ghost. A.D. 1763.]
Here it is proper, once for all, to give a true and fair statement of
Johnson's way of thinking upon the question, whether departed spirits
are ever permitted to appear in this world, or in any way to operate
upon human life. He has been ignorantly misrepresented as weakly
credulous upon that subject; and, therefore, though I feel an
inclination to disdain and treat with silent contempt so foolish a
notion concerning my illustrious friend, yet as I find it has gained
ground, it is necessary to refute it. The real fact then is, that
Johnson had a very philosophical mind, and such a rational respect for
testimony, as to make him submit his understanding to what was
authentically proved, though he could not comprehend why it was so.
Being thus disposed, he was willing to inquire into the truth of any
relation of supernatural agency, a general belief of which has prevailed
in all nations and ages[1191]. But so far was he from being the dupe of
implicit faith, that he examined the matter with a jealous attention,
and no man was more ready to refute its falsehood when he had discovered
it. Churchill, in his poem entitled _The Ghost_, availed himself of the
absurd credulity imputed to Johnson, and drew a caricature of him under
the name of 'POMPOSO[1192],' representing him as one of the believers of
the story of a Ghost in Cock-lane, which, in the year 1762, had gained
very general credit in London[1193]. Many of my readers, I am convinced,
are to this hour under an impression that Johnson was thus foolishly
deceived. It will therefore surprise them a good deal when they are
informed upon undoubted authority, that Johnson was one of those by whom
the imposture was detected. The story had become so popular, that he
thought it should be investigated[1194]; and in this research he was
assisted by the Reverend Dr. Douglas[1195], now Bishop of Salisbury, the
great detector of impostures; who informs me, that after the gentlemen
who went and examined into the evidence were satisfied of its falsity,
Johnson wrote in their presence an account of it, which was published in
the newspapers and _Gentleman's Magazine_, and undeceived the world[1196].
[Page 408: Subordination. A.D. 1763.]
Our conversation proceeded. 'Sir, (said he) I am a friend to
subordination, as most conducive to the happiness of society[1197]. There
is a reciprocal pleasure in governing and being governed.'
'Dr. Goldsmith is one of the first men we now have as an authour, and he
is a very worthy man too. He has been loose in his principles, but he is
coming right.'
[Page 409: Scotch Landlords. Ætat 54.]
I mentioned Mallet's tragedy of _Elvira_[1198], which had been acted the
preceding winter at Drury-lane, and that the Honourable Andrew
Erskine[1199], Mr. Dempster[1200], and myself, had joined in writing a
pamphlet, entitled, _Critical Strictures_, against it[1201]. That the
mildness of Dempster's disposition had, however, relented; and he had
candidly said, 'We have hardly a right to abuse this tragedy: for bad as
it is, how vain should either of us be to write one not near so good.'
JOHNSON. 'Why no, Sir; this is not just reasoning. You may abuse a
tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has
made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your
trade to make tables.'
When I talked to him of the paternal estate to which I was heir, he
said, 'Sir, let me tell you, that to be a Scotch landlord, where you
have a number of families dependent upon you, and attached to you, is,
perhaps, as high a situation as humanity can arrive at. A merchant upon
the 'Change of London, with a hundred thousand pounds, is nothing; an
English Duke, with an immense fortune, is nothing; he has no tenants who
consider themselves as under his patriarchal care, and who will follow
him to the field upon an emergency.'
His notion of the dignity of a Scotch landlord had been formed upon what
he had heard of the Highland Chiefs; for it is long since a lowland
landlord has been so curtailed in his feudal authority, that he has
little more influence over his tenants than an English landlord; and of
late years most of the Highland Chiefs have destroyed, by means too well
known, the princely power which they once enjoyed[1202].
[Page 410: Johnson's kindness of heart. A.D. 1763.]
He proceeded: 'Your going abroad, Sir, and breaking off idle habits, may
be of great importance to you. I would go where there are courts and
learned men. There is a good deal of Spain that has not been
perambulated. I would have you go thither[1203]. A man of inferiour talents
to yours may furnish us with useful observations upon that country.' His
supposing me, at that period of life, capable of writing an account of
my travels that would deserve to be read, elated me not a little.
I appeal to every impartial reader whether this faithful detail of his
frankness, complacency, and kindness to a young man, a stranger and a
Scotchman, does not refute the unjust opinion of the harshness of his
general demeanour. His occasional reproofs of folly, impudence, or
impiety, and even the sudden sallies of his constitutional irritability
of temper, which have been preserved for the poignancy of their wit,
have produced that opinion among those who have not considered that such
instances, though collected by Mrs. Piozzi into a small volume, and read
over in a few hours, were, in fact, scattered through a long series of
years; years, in which his time was chiefly spent in instructing and
delighting mankind by his writings and conversation, in acts of piety to
GOD, and good-will to men[1204].
