something which he knew was beyond the comprehension of his audience, inorder to inspire their admiration.' Taylor's _Reynolds_, ii. 456.Addison, in _The Spectator_, No. 221, tells of a preacher in a countrytown who outshone a more ignorant rival, by quoting every now and then aLatin sentence from one of the Fathers. 'The other finding hiscongregation mouldering every Sunday, and hearing at length what was theoccasion of it, resolved to give his parish a little Latin in his turn;but being unacquainted with any of the Fathers, he digested into hissermons the whole book of _Quae Genus_, adding, however, suchexplications to it as he thought might be for the benefit of his people.He afterwards entered upon _As in praesenti_, which he converted in thesame manner to the use of his parishioners. This in a very little timethickened his audience, filled his church, and routed his antagonist.'[581] See _ante_, ii. 96[582] '"Well," said he, "we had good talk." BOSWELL. "Yes, Sir; youtossed and gored several persons."' _Ante,_ ii. 66.[583] Dr. J. H. Burton says of Hume (_Life, ii. 31_):--'No Scotsmancould write a book of respectable talent without calling forth his loudand warm eulogiums. Wilkie was to be the Homer, Blacklock the Pindar,and Home the Shakespeare or something still greater of his country.' See_ante_, ii. 121, 296, 306.[584] _The Present State of Music in France and Italy,_ I vol. 1771, and_The Present State of Music in Germany, &c.,_ 2 vols. 1773. Johnson musthave skipped widely in reading these volumes, for though Dr. Burneydescribes his travels, yet he writes chiefly of music.[585] Boswell's son James says that he heard from his father, that thepassage which excited this strong emotion was the following:--'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more:I mourn, but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you;For morn is approaching, your charms to restore,Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glittering with dew;Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn;Kind Nature the embryo blossom will save:But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn?O when shall it dawn on the night of the grave?'[586] Horace Walpole (_Letters_, vii. 338) mentions this book at somelength. On March 13, 1780, he wrote:--'Yesterday was published anoctavo, pretending to contain the correspondence of Hackman and Miss Raythat he murdered.' See _ante_, iii. 383.[587] Hawkins (_Life_, p. 547), recording how Johnson used to meetPsalmanazar at an ale-house, says that Johnson one day 'remarked on thehuman mind, that it had a necessary tendency to improvement, and that itwould frequently anticipate instruction. "Sir," said a stranger thatoverheard him, "that I deny; I am a tailor, and have had manyapprentices, but never one that could make a coat till I had taken greatpains in teaching him."' See _ante_, iii. 443. Robert Hall wasinfluenced in his studies by 'his intimate association in mere childhoodwith a tailor, one of his father's congregation, who was an acutemetaphysician.' Hall's _Works_, vi. 5.[588] Johnson had never been in Grub-street. _Ante_, i. 296, note 2.[589] The Honourable Horace Walpole, late Earl of Orford, thus bearstestimony to this gentleman's merit as a writer:--'Mr. Chambers's_Treatise on Civil Architecture_ is the most sensible book, and the mostexempt from prejudices, that ever was written on that science.'--Prefaceto _Anecdotes of Painting in England_. BOSWELL. Chambers was thearchitect of Somerset House. See _ante_, p. 60, note 7.[590] The introductory lines are these:--'It is difficult to avoidpraising too little or too much. The boundless panegyricks which havebeen lavished upon the Chinese learning, policy, and arts, shew withwhat power novelty attracts regard, and how naturally esteem swells intoadmiration. I am far from desiring to be numbered among the exaggeratorsof Chinese excellence. I consider them as great, or wise, only incomparison with the nations that surround them; and have no intention toplace them in competition either with the antients or with the modernsof this part of the world; yet they must be allowed to claim our noticeas a distinct and very singular race of men: as the inhabitants of aregion divided by its situation from all civilized countries, who haveformed their own manners, and invented their own arts, without theassistance of example.' BOSWELL.