It has no similarity to a head connected with a body." com rule, a man who has waited all the morning might have the mortification to see a peer, newly come, go in before him, and Dr. Wetherell, master of the University keep him waiting still. JOHNSON. "True, College, Oxford, accompanied us home sir; but **** should not have come to the from church; and after he was gone, there levee, to be in the way of people of conse- came two other gentlemen, one of whom quence. He saw Lord Bute at all times; uttered the common-place complaints, that and could have said what he had to say at by the increase of taxes, labour would be any time, as well as at the levee. There is dear, other nations would undersell us, and now no prime minister: there is only an our commerce would be ruined. JOHNSON. agent for government in the house of com- (smiling). "Never fear, sir; our mons. We are governed by the cabinet; merce is in a very good state, and suppose but there is no one head there since we had no commerce at all, we could live Sir Robert Walpole's time." BOSWELL. very well on the produce of our own coun"What then, sir, is the use of parliament?" try." I cannot omit to mention, that I JOHNSON. "Why, sir, parliament is a never knew any man who was less dispolarge council to the king; and the advan-sed to be querulous than Johnson. Whethtage of such a council is, having a greater the subject was his own situation, or the number of men of property concerned in the legislature, who, for their own interest, will not consent to bad laws. And you must have observed, sir, the administration is feeble and timid, and cannot act with that authority and resolution which is necessary. Were I in power, I would turn out every man who dared to oppose me. Government has the distribution of offices, that it may be enabled to maintain its authority." state of the publick, or the state of human nature in general, though he saw the evils, his mind was turned to resolution, and never to whining or complaint. We went again to St. Clement's in the afternoon. He had found fault with the preacher in the morning for not choosing a text adapted to the day. The preacher in the afternoon had chosen one extremely proper: "It is finished." After the evening service, he said, "Lord Bute," he added, "took down" Come, you shall go home with me, and too fast, without building up something sit just an hour." But he was better than new." BosWELL. " Because, sir, he found his word; for after we had drunk tea with a rotten building. The political coach was Mrs. Williams, he asked me to go up to his drawn by a set of bad horses; it was neces-study with him, where we sat a long while sary to change them." JOHNSON, "But he should have changed them one by one." I told him I had been informed by Mr. Orme, that many parts of the East Indies were better mapped than the Highlands of Scotland. JOHNSON. "That a country may be mapped, it must be travelled over." Nay," said I, meaning to laugh with him at one of his prejudices, "can't you say, it is not worth mapping?" As we walked to St. Clement's church, and saw several shops open upon this most solemn fast-day of the christian world, I remarked, that one disadvantage arising from the immensity of London was, that nobody was heeded hy his neighbour; there was no fear of censure for not observing Good Friday, as it ought to be kept, and as it is kept in country towns. He said, it was, upon the whole,, very well observed even in London. He however owned that London was too large 2; but added, "It is nonsense to say the head is too big for the body. It would be as much too big, though the body were ever so large; that is to say, though the country was ever so extensive. [Home.-ED.] 2 [Yet how enormously the metropolis has increased in population and extent since the year 1775.-ED.] together in a serene undisturbed frame of mind, sometimes in silence, and sometimes conversing, as we felt ourselves inclined, or more properly speaking, as he was inclined; for during all the course of my long intimacy with him, my respectful attention never abated, and my wish to hear him was such, that I constantly watched every dawning of communication from that great and illuminated mind. He observed, "All knowledge is of itself of some value. There is nothing so minute or inconsiderable, that I would not rather know it than not, In the same manner, all power, of whatever sort, is of itself desirable. A man would not submit to learn to hem a ruffle of his wife, or his wife's maid: but if a mere wish could attain it, he would rather wish to be able to hem a ruffle 3." He again advised me to keep a journal fully and minutely, but not to mention such trifles as that meat was too much or too little done, or that the weather was fair or rainy. He had till very near his death a contempt for the notion that the weather affects the human frame. 