THIS is to me a memorable year; for in it I had the happiness to obtain the acquaintance of that extraordinary man whose memoirs I am now writing; an acquaintance which I shall ever esteem as one of the most fortunate circumstances in my life. Though then but two and twenty, I had for several years read his works with delight and instruction, and had the highest reverence for their author, which had grown up in my fancy into a kind of mysterious veneration, by figuring to myself a state of solemn elevated abstraction, in which I supposed him to live in the immense metropolis of London. Mr. Gentleman', a native of Ireland, who passed some years in Scotland as a player, and as an instructor in the English language, a man whose talents and worth were depressed by misfortunes, had given me a representation of the figure and manner of DICTIONARY JOHNSON! as he was then called 2; and during my first visit to London, which was for three months in 1760, Mr. Derrick the poet 3, who was Gentleman's friend and countryman, flattered me with hopes that he would introduce me to Johnson,- - an honour of which I was very ambitious. But he never found an Opportunity; which made me doubt that he had promised to do what was not in his power; till Johnson some years afterwards told me, *Derrick, Sir, might very well have intro Francis Gentleman was born in 1728, and educated in His father was an officer in the army, and he, at the age of fifteen, obtained a commission in the same regiBet on the reduction, at the peace of 1748, he lost this Presion, and adopted that of the stage, both as an author 4d an actor; in neither of which did he attain any eminence. He died in December, 1784; having, in the later course of his , experienced "all the hardships of a wandering actor, a the disappointments of a friendless author." 1 As great men of antiquity, such as Scipio Africanus, had epitet added to their names, in consequence of some tele rated action, so my illustrious friend was often called DETARY JOHNSON, from that wonderful achievement of and labour, his "Dictionary of the English LanEge; the merit of which I contemplate with more and More froiration. - BoxWELL. Boswell himself was at one fine assious to be called Corsica Boswell. See post, Septender, 1793. — CROKER. * See m. p. 35. n. 1.- CROKER. Early Boswell, in his tenderness to the amour prop. Dr. Johnson, cannot bear to admit that Sheridan's duced you. I had a kindness for Derrick, and am sorry he is dead." In the summer of 1761, Mr. Thomas Sheridan was at Edinburgh, and delivered lectures upon the English Language and Public Speaking to large and respectable audiences. I was often in his company, and heard him frequently expatiate upon Johnson's extraor dinary knowledge, talents, and virtues, repeat and boast of his being his guest sometimes till his pointed sayings, describe his particularities, two or three in the morning. At his house I hoped to have many opportunities of seeing the sage, as Mr. Sheridan obligingly assured me I should not be disappointed. When I returned to London in the end of 1762, to my surprise and regret I found an irreconcileable difference had taken place between Johnson and Sheridan. A pension of two hundred pounds a year had been given to Sheridan. Johnson, who, as has been already mentioned, thought slightingly of Sheridan's art, upon hearing that he was also pensioned, exclaimed, "What! have they given him a pension? Then it is time for me to give up mine." Whether this proceeded from a momentary indignation, as if it were an affront to his exalted merit that a player should be rewarded in the same manner with him, or was the sudden effect of a fit of peevishness, it was unluckily said, and, indeed, cannot be justified. Mr. Sheridan's pension was granted to him, not as a player, but as a sufferer in the cause of government, when he was manager of the Theatre Royal in Ireland, when parties ran high in 1753.4 And it must also be allowed that he was a man of literature, and had considerably improved the arts of reading and speaking with distinctness and propriety. Besides, Johnson should have recollected that Mr. Sheridan taught pronunciation to Mr. Alexander Wedderburne, whose sister was married to Sir Harry Erskine, an intimate friend of Lord Bute, who was the favourite of the king; and surely the most outrageous Whig will not maintain, that, whatever ought to be the principle in the disposal of offices, a pension ought never to be granted from any bias of court connection. Mr. Macklin, indeed, shared literary character had any thing to do with the pension, and no doubt he endeavoured to soften Johnson's resentment by giving, as he does in the above passage, this favour a political colour; but there seems no reason to believe that Sheridan's pension was given to him as a sufferer by a playhouse riot. It was probably granted (et hinc ille lacryma) on the same motive as Johnson's own, namely, the desire of the King and Lord Bute to distinguish the commencement of the new reign by the patronage of literature. Indeed, this is rendered almost certain by various passages of the letters of Mrs. Sheridan to Mr. Whyte: e. g. "London, Nov. 29. 