THE The Modern PHILOSOPHY SERIES HE Modern Student's Library has been enlarged to include a series of volumes containing writings of the great philosophers. These volumes are edited by the most competent authorities at home and abroad. The selections are comprehensive and suited to the special needs of students and the general reading public. Each volume contains an introduction giving a brief outline of the system of the author and indicating his place in the history of thought. The Philosophy Series is under the general editorship of Ralph Barton Perry, Professor of Philosophy, Harvard University. [For a complete list of THE MODERN STUDENT'S CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1 PREFACE In making this abridgment of Boswell's Life of Johnson I have omitted most of Boswell's criticisms, comments, and notes, all of Johnson's opinions in legal cases, most of the letters, and parts of the conversation dealing with matters which were of greater importance in Boswell's day than now. I have kept in mind an old habit, common enough, I dare say, among its devotees, of opening the book at random, and reading wherever the eye falls upon a passage of especial interest. All such passages, I hope, have been retained, and enough of the whole book to illustrate all the phases of Johnson's mind and of his time which Boswell observed. Loyal Johnsonians may look upon such a book with a measure of scorn. I could not have made it, had I not believed that it would be the means of drawing new readers to Boswell, and eventually of finding for them in the complete work what many have already found-days and years of growing enlightenment and happy companionship, and an innocent refuge from the cares and perturbations of life. PRINCETON, June 28, 1917. |