[591] The last execution at Tyburn was on Nov. 7, 1783, when one man washanged. The first at Newgate was on the following Dec. 9, when ten werehanged. _Gent. Mag._ 1783, pp. 974, 1060.[592] We may compare with this 'loose talk' Johnson's real opinion, asset forth in _The Rambler_, No. 114, entitled:--_The necessity ofproportioning punishments to crimes_. He writes:--'The learned, thejudicious, the pious Boerhaave relates that he never saw a criminaldragged to execution without asking himself, "Who knows whether this manis not less culpable than me?" On the days when the prisons of this cityare emptied into the grave, let every spectator of this dreadfulprocession put the same question to his own heart. Few among those thatcrowd in thousands to the legal massacre, and look with carelessness,perhaps with triumph, on the utmost exacerbations of human misery, wouldthen be able to return without horror and dejection.' He continues:--'Itmay be observed that all but murderers have, at their last hour, thecommon sensations of mankind pleading in their favour.... They who wouldrejoice at the correction of a thief, are yet shocked at the thought ofdestroying him. His crime shrinks to nothing compared with his misery,and severity defeats itself by exciting pity.'[593] Richardson, in his _Familiar Letters_, No. 160, makes a countrygentleman in town describe the procession of five criminals to Tyburn,and their execution. He should have heard, he said, 'the exhortationspoken by the bell-man from the wall of St. Sepulchre's church-yard;but the noise of the officers and the mob was so great, and the sillycuriosity of people climbing into the cart to take leave of thecriminals made such a confused noise that I could not hear them. Theyare as follow: "All good people pray heartily to God for these poorsinners, who now are going to their deaths; for whom this great belldoth toll. You that are condemned to die, repent with lamentabletears.... Lord have mercy upon you! Christ have mercy upon you!" whichlast words the bell-man repeats three times. All the way up Holborn thecrowd was so great, as at every twenty or thirty yards to obstruct thepassage; and wine, notwithstanding a late good order against thatpractice, was brought the malefactors, who drank greedily of it. Afterthis the three thoughtless young men, who at first seemed not enoughconcerned, grew most shamefully daring and wanton. They swore, laughed,and talked obscenely. At the place of execution the scene grew stillmore shocking; and the clergyman who attended was more the subject ofridicule than of their serious attention. The psalm was sung amidst thecurses and quarrelling of hundreds of the most abandoned and profligateof mankind. As soon as the poor creatures were half-dead, I was muchsurprised to see the populace fall to haling and pulling the carcaseswith so much earnestness as to occasion several warm rencounters andbroken heads. These, I was told, were the friends of the personsexecuted, or such as for the sake of tumult chose to appear so; and somepersons sent by private surgeons to obtain bodies for dissection.' Thepsalm is mentioned in a note on the line in _The Dunciad_, i. 4l, 'Hencehymning Tyburn's elegiac lines:'--'It is an ancient English custom,'says Pope, 'for the malefactors to sing a psalm at their executionat Tyburn.'[594] The rest of these miscellaneous sayings were first given in the_Additions to Dr. Johnson's Life_ at the beginning of vol. I of thesecond edition.[595] Hume (_Auto_. p. 6) speaks of Hurd as attacking him 'with all theilliberal petulance, arrogance, and scurrility which distinguish theWarburtonian school.' 'Hurd,' writes Walpole, 'had acquired a great nameby several works of slender merit, was a gentle, plausible man,affecting a singular decorum that endeared him highly to devout oldladies.' _Journal of the Reign of George III_, ii. 50. He is best knownto the present generation by his impertinent notes on Addison's _Works_.By reprinting them, Mr. Bohn did much to spoil what was otherwise anexcellent edition of that author. See _ante_, p. 47, note 2.[596] The Rev. T. Twining, one of Dr. Burney's friends, wrote in1779:--'You use a form of reference that I abominate, i.e. the latter,the former. "As long as you have the use of your tongue and your pen,"said Dr. Johnson to Dr. Burney, "never, Sir, be reduced to that shift."'