3 [Johnson said that he had once attempted to learn knitting from Dempster's sister: post, 7th April, 1778.-ED.] I told him that our friend Goldsmith had | said to me that he had come too late into the world, for that Pope and other poets had taken up the places in the Temple of Fame; so that as but a few at any period can possess poetical reputation, a man of genius can now hardly acquire it. JOHNSON, "That is one of the most sensible_things I have ever heard of Goldsmith. It is difficult to get literary fame, and it is every day growing more difficult. Ah, sir, that should make a man think of securing happiness in another world, which all who try sincerely for it may attain. In comparison of that, how little are all other things! The belief of immortality is impressed upon all men, and all men act under an impression of it, however they may talk, and though, perhaps, they may be scarcely sensible of it." I said, it appeared to me that some people had not the least notion of immortality; and I mentioned a distinguished gentleman2 of our acquaintance. JOHNSON. "Sir, if it were not for the notion of immortality, he would cut a throat to fill his pockets." When I quoted this to Beauclerk, who knew much more of the gentleman than we did, he said in his acid manner, "He would cut a throat to fill his pockets, if it were not for fear of being hanged," That is the happiest conversation where there is no competition, no vanity, but a calm quiet interchange of sentiments." In his private register this evening is thus marked, "Boswell sat with me till night; we had some serious talk." It also appears from the same record, that after I left him he was occupied in religious duties, in "giving Francis, his servant, some directions for preparation to communicate; in reviewing his life, and resolving on better conduct." ["Easter Eve, 15th April, 1775. "I rose more early than is common, after a night disturbed by flatulencies, though I had taken so little. I prayed, but my mind was unsettled, and I did not fix upon the book. After the bread and tea, Í trifled, and about three ordered coffee and buns for my dinner. I find more faintness and uneasiness in fasting than I did formerly. "While coffee was preparing, Collier came in, a man whom I had not seen for more than twenty years, but whom I consulted about Macky's books, We talked of old friends and past occurrences, and ate and drank together. "I then read a little in the Testament, and tried Fiddes's Body of Divinity, but did not settle. "I then went to evening prayer, and was tolerably composed."] Dr. Johnson proceeded; "Sir, there is a great cry about infidelity: but there are, in reality, very few infidels. I have heard a person, originally a quaker, but now, I am afraid, a deist, say, that he did not believe The humility and piety which he discovers there were, in all England, above two hun-on such occasions is truly edifying. No dred infidels 3," He was pleased to say, "If you come to settle here, we will have one day in the week on which we will meet by ourselves. [With all due deference, it seems as silly as any thing that poor Goldsmith ever said. Literary fame was perhaps as cheaply earned in the last half of the eighteenth century as at any time in our history, and when Johnson said it is difficult to get literary fame, he should have recollected that if it were not difficult, it would not be fume; and, after all, did not Goldsmith himself gain a great reputation without any very great difficulty? Goldsmith, who had read and borrowed a great deal from the light literature of the French, found a somewhat similar observation in VigneulMarvilliana, from La Bruyere, "Les anciens ont tout dit-on vient aujourd'hui trop tard pour dire des choses nouvelles."-See Vig. Mar. v. i. P. 349.-ED.] 2 [All this seems so extravagantly abusive, that the editor hopes he will be forgiven for not venturing a surmise as to the name of the distinguished gentleman" so ill, and probably so unjustly, treated by his friends.-ED.] saint, however, in the course of his religious warfare, was more sensible of the unhappy failure of pious resolves than Johnson. He said one day, talking to an acquaintance on this subject," Sir, hell is paved with good intentions 4." day, after having attended the solemn serOn Sunday, 16th April, being Eastervice at St. Paul's, I dined with Dr. JohnHorace was wrong in placing happiness in son and Mrs, Williams. I maintained that Nil admirari, for that I thought admiration one of the most agreeable of all our feelings; and I regretted that I had lost much of my disposition to admire, which people generally do as they advance in life. JOHNSON. "Sir, as a man advances in life, he gets what is better than admiration,— judgment, to estimate things at their true value." I still insisted that admiration was more pleasing than judgment, as love is more pleasing than friendship, The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef; love, like being enlivened with champagne, JoнN3 [The editor would have had no doubt that this was Cuming (see ante, p. 400), but that Johnson This is a proverbial sentence. "Hell (says saysTM now a deist," and that Cuming had died Herbert) is full of good meanings and wishings." in 1774. "Sir James Mackintosh thought Dyer-Jacula Prudentum, p. 11. edit. 1651.