1762.-Mr. Sheridan is now, as I mentioned to you formerly, busied in the English Dictionary, which he is encouraged to pursue with the more alacrity as his Majesty has vouchsafed him such a mark of royal favour. I suppose you have heard that he has granted him a pension of 2001. a year, merely as an encouragement to his undertaking, and this without solicitation, which makes it the more valuable." Whyte's Miscellanca Nova, p. 104. 107. 111. Mr. Samuel Whyte, the writer of this volume, was a celebrated schoolmaster in Dublin, a relation of and much attached to the Sheridan family. Richard Brinsley Sheridan and his elder brother with Mr. Sheridan the honour of instructing am glad that Mr. Sheridan has a pension, for Mr. Wedderburne ; and though it was too he is a very good man." Sheridan could never late in life for a Caledonian to acquire the forgive this hasty contemptuous expression. It genuine English cadence, yet so successful rankled in his mind; and though I informed were Mr. Wedderburne's instructors, and his him of all that Johnson said, and that he would own unabating endeavours, that he got rid of be very glad to meet him amicably, he posithe coarse part of his Scotch accent, retaining tively declined repeated offers which I made, only as much of the "native wood-note wild," and once went off abruptly from a house where as to mark his country; which, if any Scotch- he and I were engaged to dine, because he was man should affect to forget, I should heartily told that Dr. Johnson was to be there. I have despise him. Notwithstanding the difficulties no sympathetic feeling with such persevering which are to be encountered by those who resentment.2 It is painful when there is a have not had the advantage of an English breach between those who have lived together education, he by degrees formed a mode of socially and cordially; and I wonder that there speaking, to which Englishmen do not deny is not, in all such cases, a mutual wish that it the praise of elegance. Hence his distin- should be healed. I could perceive that Mr. guished oratory, which he exerted in his own Sheridan was by no means satisfied with Johncountry as an advocate in the Court of Session, son's acknowledging him to be a good man.3 and a ruling elder of the Kirk, has had its That could not soothe his injured vanity. I fame and ample reward, in much higher spheres. could not but smile, at the same time that I was When I look back on this noble person at offended, to observe Sheridan, in the Life of Edinburgh in situations so unworthy of his Swift, which he afterwards published, attemptbrilliant powers, and behold LORD LOUGH-ing in the writhings of his resentment to deBOROUGH, at London, the change seems almost like one of the metamorphoses in Ovid; and as his two preceptors, by refining his utterance, gave currency to his talents, we may say, in the words of that poet, "Nam vos mutastis.' I have dwelt the longer upon this remarkable instance of successful parts and assiduity, because it affords animating encouragement to other gentlemen of North Britain to try their fortunes in the southern part of the island, where they may hope to gratify their utmost ambition; and now that we are one people by the Union, it would surely be illiberal to maintain, that they have not an equal title with the natives of any other part of his Majesty's domi nions. Johnson complained that a man who disliked him repeated his sarcasm to Mr. Sheridan, without telling him what followed, which was, that after a pause he added, “However, I Charles, were placed very early under his tuition, as was, at an interval of above thirty years, my friend Thomas Moore, who, in his Life of Sheridan, pays an affectionate tribute to their common preceptor. - CROKER. 1 This is an odd coincidence. A Scotchman who wishes to learn a pure English pronunciation, employs one preceptor who happens to be an Irishman, and afterwards another, likewise an Irishman — and this Irish-taught Scot becomes -and mainly by his oratory-one of the chief ornaments of the English senate, and the first subject in the British empire. CROKER. 2 But Johnson seems to have kept it alive by persevering sarcasins. CROKER. 3 Why should he have been? his goodness had nothing to say to the question. Sheridan's pension was given for his literary character, and Johnson's following up his attack on his talents by a supercilious acknowledgment that he was nevertheless a very good man, was an additional insult. See next page, n. 4.--CROKER. 