_Recreations and Studies of a Country Clergyman of the XVIIIthCentury_, p. 72.[597] 'A shilling was now wanted for some purpose or other, and none ofthem happened to have one; I begged that I might lend one. "Ay, do,"said the Doctor, "I will borrow of you; authors are like privateers,always fair game for one another."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 212.[598] See _ante_, i. 129, note 3.[599] See _post_, June 3, 1784, where he uses almost the same words.[600] What this period was Boswell seems to leave intentionally vague.Johnson knew Lord Shelburne at least as early as 1778 (_ante_, iii.265). He wrote to Dr. Taylor on July 22, 1782:--'Shelburne speaks ofBurke in private with great malignity.' _Notes and Queries_, 6th S. v.462. The company commonly gathered at his house would have beendispleasing to Johnson. Priestley, who lived with Shelburne seven years,says (_Auto_. p. 55) that a great part of the company he saw there waslike the French philosophers, unbelievers in Christianity, and evenprofessed atheists: men 'who had given no proper attention toChristianity, and did not really know what it was.' Johnson was intimatewith Lord Shelburne's brother. _Ante_, ii. 282, note 3.[601] Johnson being asked his opinion of this Essay, answered, 'Why,Sir, we shall have the man come forth again; and as he has provedFalstaff to be no coward, he may prove Iago to be a very goodcharacter.' BOSWELL.[602] A writer in the _European Magazine_, xxx. 160, says that Johnsonvisited Lord Shelburne at Bowood. At dinner he repeated part of hisletter to Lord Chesterfield (_ante_, i. 261). A gentleman arrived late.Shelburne, telling him what he had missed, went on:-'I dare say theDoctor will be kind enough to give it to us again.' 'Indeed, my Lord, Iwill not. I told the circumstance first for my own amusement, but I willnot be dragged in as story-teller to a company.' In an argument he usedsome strong expressions, of which his opponent took no notice, Nextmorning 'he went up to the gentleman with great good-nature, and said,"Sir, I have found out upon reflection that I was both warm and wrong inmy argument with you last night; for the first of which I beg yourpardon, and for the second, I thank you for setting me right."' It isclear that the second of these anecdotes is the same as that told by Mr.Morgann of Johnson and himself, and that the scene has been wronglytransferred from Wickham to Bowood. The same writer says that it wasbetween Derrick and Boyce--not Derrick and Smart--that Johnson, in thestory that follows, could not settle the precedency.[603] See ante, i. 124, 394.[604] See ante, i. 397.[605] What the great TWALMLEY was so proud of having invented, wasneither more nor less than a kind of box-iron for smoothinglinen. BOSWELL.[606]'Hic manus ob patriam pugnando vulnera passi,Quique sacerdotes casti, dum vita manebat,Quique pii vates et Phoebo digna locuti,Inventas aut qui vitam excoluere per artes.'_Aeneid_, vi. 660.'Lo, they who in their country's fightsword-wounded bodies bore;Lo, priests of holy life and chaste,while they in life had part;Lo, God-loved poets, men who spakethings worthy Phoebus' heart,And they who bettered life on earthby new-found mastery.'MORRIS. Virgil, _Aeneids_, vi. 660. The great Twalmley might havejustified himself by _The Rambler_, No. 9:--'Every man, from thehighest to the lowest station, ought to warm his heart and animate hisendeavours with the hopes of being useful to the world, by advancing theart which it is his lot to exercise; and for that end he mustnecessarily consider the whole extent of its application, and the wholeweight of its importance.... Every man ought to endeavour at eminence,not by pulling others down, but by raising himself, and enjoy thepleasure of his own superiority, whether imaginary or real, withoutinterrupting others in the same felicity.' All this is what Twalmleydid. He adorned an art, he endeavoured at eminence, and he inoffensivelyenjoyed the pleasure of his own superiority. He could also have defendedhimself by the example of Aeneas, who, introducing himself, said:--'Sum pius Aeneas ........ fama super aethera notus.'_Aeneid_, i. 378. I fear that Twalmley met with the neglect that socommonly befalls inventors. In the _Gent. Mag_. 