约翰逊4-6-117

'In France, to which my ideas [in the _Essay on the Study of Literature_]were confined, the learning and language of Greece and Rome wereneglected by a philosophic age. The guardian of those studies, theAcademy of Inscriptions, was degraded to the lowest rank among thethree royal societies of Paris; the new appellation of _Erudits_ wascontemptuously applied to the successors of Lipsius and Casaubon; andI was provoked to hear (see M. d'Alembert, _Discours preliminaire al'Encyclopedie_) that the exercise of the memory, their sole merit,had been superseded by the nobler faculties of the imagination and thejudgment.'--_Memoirs of Edward Gibbon_, ed. 1827, i. 104._A Synod of Cooks_.(Vol. i, p. 470.)When Johnson spoke of 'a Synod of Cooks' he was, I conjecture, thinkingof Milton's 'Synod of Gods,' in Beelzebub's speech in Paradise Lost,book ii. line 391._Johnson and Bishop Percy_.(Vol. i, p. 486.)Bishop Percy in a letter to Boswell says: 'When in 1756 or 1757 Ibecame acquainted with Johnson, he told me he had lived twenty yearsin London, but not very happily.'--Nichols's _Literary History_, vii. 307._Barclay's Answer to Kenrick's Review of Johnson's'Shakespeare.'_(Vol. i, p. 498.)Neither in the British Museum nor in the Bodleian have I been able tofind a copy of this book. _A Defence of Mr. Kenricks Review_, 1766,does not seem to contain any reply to such a work as Barclay's._Mrs. Piozzi's 'Collection of Johnson s Letters.'_(Vol. ii, p. 43, n. 2.)MR. BOSWELL TO BISHOP PERCY.'Feb. 9, 1788.'I am ashamed that I have yet seven years to write of his life. ... Mrs.(Thrale) Piozzi's Collection of his letters will be out soon. ... I sawa sheet at the printing-house yesterday... It is wonderful what aviditythere still is for everything relative to Johnson. I dined at Mr.Malone's on Wednesday with Mr. W. G. Hamilton, Mr. Flood, Mr. Windham, Mr.Courtenay, &c.; and Mr. Hamilton observed very well what a proof it wasof Johnson's merit that we had been talking of him all the afternoon.'--Nichols's _Literary History_, vii. 309._Johnson on romantic virtue_.(Vol. ii, P. 76.)'Dr. Johnson used to advise his friends to be upon their guard againstromantic virtue, as being founded upon no settled principle. "A plank,"said he, "that is tilted up at one end must of course fall down on theother."'--William Seward, _Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons_, ii. 461.'_'Old' Baxter on toleration_.(Vol. ii, p. 253.)The Rev. John Hamilton Davies, B.A., F.R.H.S., Rector of St. Nicholas's,Worcester, and author of _The Life of Richard Baxter of Kidderminster,Preacher and Prisoner_ (London, Kent & Co., 1887), kindly informs me,in answer to my inquiries, that he believes that Johnson may alludeto the following passage in the fourth chapter of Baxter's ReformedPastor:--'I think the Magistrate should be the hedge of the Church. I am againstthe two extremes of universal license and persecuting tyranny. TheMagistrate must be allowed the use of his reason, to know the cause,and follow his own judgment, not punish men against it. I am the lesssorry that the Magistrate doth so little interpose.'_England barren in good historians_.(Vol. ii, p. 236, n. 2.)Gibbon, writing of the year 1759, says:'The old reproach that no British altars had been raised to the muse ofhistory was recently disproved by the first performances of Robertsonand Hume, the histories of Scotland and of the Stuarts.'--_Memoirs of Edward Gibbon_, ed. 1827, i. 103._An instance of Scotch nationality_.(Vol. ii, p. 307.)Lord Camden, when pressed by Dr. Berkeley (the Bishop's son) to appointa Scotchman to some office, replied: 'I have many years ago sworn thatI never will introduce a Scotchman into any office; for if you introduceone he will contrive some way or other to introduce forty more cousinsor friends.'--G. M. _Berkeley's Poems_, p. ccclxxi._Mortality in the Foundling Hospital of London_.(Vol. ii, p. 398.)'From March 25, 1741, to December 31, 1759, the number of childrenreceived into the Foundling Hospital is 14,994, of which have diedto December 31, 1759, 8,465.'--_A Tour through the Whole Island ofGreat Britain_, ed. 1769, vol. ii, p. 121. A great many of these died,no doubt, after they had left the Hospital._Mr. Planta_.(Vol. ii, p. 399, n. 2.)The reference is no doubt to Mr. Joseph Planta, Assistant-Librarianof the British Museum 1773, Principal Librarian 1799-1827. See Edwards'_Lives of the Founders of the British Museum_, pp. 517 sqq.; andNichols's _Illustrations of Literature_, vol. vii, pp. 677-8.'_Unitarian_'.(Vol. ii, p. 408, n. 1.)John Locke in his _Second Vindication of the Reasonableness ofChristianity_ quotes from Mr. Edwards whom he answers:--'This gentlemanand his fellows are resolved to be Unitarians; they are for one articleof faith as well as One person in the Godhead.'--Locke's _Works_, ed. 1824, vi, 200._The proposed Riding School for Oxford_.