I complained to him that I had not yet acquired much knowledge, and
asked his advice as to my studies[1205]. He said, 'Don't talk of study now.
I will give you a plan; but it will require some time to consider of
it.' 'It is very good in you (I replied,) to allow me to be with you
thus. Had it been foretold to me some years ago that I should pass an
evening with the authour of _The Rambler_, how should I have exulted!'
What I then expressed, was sincerely from the heart. He was satisfied
that it was, and cordially answered, 'Sir, I am glad we have met. I hope
we shall pass many evenings and mornings too, together.' We finished a
couple of bottles of port, and sat till between one and two in the
morning.
[Page 411: Oliver Goldsmith. Ætat 54.]
He wrote this year in the _Critical Review_ the account of 'Telemachus,
a Mask,' by the Reverend George Graham, of Eton College[1206]. The subject
of this beautiful poem was particularly interesting to Johnson, who had
much experience of 'the conflict of opposite principles,' which he
describes as 'The contention between pleasure and virtue, a struggle
which will always be continued while the present system of nature shall
subsist: nor can history or poetry exhibit more than pleasure triumphing
over virtue, and virtue subjugating pleasure.'
[Page 412: Oliver Goldsmith. A.D. 1763.]
As Dr. Oliver Goldsmith will frequently appear in this narrative, I
shall endeavour to make my readers in some degree acquainted with his
singular character. He was a native of Ireland, and a contemporary with
Mr. Burke at Trinity College, Dublin, but did not then give much promise
of future celebrity[1207]. He, however, observed to Mr. Malone, that
'though he made no great figure in mathematicks[1208], which was a study in
much repute there, he could turn an Ode of Horace into English better
than any of them.' He afterwards studied physick at Edinburgh, and upon
the Continent; and I have been informed, was enabled to pursue his
travels on foot[1209], partly by demanding at Universities to enter the
lists as a disputant, by which, according to the custom of many of them,
he was entitled to the premium of a crown, when luckily for him his
challenge was not accepted; so that, as I once observed to Dr. Johnson,
he _disputed_ his passage through Europe[1210]. He then came to England,
and was employed successively in the capacities of an usher to an
academy, a corrector of the press, a reviewer, and a writer for a
news-paper. He had sagacity enough to cultivate assiduously the
acquaintance of Johnson, and his faculties were gradually enlarged by
the contemplation of such a model. To me and many others it appeared
that he studiously copied the manner of Johnson[1211], though, indeed, upon
a smaller scale.
At this time I think he had published nothing with his name[1212], though
it was pretty generally known that _one Dr. Goldsmith_ was the authour
of _An Enquiry into the present State of polite Learning in Europe_[1213],
and of _The Citizen of the World_[1214], a series of letters supposed to be
written from London by a Chinese. No man had the art of displaying with
more advantage as a writer, whatever literary acquisitions he made.
'_Nihil quod tetigit non ornavit_'[1215]. His mind resembled a fertile, but
thin soil. There was a quick, but not a strong vegetation, of whatever
chanced to be thrown upon it. No deep root could be struck. The oak of
the forest did not grow there; but the elegant shrubbery and the
fragrant parterre appeared in gay succession. It has been generally
circulated and believed that he was a mere fool in conversation[1216]; but,
in truth, this has been greatly exaggerated.
He had, no doubt, a more than common share of that hurry of ideas which
we often find in his countrymen, and which sometimes produces a
laughable confusion in expressing them. He was very much what the French
call _un etourdi_[1217], and from vanity and an eager desire of being
conspicuous wherever he was, he frequently talked carelessly without
knowledge of the subject, or even without thought. His person was short,
his countenance coarse and vulgar, his deportment that of a scholar
awkwardly affecting the easy gentleman[1218]. Those who were in any way
distinguished, excited envy in him to so ridiculous an excess, that the
instances of it are hardly credible[1219]. When accompanying two beautiful
young ladies[1220] with their mother on a tour in France, he was seriously
angry that more attention was paid to them than to him[1221]; and once at
the exhibition of the _Fantoccini_[1222] in London, when those who sat next
him observed with what dexterity a puppet was made to toss a pike, he
could not bear that it should have such praise, and exclaimed with some
warmth, 'Pshaw! I can do it better myself[1223].'
[Page 415: The Vicar of Wakefield. Ætat 54.]
