ing your metaphor, you know that in hunting there are few so desperately keen as to follow without reserve. Some do not choose to leap ditches and hedges and risk their necks, or gallop over steeps, or even to dirty themselves in bogs and mire." BosWELL. "I am glad there are some good, quiet, moderate, political hunters." E. "I believe in any body of men in England I should have been in the minority! I have always been in the minority." P. "The house of commons resembles a private company. How seldom is any man convinced by another's argument; passion and pride rise against it." R. "What would be the consequence, if a minister, sure of a majority in the house of commons, should resolve that there should be no speaking at all upon his side?" E. "He must soon go out. That has been tried; but it was found it would not do." E." The Irish language is not primitive; it is Teutonick, a mixture of the northern tongues; it has much English in it." JOHNSON. "It may have been radically Teutonick; but English and High Dutch have no similarity to the eye, though radically the same. Once, when looking into Low Dutch, I found, in a whole page, only one word similar to English; stroem, like stream, and it signified tide." E. "I remember having seen a Dutch sonnet, in which I found this word, roesnopies. Nobody would at first think that this could be English; but when we inquire, we find roes, rose, and nopie, knob, so we have rosebuds." travellers generally mean to tell truth; though Thicknesse observes, upon Smollett's account of his alarming a whole town in France by firing a blunderbuss, and frightening a French nobleman till he made him tie on his portmanteau, that he would be loth to say Smollett had told two lies in one page; but he had found the only town in France where these things could have happened. Travellers must often be mistaken. In every thing, except where men suration can be applied, they may honestly differ. There has been, of late, a strange turn in travellers to be displeased." E. "From the experience which I have had, and I have had a great deal,—I have learnt to think better of mankind." JOHNsON. "From my experience I have found them worse in commercial dealings, more disposed to cheat than I had any notion of; but more disposed to do one another good than I had conceived." J. "Less just and more beneficent." JOHNSON. "And really it is wonderful, considering how much attention is necessary for men to take care of themselves, and ward off immediate evils which press upon them, it is wonderful how much they do for others. As it is said of the greatest liar, that he tells more truth than falsehood; so it may be said of the worst man, that he does more good than evil." BOSWELL. Perhaps from experience men may be found happier than we suppose. JOHNSON. "No, sir; the more we inquire we shall find men the less happy." P. "As to thinking better or worse JOHNSON. "I have been reading Thick- of mankind from experience, some cunning nesse's Travels, which I think are enter- people will not be satisfied unless they have BOSWELL. taining." What, sir, a good put men to the test, as they think. There book?" JOHNSON. "Yes, sir, to read is a very good story told of Sir Godfrey once. I do not say you are to make a Kneller, in his character of a justice of the study of it, and digest it; and I believe it peace. A gentleman brought his servant to be a true book in his intention. All before him, upon an accusation of having adinirable talents as a political writer, thus de-ing come out that he had laid it purposely stolen some money from him; but it havscribes the house of commons in his "Letter to Sir William Wyndham; "—" You know the nature of that assembly: they grow, like hounds, fond of the man who shows them game, and by whose halloo they are used to be encouraged.' BOSWELL. 66 [Dr. Johnson seems to have been in error in this point. Stroem signifies just what stream does in English-current, flowing water, and thence tide and the languages have undoubtedly a great similarity. Let us take as examples the explanations given in Marin's Dutch Dictionary, of the very two words to which Johnson alluded, with the English subjoined : CURRENT.-Stroom-ras stream-race. TIDE.-Water-ty-stroom-ebbe en vloet vander see water-tide-stream-ebb and flow of the sea. And under the word current is quoted a Dutch hrase which is almost English; Dat bock word tien cronen that book worth ten crowns.