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THE

LIFE

OF

SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL. D.

COMPREHENDING

AN ACCOUNT OF HIS

STUDIES AND NUMEROUS WORKS,

IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER;

A SERIES OF HIS

EPISTOLARY CORRESPONDENCE AND CONVERSATIONS
WITH MANY EMINENT PERSONS;

AND VARIOUS

ORIGINAL PIECES OF HIS COMPOSITION,

NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED:

THE WHOLE EXHIBITING

A Wiew of Literature and Literary Men in Great Britain

FOR NEAR HALF A CENTURY DURING WHICH HE FLOURISHED.

BY JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

WITH COPIOUS NOTES AND BIOGRAPHICAL ILLUSTRATIONS,
BY MALONE.

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

VOL. III.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR J. RICHARDSON AND CO.; G. OFFOR; THOMAS TEGG;
W. SHARPE AND SON; G. WALKER; R. DOBSON;

ROBINSON AND CO.; J. EVANS AND SONS; J. JONES; AND J. JOHNSON:
ALSO, J. CARFRAE, AND J. SUTHERLAND, EDINBURGH;
AND R. GRIFFIN AND CO. GLASGOW.

1823.

C. Whittingham, College House, Chiswick.

THE

LIFE

OF

SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL. D.

ON Tuesday, March 26, there came for us an equipage properly suited to a wealthy wellbeneficed clergyman: Dr. Taylor's large, roomy postchaise, drawn by four stout plump horses, and driven by two steady jolly postillions, which conveyed us to Ashbourne; where I found my friend's schoolfellow living upon an establishment perfectly corresponding with his substantial creditable equipage: his house, garden, pleasuregrounds, table, in short every thing good, and no scantiness appearing. Every man should form such a plan of living as he can execute completely. Let him not draw an outline wider than he can fill up. I have seen many skeletons of show and magnificence which excite at once ridicule and pity. Dr. Taylor had a good estate of his own, and good preferment in the church, being a prebendary of Westminster, and rector of Bosworth. He was a diligent justice of the peace, and presided over the town of Ashbourne, to the inhabitants of which I was told he was ‣ very liberal; and as a proof of this it was mentioned to me, he had, the preceding winter, distributed two hundred pounds among such of

VOL. III.

B

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