4 Dr. Johnson had depreciated the talents and character of Dr. Swift, not merely in conversation, but in his Lives of the Poets. Sheridan, in his Life of Swift, advocated the cause of the dean, for whom he had a natural and hereditary veneration; and though he observed on Johnson's criticisms and censures with a severity sharpened probably by his personal feelings, he treated him on all other points with moderation and respect. - CROKER, See antè, p. 121. n. 5. 6 My position has been very well illustrated by Mr. Belsham, of Bedford, in his Essay on Dramatic Poetry: The fashionable doctrine (says he) both of moralists and preciate Johnson, by characterising him as "a writer of gigantic fame, in these days of little men;' that very Johnson whom he once so highly admired and venerated.* This rupture with Sheridan deprived a most Johnson of one of his most agreeable resources for amusement in his lonely evenings for Sheridan's well-informed, animated, and bustling mind never suffered conversation to stagnate; and Mrs. Sheridan was agreeable companion to an intellectual man. 5 She was sensible, ingenious, unassuming, yet communicative. I recollect, with satisfaction, many pleasing hours which I passed with her under the hospitable roof of her husband, who was to me a very kind friend. Her novel, entitled "Memoirs of Miss Sydney Biddulph," contains an excellent moral, while it inculcates a future state of retribution &; and what it teaches is impressed upon the critics in these times is, that virtue and happiness are con- For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, "When a man eminently virtuous, a Brutus, a Cato, or a Socrates, finally sinks under the pressure of accumulated misfortune, we are not only led to entertain a more indignant hatred of vice, than if he rose from his distress, but we are inevitably induced to cherish the sublime idea that a day of future retribution will arrive, when he shall receive not merely poetical, but real and substantial justice."— Essays Philosophical, Historical, and Literary, London, 1791, 8vo. vol. ii. p. 317. as This is well reasoned and well expressed. I wish, indeed, that the ingenious author had not thought it necessary to introduce any instance of "a man eminently virtuous; he would then have avoided mentioning such a ruffian as Brutus under that description. Mr. Belsham discovers in his Essays so much reading and thinking, and good com. position, that I regret his not having been fortunate enough to be educated a member of our excellent national establish mind by a series of as deep distress as can affect humanity, in the amiable and pious heroine, who goes to her grave unrelieved, but resigned, and full of hope of "heaven's mercy." Johnson paid her this high compliment upon it: "I know not, Madam, that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much." Mr. Thomas Davies the actor, who then kept a bookseller's shop in Russell-Street, Covent Garden', told me that Johnson was very much his friend, and came frequently to his house, where he more than once invited me to meet him; but by some unlucky accident or other he was prevented from coming to us. Mr. Thomas Davies was a man of good understanding and talents, with the advantage of a liberal education. Though somewhat pompous, he was an entertaining companion; and his literary performances have no inconsiderable share of merit. He was a friendly and very hospitable man. Both he and his wife (who has been celebrated 2 for her beauty), though upon the stage for many years, maintained an uniform decency of character; and Johnson esteemed them, and lived in as easy an intimacy with them as with any family which he used to visit. Mr. Davies recollected several of Johnson's remarkable sayings, and was one of the best of the many imitators of his voice and manner, while relating them. He increased my impatience more and more to see the extraordinary man whose works I highly valued, and whose conversation was reported to be so peculiarly excellent. At last, on Monday, the 16th of May, when I was sitting in Mr. Davies's back parlour, after having drunk tea with him and Mrs. Davies, Johnson unexpectedly came into the shop; and Mr. Davies having perceived him through the glass-door in the room in which ment. Had he not been nursed in nonconformity, he probably would not have been tainted with those heresies (as I sinterery, and on no slight investigation, think them) both in religion and politics, which, while I read, I am sure, with candour, I cannot read without offence. BOSWELL. One wanders that with these feelings he thought it worth while to satrude, with so little excuse for it, Mr. Belsham's very toman-place remarks. CROKER. No. The very place where I was fortunate enough to be introduced to the illustrious subject of this work, deserves to be particularly marked. I never pass by it without heling reverence and regret. - BOSWELL. * By Churchill, in the Rosciad. With him came mighty Davies: on my life, Statesman all over-in plots famous grown — This sarcasm drove, it is said, (post, April 7. 