-Ed.] وو in the servant's way, in order to try his You I think Sir Godfrey should decide the suit, proach temptation to a man, you do him an injury; and, if he is overcome, you share his guilt." P. "And, when once overcome, it is easier for him to be got the better of again." Boswell. "Yes, you are his seducer; you have debauched him. I have known a man resolved to put friendship to the test, by asking a friend to lend him money, merely with that view, when he did not want it." JOHNSON. "That is very wrong, sir. Your friend may be a narrow man, and yet have many good qualities: narrowness may be his only fault. Now you are trying his general character as a friend by one particular singly, in which he happens to be defective, when, in truth, his character is composed of many particulars." E. "I understand the hogshead of claret, which this society was favoured with by our friend the dean, is nearly out; I think he should be written to, to send another of the same kind. Let the request be made with a happy ambiguity of expression, so that we may have the chance of his sending it also as a present." JOHNSON. "I am willing to offer my services as secretary on this occasion." P. "As many as are for Dr. Johnson being secretary, hold up your hands 2.-Carried unanimously." BosWELL. “He will be our dictator." JOHNSON. "No, the company is to dictate to me. I am only to write for wine; and I am quite disinterested, as I drink none; I shall not be suspected of having forged the application. I am no more than humble scribe." E. "Then you shall prescribe." Boswell. "Very well. The first play of words today." J. "No, no; the bulls in Ireland." JOHNSON. "Were I your dictator, you should have no wine. It would be my business cavere ne quid detrimenti Respublica caperet, and wine is dangerous. Rome was ruined by luxury." (smiling).. E. "If you allow no wine as dictator, you shall not have me for your master of horse." On Saturday, April 4, I drank tea with Johnson at Dr. Taylor's, where he had dined. He entertained us with an account of a tragedy written by a Dr. Kennedy (not the Lisbon physician). * * * * * *3 He was very silent this evening, and read in a variety of books; suddenly throwing down one, and taking up another. He talked of going to Streatham that night. TAYLOR. "You'll be robbed, if you do; or you must shoot a highwayman. Now I would rather be robbed than do that; I would not shoot a highwayman." JOHN [Dr. Barnard, Dean of Derry, afterwards Bishop of Killaloe and Limerick.-ED.] 2 [This supports the conjecture that Dr. Johnson was not the President.-ED.] 3 [Here a few lines, relating to the disgusting and indelicate subject of this tragedy, are omitted.-ED.] son. "But I would rather shoot him in the instant when he is attempting to rob me, than afterwards swear against him at the Old Bailey, to take away his life, after he has robbed me. I am surer I am right in the one case, than in the other. I may be mistaken as to the man when I swear; cannot be mistaken, if I shoot him in the act. Besides, we feel less reluctance to take away a man's life, when we are heated by the injury, than to do it at a distance of time by an oath, after we have cooled." BosWELL. "So, sir, you would rather act from the motive of private passion, than that of publick advantage." JOHNSON. "Nay, sir, when I shoot the highwayman, I act from both." BoswELL. "Very well, very well. There is no catching him." JOHNSON. "At the same time, one does not know what to say. For perhaps one may, a year after, hang himself from uneasiness for having shot a highwayman 4. Few minds are fit to be trusted with so great a thing." BOSWELL. "Then, sir, you would not shoot him?" JOHNSON. "But I might be vexed afterwards for that too." Thrale's carriage not having come for him, as he expected, I accompanied him some part of the way home to his own house. I told him, that I had talked of him 5 to Mr. Dunning a few days before, and had said, that in his company we did not so much interchange conversation, as listen to him; and that Dunning observed, upon this, "One is always willing to listen to Dr. Johnson; " to which I answered, "That is a great deal from you, sir." "Yes, sir," said Johnson," a great deal indeed. Here is a man willing to listen, to whom the world is listening all the rest of the year." BosWELL. "I think, sir, it is right to tell one man of such a handsome thing, which has been said of him by another. It tends to 4 The late Duke of Montrose was generally said to have been uneasy on that account; but I can contradict the report from his grace's own au thority. As he used to admit me to very easy conversation with him, I took the liberty to introriding one night near London, he was attacked by duce the subject. His grace told me, that when two highwaymen on horseback, and that he instantly shot one of them, upon which the other galloped off; that his servant, who was very well mounted, proposed to pursue him and take him, but that his grace said, "No, we have had blood enough; I hope the man may live to repent.' His grace, upon my presuming to put the question, assured me, that his mind was not at all clouded by what he had thus done in self-defence.-BosWELL.. [This is another striking instance of Mr. Boswell's readiness to ask questions. His curiosity has benefited us; but few could have the boldness to have made such inquiries.--ED.] 5 [Yet Mr. Boswell sometimes censures Mrs. Thrale for flattery !