-Ma-. was meant, but he too was dead.-ED.] LONE. SON. "No, sir; admiration and love are like being intoxicated with champagne; judgment and friendship like being enlivened. Waller has hit upon the same thought with you but I don't believe you have borrowed from Waller. I wish you would enable yourself to borrow more." obliged to go by himself on horseback, leaving his coach to Johnson and me. Johnson was in such good spirits, that eve| ry thing seemed to please him as we drove along. Our conversation turned on a variety of subjects. He thought portrait-painting an improper employment for a woman 2. "Publick practice of any art," he observed, He then took occasion to enlarge on the advantages of reading, and combated the idle superficial notion, that knowledge" and staring in men's faces, is very indelienough may be acquired in conversation. "The foundation (said he) must be laid by reading. General principles must be had from books, which, however, must be brought to the test of real life. In conversation you never get a systern. What is said upon a subject is to be gathered from a hundred people. The parts of a truth, which a man gets thus, are at such a distance from each other that he never attains to a full view." "TO BENNET LANGTON, ESQ. "17th April, 1775. "DEAR SIR, I have inquired more minutely about the medicine for the rheumatism, which I am sorry to hear that you still want. The receipt is this: "Take equal quantities of flour of sulphur, and flour of mustard-seed, make them an electuary with honey or treacle; and take a bolus as big as a nutmeg several times a day, as you can bear it; drinking after it a quarter of a pint of the infusion of the root of lovage. "Lovage, in Ray's Nomenclature,' is levisticum: perhaps the botanist may know the Latin name. "Of this medicine I pretend not to judge. There is all the appearance of its efficacy, which a single instance can afford: the patient was very old, the pain very violent, and the relief, I think, speedy and lasting. "My opinion of alterative medicine is not high, but quid tentasse nocebit? if it does harm, or does no good, it may be omitted; but that it may do good, you have, I hope, reason to think is desired by, sir, your most affectionate, humble servant, "SAM, JOHNSON." On Tuesday, April 18, he and I were engaged to go with Sir Joshua Reynolds to dine with Mr. Cambridge, at his beautiful villa on the banks of the Thames, near Twickenham. Dr. Johnson's tardiness was such, that Sir Joshua, who had an appointment at Richmond early in the day, was 1 "Amoret 's as sweet and good That is mortal can sustain."-BOSWELL cate in a female." I happened to start a question, whether when a man knows that some of his intimate friends are invited to the house of another friend, with whom they are all equally intimate, he may join ́ them without an invitation. JOHNSON. "No, sir; he is not to go when he is not invited. They may be invited on purpose to abuse him," smiling. As a curious instance how little a man knows, or wishes to know, his own character in the world, or rather as a convincing proof that Johnson's roughness was only external, and did not proceed from his heart, I insert the following dialogue. JOHNSON. " It is wonderful, sir, how rare a quality good humour is in life. We meet with very few good-humoured men." I mentioned four of our friends, none of whom he would allow to be good-humoured. One was acid, another was muddy, and to others he had objections which have escaped me. Then shaking his head and stretching himself at ease in the coach, and smiling with much complacency, he turned to me and said, "I look upon myself as a good-humoured fellow." The epithet fellow, applied to the great lexicographer, the stately moralist, the masterly critick, as if it had been Sam Johnson, a mere pleasant companion, was highly diverting; and this light notion of himself struck me with wonder. I answered, also smiling," No, no, sir; that will not do. You are good-natured, but not good-humoured; you are irascible. You have not patience with folly and absurdity. I believe you would pardon them, if there were time to deprecate your vengeance; but punishment follows so quick after sentence, that they cannot escape 3." I had brought with me a great bundle of Scotch magazines and newspapers, in which his "Journey to the Western Islands" was attacked in every mode; and I read a great part of them to him, knowing they would afford him entertainment. I wish the writers of them had been present; they would have been sufficiently vexed. One ludi [This topic was probably suggested to them by Miss Reynolds, who practised that art; and we shall see that one of the last occupations of Johnson's life was to sit for his picture to that lady.