There seems no great difficulty in resolving your doubts. The reasons for which you are inclined to visit London, are, I think, not of sufficient strength to answer the objections. That you should delight to come once a year to the fountain of intelligence and pleasure, is very natural; but the desire both of information and of pleasure, must be regulated by propriety. Pleasure, which cannot be obtained but by unreasonable or unsuitable expense, must always end in pain: and pleasure, which must be enjoyed at the expense of another's pain, can never be such as a worthy mind can fully delight in, What improvement you might gain by coming to London, you may easily supply, or easily compensate, by enjoining yourself some particular study at home, or opening some new avenue to information. Edinburgh is not yet exhausted; and I am sure you will find no pleasure here which can deserve either that you should anticipate any part of your future fortune, or that you should condemn yourself and your lady to penurious frugality for the rest of the year.

I need not tell you what regard you owe to Mrs. Boswell's entreaties; or how much you ought to study the happiness of her, who studies yours with so much diligence, and of whose kindness you enjoy so good effects. Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions. She permitted you to ramble last year, you must permit her now to keep you at home.

Your last reason is so serious, that I am unwilling to oppose it. Yet you must remember, that your image of worshiping once a year in a certain place, in imitation of the Jews, is but a comparison, and "simile non est idem." If the annual resort to Jerusalem was a duty to the Jews, it was a duty, because it was commanded :

and you have no such command; therefore, no such duty. It may be dangerous to receive too readily, and indulge too fondly, opinions (from which perhaps no pious mind is wholly disengaged) of local sanctity and local devotion. You know what strange effects they have produced over a great part of the Christian world. I am now writing, and you, when you read this, are reading, under the Eye of Omnipresence.

To what degree Fancy is to be admitted into religious offices, it would require much deliberation to determine. I am far from intending totally to exclude it. Fancy is a faculty bestowed by our Creator; and it is reasonable that all his gifts should be used to his glory, that all our faculties should co-operate in his worship: but they are to co-operate according to the will of HIM who gave them; according to the order which His wisdom has established. As ceremonies prudential or convenient are less obligatory than positive ordinances; as bodily wor ship is only the token to others or ourselves of mental adoration; so Fancy is always to act in subordination to Reason. We may take Fancy for a companion; but we must follow Reason as our guide. We may allow Fancy to suggest certain ideas in certain places; but Reason must always be heard, when she tells us, that those ideas and those places have no natural or necessary relation. When we enter a church, we habitually recall to mind the duty of adoration; but we must not omit adoration for want of a temple: because we know, and we ought to remember, that the Universal Lord is every where present; and that, therefore, to come to Jona, or to Jerusalem, though it may be useful, cannot be ne

cessary.

Thus I have answered your letter; and I have not

answered it negligently. I love you too well to be careless when you are serious.

I think I shall be very diligent next week about our travels, which I have too long neglected.

I am, dear sir,

Your most &c.

Samuel Johnson.

Dear madam,

LETTER XIV.

To Mrs. Thrale.

Lichfield, March 25, 1776.

This letter will not, I hope, reach you many days before me. In a distress which can be so little relieved, nothing remains for a friend, but to come, and partake it.

Dear, sweet, little boy! When I read the letter this day to Mrs. Aston, she said: "Such a death is the next to translation." But however I may convince myself of this, the tears are in my eyes: and yet I could not love him as you loved him; nor reckon upon him for a future comfort as you and his father reckoned upon him.

He is gone, and we are going! We could not have enjoyed him long; and we shall not long be separated from him. He has probably escaped many such pangs as you are now feeling.

Nothing remains, but that with humble confidence we resign ourselves to Almighty Goodness; and fall down, without irreverent murmurs, before the Sovereign Distri butor of good and evil, with hope that though sorrow endureth for a night yet joy may come in the morning.

I have known you, madam, too long to think that you want any arguments for submission to the Supreme Will;

nor can my consolation have any effect but that of showing that I wish to comfort you. What can be done, you must do for yourself. Remember first, that your child is happy; and then, that he is safe, not only from the ills of this world, but from those more formidable dangers which extend their mischief to eternity. You have brought into the world a rational being; you have seen him happy during the little life that has been granted him; and you can have no doubt but that his happiness is now permanent and immutable.

When you have obtained by prayer such tranquillity as nature will admit, force your attention, as you can, upon your accustomed duties and accustomed entertainments. You can do no more for our dear boy; but you must not, therefore, think less on those whom your attention may make fitter for the place to which he is gone.

Life is

are at last on good terms with your father. Cultivate his kindness by all honest and manly means. short; no time can be afforded but for the indulgence of real sorrow, or contests upon questions seriously momentous. Let us not throw away any of our days upon useless resentment, or contend who shall hold out longest in stubborn malignity. It is best not to be angry; and

best, in the next place, to be quickly reconciled. May you and your father pass the remainder of your time in reciprocal benevolence!

Mrs. Williams, whom you may reckon as one of your wellwishers, is in a feeble and languishing state.

went for some part of the autumn into the country, but she is little benefited; and Dr. Lawrence confesses that his art is at an end. I am sorry for her pain, sorry for her decay.

and more

I was some weeks this autumn at Brighthelmstones The place was very dull, and I was not well; the expedition to the Hebrides was the most pleasant journey that I ever made. Such an effort annually would give the world a little diversity.

Every year, however, we cannot wander; and we must, therefore, endeavour to spend our time at home as well as we can. I believe it is best to throw life into a method, that every hour may bring its employment, and every employment have its hour. Xenophon observes, in his "Treatise of Economy," that if every thing is kept in a certain place, when any thing is worn out or consumed, the vacuity which it leaves will show what is wanting; so, if every part of time has its duty, the hour will call into remembrance its proper engage

ment.

I have not practised all this prudence myself, but I have suffered much for want of it; and I would have you, by timely recollection and steady resolution, escape from those evils which have lain heavy upon me,

I am, my dearest Boswell,

Your most humble servant,

Samuel Johnson.