-ED.] increase benevolence." JOHNSON. doubtedly it is right, sir." "Un- | be a knitter of stockings." He asked me to go down with him and dine at Mr. Thrale's at Streatham, to which I agreed. I had lent him" An Account of Scotland, in 1702," written by a man of various inquiry, an English chaplain to a regiment stationed there. JOHNSON. "It is sad stuff, sir, miserably written, as books in general then were. There is now an elegance of style universally diffused. No man now writes so ill as Martin's Account of the Hebrides' is written. A man could not write so ill, if he should try. Set a merchant's clerk now to write, and he 'll do better." "I am He talked to me with serious concern of a certain female friend's 4 "laxity of narration, and inattention to truth." as much vexed," said he, "at the ease with which she hears it mentioned to her, as at the thing itself. I told her, 'Madam, you are contented to hear every day said to you, what the highest of mankind have died for, rather than bear.' You know, sir, the highest of mankind have died rather than bear to be told they had uttered a falsehood. Do talk to her of it: I am weary." On Tuesday, April 7, I breakfasted with him at his house. He said, "Nobody was content." I mentioned to him a respectable person in Scotland whom he knew; and I asserted, that I really believed he was always content. JOHNSON. "No, sir, he is not content with the present; he has always some new scheme, some new plantation, something which is future. You know he was not content as a widower, for he married again." BOSWELL. "But he is not restless." JOHNSON. "Sir, he is only locally at rest. A chymist is locally at rest; but his mind is hard at work. This gentleman has done with external exertions. It is too late for him to engage in distant projects." BoswELL. "He seems to amuse himself quite well; to have his attention fixed, and his tranquillity preserved by very small matters. I have tried this; but it would not do with me." JOHNSON (laughing). "No, sir; it must be born with a man to be contented to take up with little things. Women have a great advantage that they may take up with little things without disgracing themselves: a man cannot, except with fiddling. Had I learnt to fiddle, I should have done nothing else." BOSWELL. "Pray, sir, did you ever play on any musical instrument?" JOHNSON. "No, sir. I once bought me a flagelet; but I never made out a tune." BOSWELL. A flagelet, sir!-so small an instrument?? I should have liked to hear you play on the That should have been your instrument." JOHNSON. "Sir, I might as well have played on the violoncello as another; but I should have done nothing else. No, sir; a man would never undertake great things, could he be amused with small. I once tried knotting. Dempster's sister undertook to teach me; but I could not learn it." BOSWELL. "So, sir; it will be related in pompous narrative, 'Once for his amusement he tried knotting; nor did this Hercules disdain the distaff."" JOHNSON. "Knitting of stockings is a good amuse-plained.—ED.] ment. As a freeman of Aberdeen, I should violoncello. BOSWELL. "Was not Dr. John Camp bell a very inaccurate man in his narrative, sir? He once told me, that he drank thirteen bottles of port at a sitting 5." JOHN 66 4 [Mrs. Thrale. Dr. Johnson is here made to say, that he was weary of chiding her on this subject." It is, however, remarkable that in all his letters to her-written certainly with equal freedom and affection—there should be no allusion of this kind. Without accusing Mr. Boswell of stating what was not true, we may suspect that on these occasions he did not tell the whole truth; and that Dr. Johnson's expressions were answers to suggestions of his own; and to enable us to judge fairly of the answer, the suggestion itself should have been stated. This seems the more probable from Johnson's saying, "Do talk to her of it;" which would have been a violation of all decency and friendship (considering the relative situations of Mrs. Thrale, Dr. Johnson, and Mr. Boswell), if it did not allude to some particular fact of which Boswell himself had com 5 Lord Macartney observes upon this passage, "I have heard him tell many things, which, though embellished by their mode of narrative, had their foundation in truth; but I never remember any thing approaching to this. If he had written it, I should have supposed some wag had put the figure of one before the three." I am, however, absolutely certain that Dr. Campbell told me it, and I gave particular attention to it, being myself a lover of wine, and therefore curious to hear whatever is remarkable concerning drink ing. There can be no doubt that some men can drink, without suffering any injury, such a quantity as to others appears incredible. It is but fair to add, that Dr. Campbell told me, he took a very long time to this great potation; and I have heard Dr. Johnson say, "Sir, if a man drinks very SON Why, sir, I do not know that | I looked into his book, and thought he did Campbell ever lied with pen and ink; but you could not entirely depend on any thing he told you in conversation, if there was fact mixed with it. However, I loved Campbell: he was a solid orthodox man: he had a reverence for religion. Though defective in practice, he was religious in principle; and he did nothing grossly wrong that I have heard 1." I told him that I had been present the day before, when Mrs. Montagu, the literary lady, sat to Miss Reynolds for her picture; and that she said," she had bound up Mr. Gibbon's History without the last two offensive chapters; for that she thought the book so far good, as it gave, in an elegant manner, the substance of the bad writers medii avi, which the late Lord Lyttelton advised her to read." JOHNSON. 