1783, p. 719, I find inthe list of 'B-nk-ts,' Josiah Twamley, the elder, of Warwick,ironmonger.[607] 'Sir, Hume is a Tory by chance, as being a Scotchman; but not upona principle of duty, for he has no principle. If he is anything, he is aHobbist.' Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. 30. Horace Walpole's opinion wasvery different. 'Are not atheism and bigotry first cousins? Was notCharles II. an atheist and a bigot? and does Mr. Hume pluck a stone froma church but to raise an altar to tyranny?' _Letters_, v. 444. Humewrote in 1756:--'My views of _things_ are more conformable to Whigprinciples; my representations of _persons_ to Tory prejudices.' J.H.Burton's _Hume_, ii. 11. Hume's Toryism increased with years. He says inhis _Autobiography/_ (p. xi.) that all the alterations which he made inthe later editions of his _History of the Stuarts_, 'he made invariablyto the Tory side.' Dr. Burton gives instances of these; _Life of Hume_,ii. 74. Hume wrote in 1763 that he was 'too much infected with theplaguy prejudices of Whiggism when he began the work.' _Ib_. p. 144. In1770 he wrote:--'I either soften or expunge many villainous, seditiousWhig strokes which had crept into it.' _Ib_. p. 434. This growing hatredof Whiggism was, perhaps, due to pique. John Home, in his notes ofHume's talk in the last weeks of his life, says: 'He recurred to asubject not unfrequent with him--that is, the design to ruin him as anauthor, by the people that were ministers at the first publication ofhis _History_, and called themselves Whigs.' _Ib_. p. 500. As regardsAmerica, Hume was with the Whigs, as Johnson had perhaps learnt fromtheir common friend, Mr. Strahan. 'He was,' says Dr. Burton, 'far moretolerant of the sway of individuals over numbers, which he looked uponas the means of preserving order and civilization, than of thepredominance of one territory over another, which he looked upon assubjugation.' _Ib_. p. 477. Quite at the beginning of the struggle heforetold that the Americans would not be subdued, unless they broke inpieces among themselves. _Ib_. p. 482. He was not frightened by theprospect of the loss of our supremacy. He wrote to Adam Smith:--'Mynotion is that the matter is not so important as is commonly imagined.Our navigation and general commerce may suffer more than ourmanufactures.' _Ib_. p. 484. Johnson's charge against Hume that he hadno principle, is, no doubt, a gross one; yet Hume's advice to asceptical young clergyman, who had good hope of preferment, that heshould therefore continue in orders, was unprincipled enough. 'It is,'he wrote, 'putting too great a respect on the vulgar and on theirsuperstitions to pique one's self on sincerity with regard to them. Didever one make it a point of honour to speak truth to children or madmen?If the thing were worthy being treated gravely, I should tell him thatthe Pythian oracle, with the approbation of Xenophon, advised every oneto worship the gods--[Greek: nomo poleos]. I wish it were still in mypower to be a hypocrite in this particular. The common duties of societyusually require it; and the ecclesiastical profession only adds a littlemore to an innocent dissimulation, or rather simulation, without whichit is impossible to pass through the world.' _Ib/_. p. 187.[608] Mrs. Piozzi (_Anec_. p. 48) says that Johnson told her that inwriting the story of Gelaleddin, the poor scholar (_Idler_, No. 75), whothought to fight his way to fame by his learning and wit, 'he had hisown outset into life in his eye.' Gelaleddin describes how 'he wassometimes admitted to the tables of the viziers, where he exerted hiswit and diffused his knowledge; but he observed that where, by endeavouror accident he had remarkably excelled, he was seldom invited a secondtime.' See _ante_, p. 116.[609] See ante, p. 115.[610] Bar. BOSWELL.[611] Nard. BOSWELL.[612] Barnard. BOSWELL.[613] It was reviewed in the _Gent. Mag_. 1781, p. 282, where it is saidto have been written by Don Gabriel, third son of the King of Spain.[614] Though 'you was' is very common in the authors of the last centurywhen one person was addressed, I doubt greatly whether Johnson ever soexpressed himself.[615] See _ante_, i. 311.[616] Horace Walpole (_Letters_ v. 85) says, 'Boswell, like Cambridge,has a rage of knowing anybody that ever was talked of.' Miss Burneyrecords 'an old trick of Mr. Cambridge to his son George, when listeningto a dull story, in saying to the relator "Tell the rest of that toGeorge."