-ED.] 3 [See, on Johnson's politeness, post, 30th April, 1778.-ED.] crous imitation of his style, by Mr. Maclaurin 1, now one of the Scotch judges, with the title of Lord Dreghorn, was distinguished by him from the rude mass. "This," | said he, "is the best. But I could caricature my own style much better myself." He defended his remark upon the general insufficiency of education in Scotland; and confirmed to me the authenticity of his witty saying on the learning of the ScotchTheir learning is like bread in a besieged town; every man gets a little, but no man gets a full meal 2." "There is," said he, "in Scotland a diffusion of learning, a certain portion of it widely and thinly spread. A merchant has as much learning as one of their clergy." he certainly thinks those whom he flatters He talked of "Isaac Walton's Lives," which was one of his most favourite books. Dr. Donne's life, he said, was the most perfect of them. He observed, that "it was wonderful that Walton, who was in a very low situation of life, should have been familiarly received by so many great men, and that at a time when the ranks of socie-treated of it. This leads us to look at cataty were kept more separate than they are now." He supposed that Walton had then given up his business as a linen-draper and sempster, and was only an authour 4; and added, "that he was a great panegyrist." BoswELL. "No quality will get a man more friends than a disposition to admire the qualities of others. I do not mean flattery, but a sincere admiration." JOHNSON. Nay, sir, flattery pleases very generally. In the first place, the flatterer may think what he says to be true; but, in the second place, whether he thinks so or not, 66 [It may be doubted whether, if Mr. Maclaurin had not taken this liberty, Mr. Boswell would have recorded Dr. Johnson's censure of his cook. -See ante, p. 208.-ED.] logues, and the backs of books in libraries." p. 155. Johnson was here solaced with an ele gant entertainment, a very accomplished family, and much good company: among whom was Mr. Harris, of Salisbury, who paid him many compliments on his "Journey to the Western Islands.” [Mrs. Piozzi repeats this story (p 203), probably more truly and more forcibly, though The common remark as to the utility of with rather less delicacy of expression" Every reading history being made;-JOHNSON. man gets a mouthful, but no inan a bellyful ;” "We must consider how very little history and adds, that Johnson told her that some off-there is; I mean real authentick history 6. cious friend carried it to Lord Bute, while the question of his pension was afloat, and that Lord Bute only replied, "He will have the pension, nevertheless." -ED.] 3 [Dr. Johnson seems to confound distinction of ranks with separation. Literature has always been a passport into higher society. Walton was received as Johnson himself was, not on a footing of personal or political equality, but of social and literary intercourse.-ED.] - 4 Johnson's conjecture was erroneous. Walton did not retire from business till 1643. But in 1664, Dr. King, bishop of Chichester, in a letter prefixed to his "Lives," mentions his having been familiarly acquainted with him for forty years; and in 1631 he was so intimate with Dr. Donne, that he was one of the friends who attended him on his death-bed.-J. BouWELL. That certain kings reigned, and certain battles were fought, we can depend upon as true; but all the colouring, all the philosophy of history is conjecture." Boswell. “Then, sir, you would reduce all history to no better than an almanack 7, a mere The first time he dined with me, he was shown into my book room, and instantly pored over the lettering of each volume within his reach. My collection of books is very miscellaneous, and I feared there might be some among them that he would not like. But seeing the number of volumes very considerable, he said, You are an honest man to have formed so great an accumulation of knowledge.”—BURNEY. 6 [See ante, p. 257, n.