'Sir, she has not read them: she shows none of this impetuosity to me: she does not know Greek, and, I fancy, knows little Latin. She is willing you should think she knows them; but she does not say she does 2." BOSWELL. "Mr. Harris, who was present, agreed with her." JOHNSON. "Harris was laughing at her, sir. Harris is a sound sullen scholar; he does not like interlopers. Harris, however, is a prig, and a bad prig 3. slowly, and lets one glass evaporate before he takes another, I know not how long he may drink." Dr. Campbell mentioned a colonel of militia who sat with him all the time, and drank equally. BoswELL. Dr. John Campbell died about two years before this conversation took place; Dec. 10, 1776. -MALONE. [See ante, v. i. p. 270. 306.— ED.] 2 [All this must be truncated and distorted. Mrs. Montagu did not say that she had read these authours, but had been advised to read them; and the inference from what she did say might be, that she had read Gibbon instead: and surely the word " impetuosity must be a mistake, arising, perhaps, from Mr. Boswell's not being able to decipher his own manuscript. Then, again, Mr. Harris is said to agree with her-in what?-in thinking that Gibbon's History gave, in an elegant manner, the substance of the writers of the medii ævi. How could this be laughing at her? Mr. Boswell says elsewhere of himself, brevis esse laboro, obscurus fio.-ED.] 3 What my friend meant by these words concerning the amiable philosopher of Salisbury, I am at a loss to understand. A friend suggests, that Johnson thought his manner as a writer affected, while at the same time the matter did not compensate for that fault. In short, that he meant to make a remark quite different from that which a celebrated gentleman made on a very eminent physician: He is a coxcomb, but a satisfactory coxcomb -BOSWELL. The celebrated gentleman here alluded to was the late Right Honourable William Gerard Hamilton.-MA LONF. not understand his own system." BoswELL. "He says plain things in a formal and abstract way, to be sure; but his method is good: for to have clear_notions upon any subject, we must have recourse to ana lytick arrangement." JOHNSON. "Sir, it is what every body does, whether they will or no. But sometimes things may be made darker by definition. I see a cow. I define her, Animal quadrupes ruminans cornutum. But a goat ruminates, and a cow may have no horns. Cow is plainer." BOSWELL. "I think Dr. Franklin's definition of Man a good one-‘A tool-making animal.'” JOHNSON. "But many a man never made a tool: and suppose a man without arms, he could not make a tool." 66 "It Talking of drinking wine, he said, “I did not leave off wine, because I could not bear it; I have drunk three bottles of port without being the worse for it. University College has witnessed this." Boswell. Why then, sir, did you leave it off?" JOHNSON. "Why, sir, because it is so much better for a man to be sure that he is never to be intoxicated, never to lose the power over himself. I shall not begin to drink wine again till I grow old 4, and want it." BOSWELL. "I think, sir, you once said to me, that not to drink wine was a great deduction from life." JOHNSON. is a diminution of pleasure, to be sure; but I do not say a diminution of happiness. There is more happiness in being rational." BOSWELL. "But if we could have pleasure always, should not we be happy? The greatest part of men would compound for pleasure." JOHNSON. "Supposing we could have pleasure always, an intellectual man would not compound for it. The greatest part of men would compound, because the greatest part of men are gross." "BoswELLl. "I allow there may be greater pleasure than from wine. I have had more pleasure from your conversation. I have indeed; I assure you I have." JOHNSON. "When we talk of pleasure, we mean sensual pleasure. * *5 Philosophers tell you, that pleasure is contrary to happiness. Gross men prefer animal pleasure. So there are men who have preferred living among savages. what a wretch must he be, who is content with such conversation as can be had among savages! You may remember an officer at Fort Augustus, who had served in America, told us of a woman whom they were obliged to bind, in order to get her back from savage life." BOSWELL. "She must have been an animal, a beast." JOHNSON. she was a speaking cat." Now 66 Sir, I mentioned to him that I had become 4 [He was now in his seventieth year.-ED.] 5 Two lines are here omitted.