(Vol. ii, p. 424.)My friend, Mr. C. E. Doble, has pointed out to me the following passagein _Collectanea_, First Series, edited by Mr. C. R. L. Fletcher, Fellowof All Souls College, and printed for the Oxford Historical Society,Oxford, 1885.'The _Advertisement to Religion and Policy, by Edward Earl of Clarendon_,runs as follows:--"Henry Viscount Cornbury, who was called up to the House of Peersby the title of Lord Hyde, in the lifetime of his father, Henry Earlof Rochester, by a codicil to his will, dated Aug. 10, 1751, leftdivers MSS. of his great grandfather, Edward Earl of Clarendon, toTrustees, with a direction that the money to arise from the sale orpublication thereof, should be employed as a beginning of a fund forsupporting a Manage or Academy for riding and other useful exercisesin Oxford; a plan of this sort having been also recommended by LordClarendon in his Dialogue on Education. Lord Cornbury dying beforehis father, this bequest did not take effect. But Catharine, one ofthe daughters of Henry Earl of Rochester, and late Duchess Dowagerof Queensbury, whose property these MSS. became, afterwards by deedgave them, together with all the monies which had arisen or might arisefrom the sale or publication of them, to [three Trustees] upon trustfor the like purposes as those expressed by Lord Hyde in his codicil."'The preface to the _Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon, written byhimself_., has words to the same effect. (See also _Notes and Queries_,Ser. I. x. 185, and xi. 32.)'From a letter in _Notes and Queries_, Ser. II. x. p. 74, it appearsthat in 1860 the available sum, in the hands of the Trustees of theClarendon Bequest, amounted to L10,000. The University no longer neededa riding-school, and the claims of Physical Science were urgent; and in1872 the announcement was made, that by the liberality of the ClarendonTrustees an additional wing had been added to the University Museum,containing the lecture-rooms and laboratories of the department ofExperimental Philosophy.' Vol. i. p. 305._Boswell and Mrs. Rudd._(Vol. ii, p. 450, n. 1.)In Mr. Alfred Morrison's _Collection of Autographs_, vol. i. p. 103,mention is made among Boswell's autographs of verses entitled _LurganClanbrassil_, a supposed Irish song.'I have learnt, through Mr. Morrison's kindness, that 'on the documentitself there is the following memorandum, signed, so far as can be madeout, H. W. R.:--"The enclosed song was written and composed by James Boswell, thebiographer of Johnson, in commemoration of a tour he made with Mrs.Rudd whilst she was under his protection, for living with whom hedispleased his father so much that he threatened to disinherit him."Mrs. Rudd had lived with one of the Perreaus, who were tried andexecuted for forgery. She was tried at the same time and acquitted."My father having heard that Boswell used to sing this song at the HomeCircuit, requested it of him, and he wrote it and gave it him. H.W. R."'"Feb. 1828."Christopher Smart.(Vol. ii, p. 454, n. 3.)Mr. Robert Browning, in his Parleyings with Christopher Smart, underthe similitude of 'some huge house,' thus describes the general run ofthat unfortunate poet's verse:--'All showed the Golden Mean without a hintOf brave extravagance that breaks the rule.The master of the mansion was no foolAssuredly, no genius just as sure!Safe mediocrity had scorned the lureOf now too much and now too little cost,And satisfied me sight was never lostOf moderate design's accomplishmentIn calm completeness.'Mr. Browning goes on to liken one solitary poem to a Chapel in the house,in which is found--'from floor to roof one evidenceOf how far earth may rival heaven.'_Parleyings with certain People of Importance in their Day_ (pp. 80-82),London, 1887._Johnsons discussion on baptism--with Mr. Lloyd, the Birmingham Quaker_.(Vol. ii, p. 458.)In _Farm and its Inhabitants_ (_ante_, p. xlii), a further account isgiven of the controversy between Johnson and Mr. Lloyd the Quaker, onthe subject of Barclay's _Apology_.'Tradition states that, losing his temper, Dr. Johnson threw the volumeon the floor, and put his foot on it, in denunciation of its statements.The identical volume is now in the possession of G. B. Lloyd, of EdgbastonGrove.'At the dinner table he continued the debate in such angry tones, andstruck the table so violently that the children were frightened, anddesired to escape.'The next morning Dr. Johnson went to the bank [Mr. Lloyd was a banker]and by way of apology called out in his stentorian voice, "I say, Lloyd,I'm the best theologian, but you are the best Christian.'" p. 41. Itcould not have been 'the next morning' that Johnson went to the bank,for he left for Lichfield on the evening of the day of the controversy(_ante_, ii. 461). He must have gone in the afternoon, while Boswellwas away seeing Mr. Boulton's great works at Soho (ib. p. 459).Mr. G. B. Lloyd, the great-grandson of Johnson's host, in a letterwritten this summer (1886), says: 'Having spent much of my boyhoodwith my grandfather in the old house, I have heard him tell the storyof the stamping on the broad volume.'Boswell mentions (ib. p. 457) that 'Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd, like theirMajesties, had been blessed with a numerous family of fine children,their numbers being exactly the same.' The author of _Farm and itsInhabitants_ says (p. 46): 'There is a tradition that when SampsonLloyd's wife used to feel depressed by the care of such a large family(they had sixteen children) he would say to her, "Never mind, thetwentieth will be the most welcome."' His fifteenth child Catharinemarried Dr. George Birkbeck, the founder of the Mechanics' Institutes(ib. p. 48).A story told (p. 50) of one of Mr. Lloyd's sons-in-law, Joseph Biddle,is an instance of that excess of forgetfulness which Johnson called'morbid oblivion' (_ante_, v. 68). 