He, I am afraid, had no settled system of any sort[1224], so that his
conduct must not be strictly scrutinised; but his affections were social
and generous, and when he had money he gave it away very liberally. His
desire of imaginary consequence predominated over his attention to
truth. When he began to rise into notice, he said he had a brother who
was Dean of Durham[1225], a fiction so easily detected, that it is
wonderful how he should have been so inconsiderate as to hazard it. He
boasted to me at this time of the power of his pen in commanding money,
which I believe was true in a certain degree, though in the instance he
gave he was by no means correct. He told me that he had sold a novel for
four hundred pounds. This was his _Vicar of Wakefield_. But Johnson
informed me, that he had made the bargain for Goldsmith, and the price
was sixty pounds[1226]. 'And, Sir, (said he,) a sufficient price too, when
it was sold; for then the fame of Goldsmith had not been elevated, as it
afterwards was, by his _Traveller_; and the bookseller had such faint
hopes of profit by his bargain, that he kept the manuscript by him a
long time, and did not publish it till after _The Traveller_ had
appeared[1227]. Then, to be sure, it was accidentally worth more
money[1228].'
Mrs. Piozzi[1229] and Sir John Hawkins[1230] have strangely mis-stated the
history of Goldsmith's situation and Johnson's friendly interference,
when this novel was sold. I shall give it authentically from Johnson's
own exact narration:--'I received one morning a message from poor
Goldsmith that he was in great distress, and as it was not in his power
to come to me, begging that I would come to him as soon as possible. I
sent him a guinea, and promised to come to him directly. I accordingly
went as soon as I was drest, and found that his landlady had arrested
him for his rent, at which he was in a violent passion. I perceived that
he had already changed my guinea, and had got a bottle of Madeira and a
glass before him[1231]. I put the cork into the bottle, desired he would be
calm, and began to talk to him of the means by which he might be
extricated. He then told me that he had a novel ready for the press,
which he produced to me. I looked into it, and saw its merit; told the
landlady I should soon return, and having gone to a bookseller, sold it
for sixty pounds. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he discharged his
rent, not without rating his landlady in a high tone for having used him
so ill[1232].'
[Page 417: Dr. John Campbell. Ætat 54.]
My next meeting with Johnson was on Friday the 1st of July, when he and
I and Dr. Goldsmith supped together at the Mitre. I was before this time
pretty well acquainted with Goldsmith, who was one of the brightest
ornaments of the Johnsonian school[1233]. Goldsmith's respectful attachment
to Johnson was then at its height; for his own literary reputation had
not yet distinguished him so much as to excite a vain desire of
competition with his great Master. He had increased my admiration of the
goodness of Johnson's heart, by incidental remarks in the course of
conversation, such as, when I mentioned Mr. Levet, whom he entertained
under his roof, 'He is poor and honest, which is recommendation enough
to Johnson;' and when I wondered that he was very kind to a man of whom
I had heard a very bad character, 'He is now become miserable, and that
insures the protection of Johnson.'
Goldsmith attempted this evening to maintain, I suppose from an
affectation of paradox, 'that knowledge was not desirable on its own
account, for it often was a source of unhappiness.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir,
that knowledge may in some cases produce unhappiness, I allow. But, upon
the whole, knowledge, _per se_, is certainly an object which every man
would wish to attain, although, perhaps, he may not take the trouble
necessary for attaining it[1234].'
[Page 418: Churchill's attack on Johnson. A.D. 1763.]
Dr. John Campbell[1235], the celebrated political and biographical writer,
being mentioned, Johnson said, 'Campbell is a man of much knowledge, and
has a good share of imagination. His _Herinipptis Redivivus_[1236] is very
entertaining, as an account of the Hermetick philosophy, and as
furnishing a curious history of the extravagancies of the human mind. If
it were merely imaginary it would be nothing at all. Campbell is not
always rigidly careful of truth in his conversation; but I do not
believe there is any thing of this carelessness in his books[1237].
Campbell is a good man, a pious man. I am afraid he has not been in the
inside of a church for many years[1238]; but he never passes a church
without pulling off his hat[1239]. This shews that he has good
principles[1240]. I used to go pretty often to Campbell's on a Sunday
evening[1241] till I began to consider that the shoals of Scotchmen who
flocked about him might probably say, when any thing of mine was well
done, 'Ay, ay, he has learnt this of CAWMELL!'
[Page 419: Churchill's poetry. Ætat 54.]
He talked very contemptuously of Churchill's poetry, observing that 'it
had a temporary currency, only from its audacity of abuse, and being
filled with living names, and that it would sink into oblivion.' I
ventured to hint that he was not quite a fair judge, as Churchill had
attacked him violently. JOHNSON. 'Nay, Sir, I am a very fair judge. He
did not attack me violently till he found I did not like his poetry[1242];
and his attack on me shall not prevent me from continuing to say what I
think of him, from an apprehension that it may be ascribed to
resentment. No, Sir, I called the fellow a blockhead[1243] at first, and I
will call him a blockhead still. However, I will acknowledge that I have
a better opinion of him now, than I once had; for he has shewn more
fertility than I expected[1244]. To be sure, he is a tree that cannot
produce good fruit: he only bears crabs. But, Sir, a tree that produces
a great many crabs is better than a tree which produces only a few.'