1778) poor Duries from the stage. - CROKER. 66 portrait of him painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds soon after he had published his Dictionary, in the attitude of sitting in his easy chair in deep meditation; which was the first picture his friend did for him, which Sir Joshua very kindly presented to me, and from which an engraving has been made for this work. Mr. Davies mentioned my name, and respectfully introduced me to him. I was much agitated; and recollecting his prejudice against the Scotch, of which I had heard much, I said to Davies, "Don't tell where I come from." "From Scotland," cried Davies, roguishly. "Mr. Johnson," said I, "I do indeed come from Scotland, but I cannot help it." I am willing to flatter myself that I meant this as light pleasantry to soothe and conciliate him, and not as an humiliating abasement at the expense of my country. But however that might be, this speech was somewhat unlucky; for with that quickness of wit for which he was so remarkable, he seized the expression come from Scotland," which I used in the sense of being of that country; and, as if I had said that I had come away from it, or left it, retorted, "That, Sir, I find, is what a very great many of your countrymen cannot help." This stroke stunned me a good deal; and when we had sat down, I felt myself not a little embarrassed, and apprehensive of what might come next. He then addressed himself to Davies: "What do you think of Garrick ? He has refused me an order for the play for Miss Williams, because he knows the house will be full, and that an order would be worth three shillings." Eager to take any opening to get into conversation with him, I ventured to say, "O Sir, I cannot think Mr. Garrick would grudge such a trifle to you." "Sir," said he, with a stern look, "I have known David Garrick longer than you have done: and I know no right you have to talk to me on the subject." Perhaps I deserved this check; for it was rather presumptuous in me, an entire stranger, to express any doubt of the justice of his animadversion upon his old acquaintance and pupil. I now felt myself much mortified, and began to think that the hope which I had long indulged of obtaining 3 Mr. Murphy, in his " Essay on the Life and Genius of Dr. Johnson,' [first published after the first edition of this work,] has given an account of this meeting considerably different from mine, I am persuaded without any consciousness of error. His memory, at the end of near thirty years, has undoubtedly deceived him, and he supposes himself to have been present at a scene which he has probably heard inaccurately described by others. In my note taken on the very day, in which I am confident I marked every thing material that passed, no mention is made of this gentleman, and I am sure that I should not have omitted one so well known in the literary world. It may easily be imagined that this my first interview with Dr. Johnson, with all its circumstances, made a strong impression on my mind, and would be registered with peculiar attention. -BosWELL. 4 That this was a momentary sally against Garrick there can be no doubt; for at Johnson's desire he had, some years before, given a benefit-night at his theatre to this very person, by which she had got two hundred pounds. Johnson, indeed, upon all other occasions, when I was in his company, praised the very liberal charity of Garrick. I once mentioned to his acquaintance was blasted. And, in truth, had not my ardour been uncommonly strong, and my resolution uncommonly persevering, so rough a reception might have deterred me for ever from making any further attempts. Fortunately, however, I remained upon the field not wholly discomfited; and was soon rewarded by hearing some of his conversation, of which I preserved the following short minute, without marking the questions and observations by which it was produced. "People," he remarked, "may be taken in once, who imagine that an author is greater in private life than other men. Uncommon parts require uncommon opportunities for their exertion." "In barbarous society, superiority of parts is of real consequence. Great strength or great wisdom is of much value to an individual. But in more polished times there are people to do every thing for money; and then there are a number of other superiorities, such as those of birth, and fortune, and rank, that dissipate men's attention, and leave no extraordinary share of respect for personal and intellectual superiority. This is wisely ordered by Providence, to preserve some equality among mankind." 