'He went to pay a call in Leamington.The servant asked him for his name, he could not remember it; inperplexity he went away, when a friend in the street met him andaccosted him, "How do you do, Mr. Biddle?" "Oh, Biddle, Biddle, Biddle,that's the name," cried he, and rushed off to pay his call.'The editor is in error in stating (p. 45, n. 1) that a very poor poementitled _A bone for Friend Mary to pick_, is by Johnson. It may befound in the _Gent. Mag._ for 1791, p. 948._Lichfield in 1783._(Vol. ii, p. 461.)C. P. Moritz, a young Prussian clergyman who published an account ofa pedestrian tour that he made in England in the year 1782, thus describesLichfield as he saw it on a day in June:--'At noon I got to Lichfield, an old-fashioned town with narrow dirtystreets, where for the first time I saw round panes of glass in thewindows. The place to me wore an unfriendly appearance; I thereforemade no use of my recommendation, but went straight through and onlybought some bread at a baker's, which I took along with me.'--_Travelsin England in 1782_, p. 140, by C. P. Moritz. Cassell's National Library,1886.The 'recommendation' was an introduction to an inn given him by thedaughter of his landlord at Sutton, who told him 'that the people inLichfield were, in general, very proud.' Travelling as he did, on footand without luggage, he was looked upon with suspicion at the inns,and often rudely refused lodging._Richard Baxter's doubt_.(Vol. ii, p. 477.)The Rev. J. Hamilton Davies [See _ante_, p. xlix. 1] informs me thatthere can be no doubt that Johnson referred to the following passagein _Reliquiae Baxterianae_, folio edition of 1696, p. 127:--'This is another thing which I am changed in; that whereas in myyounger days I was never tempted to doubt of the Truth of Scriptureor Christianity, but all my Doubts and Fears were exercised at home,about my own Sincerity and Interest in Christ--since then my sorestassaults have been on the other side, and such they were, that had Ibeen void of internal Experience, and the adhesion of Love, and thespecial help of God, and had not discerned more Reason for my Religionthan I did when I was younger, I had certainly apostatized to Infidelity,'&c.Johnson, the day after he recorded his 'doubt,' wrote that he was'troubled with Baxter's _scruple_' (_ante_, ii. 477). The 'scruple'was, perhaps, the same as the 'doubt.' In his _Dictionary_ he defines_scruple_ as _doubt; difficulty of determination; perplexity; generallyabout minute things_._Oxford in 1782_.(Vol. iii, p. 13, n. 3.)The Rev. C. P. Moritz (_ante_, p. liv) gives a curious account ofhis visit to Oxford. On his way from Dorchester on the evening ofa Sunday in June, he had been overtaken by the Rev. Mr. Maud, who seemsto have been a Fellow and Tutor of Corpus College[3], and who wasreturning from doing duty in his curacy. It was late when they arrivedin the town. Moritz, who, as I have said, more than once had foundgreat difficulty in getting a bed, had made up his mind to pass thesummer night on a stonebench in the High Street. His comrade would nothear of this, but said that he would take him to an ale-house where'it is possible they mayn't be gone to bed, and we may yet find company.'This ale-house was the Mitre.'We went on a few houses further, and then knocked at a door. It wasthen nearly twelve. They readily let us in; but how great was myastonishment when, on being shown into a room on the left, I sawa great number of clergymen, all with their gowns and bands on, sittinground a large table, each with his pot of beer before him. My travellingcompanion introduced me to them as a German clergyman, whom he could notsufficiently praise for my correct pronunciation of the Latin, myorthodoxy, and my good walking.'I now saw myself in a moment, as it were, all at once transportedinto the midst of a company, all apparently very respectable men, butall strangers to me. And it appeared to me extraordinary that I shouldthus at midnight be in Oxford, in a large company of Oxonian clergy,without well knowing how I had got there. Meanwhile, however, I tookall the pains in my power to recommend myself to my company, and in thecourse of conversation I gave them as good an account as I could ofour German universities, neither denying nor concealing that now andthen we had riots and disturbances. "Oh, we are very unruly here,too," said one of the clergymen, as he took a hearty draught out of hispot of beer, and knocked on the table with his hand. The conversationnow became louder, more general, and a little confused. ... At last,when morning drew near, Mr. Maud suddenly exclaimed, "D-n me, I mustread prayers this morning at All Souls!" "D-n me" is an abbreviation