-ED.] very weary in company where I heard not a single intellectual sentence, except that a man who had been settled ten years in Minorca was become a much inferiour man to what he was in London, because a man's mind grows narrow in a narrow place." JOHNSON. "A man's mind grows narrow in a narrow place, whose mind is enlarged only because he has lived in a large place: but what is got by books and thinking is preserved in a narrow place as well as in a large place. A man cannot know modes of life as well in Minorca as in London; but he may study mathematicks as well in Minorca. BOSWELL." I don't know, sir: if you had remained ten years in the isle of Col, you would not have been the man JOHNSON. that you now are." Yes, sir, if I had been there from fifteen to twentyfive; but not if from twenty-five to thirtyfive." BOSWELL. "I own, sir, the spirits which I have in London make me do every thing with more readiness and vigour. I can talk twice as much in London as any where else." Of Goldsmith, he said, "He was not an agreeable companion, for he talked always for fame 1. A man who does so never can be pleasing. The man who talks to unburden his mind is the man to delight you. An eminent friend of ours 2 is not so agreeable as the variety of his knowledge would otherwise make him, because he talks partly from ostentation." Soon after our arrival at Thrale's, I heard one of the maids calling eagerly on another to go to Dr. Johnson. I wondered what this could mean. I afterwards learnt, that it was to give her a Bible, which he had brought from London as a present to her. He was for a considerable time occupied in reading" Memoires de Fontenelle," leaning and swinging upon the low gate into the court, without his hat. I looked into Lord Kaimes's "Sketches of the History of Man; " and mentioned to Dr. Johnson his censure of Charles the Fifth, for celebrating his funeral obsequies in his life-time, which, I told him, I had been used to think a solemn and affecting act. JOHNSON. "Why, sir, a man may dispose his mind to think so of that act of Charles; but it is so liable to ridicule, that if one man out of ten thousand laughs at it, he'll make the other nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine laugh too." I could not agree with him in this. Hawk. [Johnson thought very well of Apoph. Lord Kaimes's Elements of Criticism; of others of his writings he thought very indifferently, and laughed p. 209. much at his opinion that war was a good thing occasionally, as so much valour and virtue were exhibited in it. "A fire," says Johnson, "might as well be thought a good thing; there is the bravery and address of the firemen in extinguishing it; there is much humanity exerted in saving the lives and properties of the poor sufferers; yet,' says he," after all this, who can say a fire is a good thing?"] WELL. Sir John Pringle had expressed a wish that I would ask Dr. Johnson's opinion what were the best English sermons for style. I took an opportunity to-day of mentioning several to him. "Atterbury?" JOHNSON. “Yes, sir, one of the best." Bos"Tillotson?" JOHNSON. " Why, not now. I should not advise a preacher at this day to imitate Tillotson's style; though I don't know; I should be cautious of objecting to what has been applauded by so many suffrages.-South is one of the best, if you except his peculiarities, and his violence, and sometimes coarseness of language.-Seed has a very fine style; but he is not very theological.-Jortin's sermons are very elegant.-Sherlock's style, too, is very elegant, though he has not made it his principal study. And you may add Smalridge. All the latter preachers have a good style. Indeed, nobody now talks much of style: every body composes pretty well. There are no such inharmonious periods as there were a hundred years ago. I should recommend Dr. Clarke's sermons, were he orthodox. However, it is very well known where he is not orthodox, which was upon the doctrine of the Trinity, as to which he is a condemned heretick; so one is aware of it." BosWELL. "I like Ogden's Sermons on Prayer very much, both for neatness of style and subtilty of reasoning." JOHNSON. "I should like to read all that Ogden has written." BOSWELL. "What I wish to know is, what sermons afford the best specimen of English pulpit eloquence." JOHNSON. "We have no sermons addressed to the passions, that are good for any thing; if you mean that kind of eloquence." A CLERGYMAN (whose name I do not recollect). "Were not Dodd's sermons addressed to the passions? JOHNSON. They were nothing, sir, be they addressed to what they may." دو At dinner, Mrs. Thrale expressed a wish to go and see Scotland. JOHNSON. "Seeing Scotland, madam, is only seeing a worse England. It is seeing the flower gradually fade away to the naked stalk. Seeing the Hebrides, indeed, is seeing quite a different scene." Our poor friend, Mr. Thomas Davies, was soon to have a benefit at Drury-lane Theatre, as some relief to his unfortunate circumstances. We were all warmly in |