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 274. See _ante_, ii. 361.[617] Virgil, _Eclogues_, i. 47.[618] 'Mr. Johnson,' writes Mrs. Piozzi (_Anec_. p. 21), 'wasexceedingly disposed to the general indulgence of children, and was evenscrupulously and ceremoniously attentive not to offend them. He hadstrongly persuaded himself of the difficulty people always find to eraseearly impressions either of kindness or resentment.'[619] _Ante_, ii.171, iv.75; also _post_, May 15, 1784.[620] Johnson, on May 1, 1780, wrote of the exhibition dinner:--'Theapartments were truly very noble. The pictures, for the sake of asky-light, are at the top of the house; there we dined, and I sat overagainst the Archbishop of York. See how I live when I am not underpetticoat government.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 111. It was ArchbishopMarkham whom he met; he is mentioned by Boswell in his _Hebrides, post_,v. 37. In spite of the 'elaboration of homage' Johnson could judgefreely of an archbishop. He described the Archbishop of Tuam as 'a mancoarse of voice and inelegant of language.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 300.[621] By Lord Perceval, afterwards Earl of Egmont. He carried, writesHorace Walpole (_Letters_, ii. 144), 'the Westminster election at theend of my father's ministry, which he amply described in the history ofhis own family, a genealogical work called the _History of the House ofYvery_, a work which cost him three thousand pounds; and which was soridiculous, that he has since tried to suppress all the copies. Itconcluded with the description of the Westminster election, in these orsome such words:--"And here let us leave this young nobleman strugglingfor the dying liberties of his country."'[622] Five days earlier Johnson made the following entry in hisDiary:--'1783, April 5. I took leave of Mrs. Thrale. I was much moved. Ihad some expostulations with her. She said that she was likewiseaffected. I commended the Thrales with great good-will to God; may mypetitions have been heard.' Hawkins's _Life_, p. 553. This was not 'aformal taking of leave,' as Hawkins says. She was going to Bath (Mme.D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 264). On May-day he wrote to her on the death ofone of her little girls:--'I loved her, for she was Thrale's and yours,and, by her dear father's appointment, in some sort mine: I love youall, and therefore cannot without regret see the phalanx broken, andreflect that you and my other dear girls are deprived of one that wasborn your friend. To such friends every one that has them has recourseat last, when it is discovered and discovered it seldom fails to be,that the fortuitous friendships of inclination or vanity are at themercy of a thousand accidents.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 255. He was sadlythinking how her friendship for him was rapidly passing away.[623] Johnson modestly ended his account of the tour by saying:--'Icannot but be conscious that my thoughts on national manners are thethoughts of one who has seen but little.' _Works_, ix. 161. SeeBoswell's _Hebrides_, Nov. 22.[624] See _ib_. Oct. 21.[625] She says that he was 'the genuine author of the first volume. Aningenious physician,' she continues, 'with the assistance of severalothers, continued the work until the eighth volume.' Mrs. Manley's_History of her own Life and Times_, p. 15--a gross, worthless book.Swift satirised her in _Corinna, a Ballad_. Swift's _Works_ (1803),x. 94.[626] The real authour was I. P. Marana, a Genoese, who died at Paris in1693. John Dunton in his _Life_ says, that Mr. _William Bradshaw_received from Dr. Midgeley forty shillings a sheet for writing part ofthe _Turkish Spy_; but I do not find that he any where mentions _Sault_as engaged in that work. MALONE.[627] See _ante_, ii. 355, iii. 46, and iv. 139.[628] This was in June, 1783, and I find in Mr. Windham's private diary(which it seems this conversation induced him to keep) the followingmemoranda of Dr. Johnson's advice: 'I have no great timidity in my owndisposition, and am no encourager of it in others. Never be afraid tothink yourself fit for any thing for which your friends think you fit.
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