[Page 420: Bonnell Thornton's ODE. A.D. 1763.]
In this depreciation of Churchill's poetry I could not agree with
him[1245]. It is very true that the greatest part of it is upon the topicks
of the day, on which account, as it brought him great fame and profit at
the time[1246], it must proportionally slide out of the publick attention
as other occasional objects succeed. But Churchill had extraordinary
vigour both of thought and expression. His portraits of the players will
ever be valuable to the true lovers of the drama; and his strong
caricatures of several eminent men of his age, will not be forgotten by
the curious. Let me add, that there are in his works many passages which
are of a general nature[1247]; and his _Prophecy of Famine_ is a poem of no
ordinary merit. It is, indeed, falsely injurious to Scotland, but
therefore may be allowed a greater share of invention.
Bonnell Thornton had just published a burlesque _Ode on St. Cecilia's
day, adapted to the ancient British musick, viz. the salt-box, the
Jew's-harp, the marrow-bones and cleaver, the humstrum or hurdy-gurdy,
&c_. Johnson praised its humour, and seemed much diverted with it. He
repeated the following passage:--
'In strains more exalted the salt-box shall join,
And clattering and battering and clapping combine;
With a rap and a tap while the hollow side sounds,
Up and down leaps the flap, and with rattling rebounds[1248].
I mentioned the periodical paper called _The Connoisseur[1249]_. He said it
wanted matter.--No doubt it has not the deep thinking of Johnson's
writings. But surely it has just views of the surface of life, and a
very sprightly manner. His opinion of _The World_ was not much higher
than of the _Connoisseur_.
[Page 421: Tea with Miss Williams. Ætat 54.]
Let me here apologize for the imperfect manner in which I am obliged to
exhibit Johnson's conversation at this period. In the early part of my
acquaintance with him, I was so wrapt in admiration of his extraordinary
colloquial talents, and so little accustomed to his peculiar mode of
expression, that I found it extremely difficult to recollect and record
his conversation with its genuine vigour and vivacity. In progress of
time, when my mind was, as it were, _strongly impregnated--with the
Johnsonian æther_, I could, with much more facility and exactness, carry
in my memory and commit to paper the exuberant variety of his wisdom and
wit.
At this time _Miss_ Williams, as she was then called, though she did not
reside with him in the Temple under his roof, but had lodgings in
Bolt-court, Fleet-street[1250], had so much of his attention, that he every
night drank tea with her before he went home, however late it might be,
and she always sat up for him. This, it may be fairly conjectured, was
not alone a proof of his regard for _her_, but of his own unwillingness
to go into solitude, before that unseasonable hour at which he had
habituated himself to expect the oblivion of repose. Dr. Goldsmith,
being a privileged man, went with him this night, strutting away, and
calling to me with an air of superiority, like that of an esoterick over
an exoterick disciple of a sage of antiquity, 'I go to Miss Williams.' I
confess, I then envied him this mighty privilege, of which he seemed so
proud; but it was not long before I obtained the same mark of
distinction[1251].
On Tuesday the 5th of July, I again visited Johnson. He told me he had
looked into the poems of a pretty voluminous writer, Mr. (now Dr.) John
Ogilvie, one of the Presbyterian ministers of Scotland, which had lately
come out, but could find no thinking in them. BOSWELL. 'Is there not
imagination in them, Sir?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, there is in them what
_was_ imagination, but it is no more imagination in _him_, than sound is
sound in the echo. And his diction too is not his own. We have long ago
seen _white-robed innocence_, and _flower-bespangled meads_.'
[Page 422: The immensity of London. A.D. 1763.]
Talking of London, he observed, 'Sir, if you wish to have a just notion
of the magnitude of this city, you must not be satisfied with seeing its
great streets and squares, but must survey the innumerable little lanes
and courts. It is not in the showy evolutions of buildings, but in the
multiplicity of human habitations which are crouded together, that the
wonderful immensity of London consists.'--I have often amused myself
with thinking how different a place London is to different people. They,
whose narrow minds are contracted to the consideration of some one
particular pursuit, view it only through that medium. A politician
thinks of it merely as the seat of government in its different
departments; a grazier, as a vast market for cattle; a mercantile man,
as a place where a prodigious deal of business is done upon 'Change; a
dramatick enthusiast, as the grand scene of theatrical entertainments; a
man of pleasure, as an assemblage of taverns, and the great emporium for
ladies of easy virtue. But the intellectual man is struck with it, as
comprehending the whole of human life in all its variety, the
contemplation of which is inexhaustible[1252].
[Page 423: Goldsmith's eagerness to shine. Ætat 54.]