1 Sir, this book (The Elements of Criticism;' which he had taken up) is a pretty essay, and deserves to be held in some estimation, though much of it is chimerical." Speaking of one 2 who with more than ordinary boldness attacked public measures and the royal family, he said, "I think he is safe from the law, but he is an abusive scoundrel; and instead of applying to my Lord Chief Justice to punish him, I would send half a dozen footmen and have him well ducked." "The notion of liberty amuses the people of England, and helps to keep off the tædium vitæ. When a butcher tells you that his heart bleeds for his country, he has, in fact, no uneasy feeling." 66 Sheridan will not succeed at Bath with his oratory. Ridicule has gone down before him, and, I doubt, Derrick is his enemy." 3 "Derrick may do very well, as long as he can outrun his character; but the moment his character gets up with him, it is all over." him, "It is observed. Sir, that you attack Garrick yourself, but will suffer nobody else to do it." Johnson (smiling): "Why, Sir, that is true."- BOSWELL. These sallies are of too frequent recurrence to allow us to receive Boswell's apologetical assertion that they were momentary; and too many circumstances of his conduct towards both Garrick and Sheridan remind us of Davies's admission, in his Life of Garrick, that Johnson was but too susceptible of the feeling of envy. "I never," he says, "knew any man but one Doctor Johnson-who had the honesty and courage to confess that he had a tincture of envy in him." ii. 380. It is ereditable to the candour both of Davies and Johnson, that this passage was read by Johnson before its publication. See also a somewhat similar confession from Boswell himself, post, sub 17th April, 1778. CROKER. By Henry Home, Lord Kames; published in 1762. — CROKER. It is, however, but just to record, that some years afterwards, when I reminded him of this sarcasm, he said, "Well, but Derrick has now got a character that he need not run away from." I was highly pleased with the extraordinary vigour of his conversation, and regretted that I was drawn away from it by an engagement at another place. I had, for a part of the evening, been left alone with him, and had ventured to make an observation now and then, which he received very civilly: so that I was satisfied that though there was a roughness in his manner, there was no ill-nature in his disposition. Davies followed me to the door, and when I complained to him a little of the hard blows which the great man had given me, he kindly took upon him to console me by saying, "Don't be uneasy, I can see he likes you very well." Wilkes, A few days afterwards I called on Davies, and asked him if he thought I might take the liberty of waiting on Mr. Johnson at his chambers in the Temple. He said I certainly might, and that Mr. Johnson would take it as a compliment. So upon Tuesday the 24th of May, after having been enlivened by the witty sallies of Messieurs Thornton 4, Churchill, and Lloyd, with whom I had passed the morning, I boldly repaired to Johnson. His chambers were on the first floor of No. 1. Inner Temple Lane, and I entered them with an impression given me by the Rev. Dr. Blair of Edinburgh, who had been introduced to me not long before, and described his having "found the Giant in his den;" an expression which, when I came to be pretty well acquainted with Johnson, I repeated to him, and he was diverted at this picturesque account of himself. Dr. Blair had been presented to him by Dr. James Fordyce. At this time the controversy concerning the pieces published by Mr. James Macpherson, as translations of Ossian, was at its height. Johnson had all along denied their authenticity; and, what was still more provoking to their admirers, maintained that they had no merit. subject having been introduced by Dr. Fordyce, Dr. Blair, relying on the internal evidence of their antiquity, asked Dr. Johnson whether he thought any man of a modern age could have written such poems? Johnson The 2 Mr. Wilkes, no doubt. Boswell was a friend and, personally, an admirer of Wilkes, and therefore very properly (Wilkes being still alive) suppressed the name. CROKER. 3 Mr. Sheridan was then reading lectures upon Oratory at Bath, where Derrick was Master of the Ceremonies; or, as the phrase is, KING. BOSWELL. 4 Boswell had a passion for getting acquainted with all the notorieties of the day, and these were then reigning wits. -CROKER. 5 Dr. Hugh Blair, the celebrated professor and minister of Edinburgh; born in 1718, died in 1800. The Doctor's "Dissertation on Ossian" appeared in 1762. — WRIGHT, 6 Dr. James Fordyce, author of "Sermons to Young Women," &c., was born at Aberdeen in 1720, and died at Bath in 1796.