—Ev.] 66 7 [This allusion was revived in our day, in a chronological series of remarkable events." Mr. Gibbon, who must at that time have been employed upon his history, of which he published the first volume in the following year, was present; but did not step forth in defence of that species of writing. He probably did not like to trust himself with Johnson 1. Johnson observed, that the force of our early habits was so great, that though reason approved, nay, though our senses relished a different course, almost every man returned to them. I do not believe there is any observation upon human nature better founded than this; and in many cases, it is a very painful truth; for where early habits have been mean and wretched, the joy and elevation resulting from better modes of life must be damped by the gloomy consciousness of being under an almost inevitable doom to sink back into a situation which we recollect with disgust. It surely may be prevented, by constant attention and unremitting exertion to establish contrary habits of superiour efficacy. "The Beggar's Opera," and the common question, whether it was pernicious in its effects, having been introduced:-JOHNSON. "As to this matter, which has been very much contested, I myself am of opinion, that more influence has been ascribed to "The Beggar's Opera' than it in reality ever had; for I do not believe that any man was ever made a rogue by being present at its representation. At the same time I do not deny that it may have some influence, by making the character of a rogue familiar, and in some degree pleasing 2." Then collecting himself, as it were, to give a heavy stroke: "There is in it such a labefactation of all principles as may be injurious to morality." very striking manner, by Mr. (now Lord) Plunkett, in one of his speeches in the house of commons, in which he said, that if not read in the spirit of prudence and experience, "history was no better than an old almanack."-Par. Deb. 28th Feb. 1825.-ED.] See ante, p. 520.-BoswELL. 2 A very eminent physician, whose discernment is as acute and penetrating in judging of the human character as it is in his own profession, remarked once at a club where I was, that a lively young man, fond of pleasure, and without money, would hardly resist a solicitation from his mistress to go upon the highway, immediately after being present at the representation of "The Beggar's Opera." I have been told of an ingenious observation by Mr. Gibbon, that "The Beggar's Opera, may, perhaps, have sometimes increased the number of highwaymen: but that it has had a beneficial effect in refining that class of men, making them less ferocious, more polite, in short, more like gentlemen." Upon this Mr. Courtenay said, that “ Gay was the Orpheus of highwaymen."-BOSWELL. While he pronounced this response, we sat in a comical sort of restraint, smothering a laugh, which we were afraid might burst out. In his Life of Gay, he has been still more decisive as to the inefficiency of "The Beggar's Opera" in corrupting society.-But I have ever thought somewhat differently; for, indeed, not only are the gaiety and heroism of a highwayman very captivating to a youthful imagination, but the arguments for adventurous depredation are so plausible, the allusions so lively, and the contrasts with the ordinary and more painful modes of acquiring property are so artfully displayed, that it requires a cool and strong judgment to resist so imposing an aggregate: yet, I own, I should be very sorry to have "The Beggar's Opera" suppressed; for there is in it so much of real London life, so much brilliant wit, and such a variety of airs, which, from early association of ideas, engage, soothe, and enliven the mind, that no performance which the theatre exhibits delights me more. The late "worthy" Duke of Queensbury 3, as Thomson, in his "Seasons," justly characterizes him, told me, that when Gay showed him "The Beggar's Opera," his grace's observation was, "This is a very odd thing, Gay; I am satisfied that it is either a very good thing, or a very bad thing." It proved the former, beyond the warmest expectations of the authour, or his friends. Mr. Cambridge, however. showed us to-day, that there was good reason enough to doubt concerning its success. He was told by Quin, that during the first night of its appearance it was long in a very dubious state; that there was a disposition to damn it, and that it was saved by the song, "Oh ponder well! be not severe !" the audience being much affected by the those two lines, which exhibit at once a innocent looks of Polly, when she came to painful and ridiculous image, "For on the rope that hangs my dear, Quin himself had so bad an opinion of it, that he refused the part of Captain Macheath, and gave it to Walker, who acquired great celebrity by his grave yet animated performance of it. 4 We talked of a young gentleman's marriage 5 with an eminent singer, and his de 3 [The third Duke of Queensbury, and second Duke of Dover; the patron of Gay and Thomson. He died in 1778, in the 80th year of his age.ED.] [The gravity of the performance of Macheath seems a strange merit.-ED.] 5 [This, no doubt, alludes to Mr. R. B. Sheridan's refusal to allow his wife to sing in pub |