- WRIGHT. replied, "Yes, Sir, many men, many women, and many children." Johnson, at this time, did not know that Dr. Blair had just published a Dissertation, not only defending their authenticity, but seriously ranking them with the poems of Homer and Virgil; and when he was afterwards informed of this circumstance, he expressed some displeasure at Dr. Fordyce's having suggested the topic, and said, "I am not sorry that they got thus much for their pains. Sir, it was like leading one to talk of a book when the author is concealed behind the door." He received me very courteously; but it must be confessed, that his apartment, and furniture, and morning dress, were sufficiently uncouth. His brown suit of clothes looked very rusty; he had on a little old shrivelled unpowdered wig, which was too small for his head; his shirt-neck and knees of his breeches were loose; his black worsted stockings ill drawn up; and he had a pair of unbuckled shoes by way of slippers. But all these slovenly particularities were forgotten the moment that he began to talk. Some gentlewhom I do not recollect, were sitting with him; and when they went away, I also rose; but he said to me," Nay, don't go.". “Sir,” said I, “I am afraid that I intrude upon you. It is benevolent to allow me to sit and hear you." He seemed pleased with this compliment, which I sincerely paid him, and answered, "Sir, I am obliged to any man who visits me." -I have preserved the following short minute of what passed this day. men, Madness frequently discovers itself merely by unnecessary deviation from the usual modes of the world. My poor friend Smart showed the disturbance of his mind by falling upon his knees and saying his prayers in the street, or in any other unusual place. Now, although, rationally speaking, it is greater madness not to pray at all, than to pray as Smart did, I am afraid there are so many who do not pray, that their understanding is not called in question." " Concerning this unfortunate poet, Christopher Smart, who was confined in a madhouse', he had, at another time, the following conversation with Dr. Burney. BURNEY. "How does poor Smart do, Sir? is he likely ito recover?' JOHNSON. "It seems as if his mind had ceased to struggle with the disease; for he grows fat upon it." BURNEY. "Perhaps, Fr, that may be from want of exercise." JOISSON. No, Sir; he has partly as much xercise as he used to have, for he digs in the garden. Indeed, before his confinement, he used for exercise to walk to the ale-house; but he was carried back again. I did not think he ought to be shut up. His infirmities were not noxious to society. He insisted on people praying with him; and I'd as lief pray with Kit Smart as any one else. Another charge was, that he did not love clean linen: and I have no passion for it." Johnson continued. "Mankind have a great aversion to intellectual labour 2; but even supposing knowledge to be easily attainable, more people would be content to be ignorant than would take even a little trouble to acquire it." "The morality of an action depends on the motive from which we act. If I fling half a crown to a beggar with intention to break his head, and he picks it up and buys victuals with it, the physical effect is good; but, with respect to me, the action is very wrong. So, religious exercises, if not performed with an intention to please God, avail us nothing. As our Saviour says of those who perform them from other motives, 'Verily they have their reward.' "The Christian religion has very strong evidences. It, indeed, appears in some degree strange to reason; but in History we have undoubted facts, against which, in reasoning à priori, we have more arguments than we have for them: but then, testimony has great weight, and casts the balance. I would recommend to every man whose faith is yet unsettled, Grotius, Dr. Pearson, and Ďr. Clarke." Talking of Garrick, he said, "He is the first man in the world for sprightly conversation." When I rose a second time, he again pressed me to stay, which I did. He told me, that he generally went abroad at four in the afternoon, and seldom came home till two in the morning. I took the liberty to ask if he did not think it wrong to live thus, and not make more use of his great talents. He owned it was a bad habit. On reviewing, at the distance of many years, my journal of this period, I wonder how, at my first visit, I ventured to talk to him so freely, and that he bore it with so much indulgence. Before we parted, he was so good as to promise to favour me with his company one evening at my lodgings; and, as I took my leave, shook me cordially by the hand. It is almost needless to add, that I felt no little elation at having now so happily established an acquaintance of which I had been so long ambitious. My readers will, I trust, excuse me for may have been some difficulty about the copyright of his poems, as there was, we know, about those of Goldsmith. See post, sub July 9. 1770. Smart's are to be found, with a Life, in Anderson's Poets. Smart died in 1770, æt. 70. — CROKER. 2 See post, July 30. 1763, an opinion somewhat different.CROKER. |