disarmed the force of his lies. But, besides; a man had rather have a hundred lies told of him, than one truth which he does not wish should be told." GOLDSMITH. "For my part, I'd tell truth, and shame the devil." JOHNSON. "Yes, Sir; but the devil will be angry. I wish to shame the devil as much as you do, but I should choose to be out of the reach of his claws." GOLDSMITH. "His claws can do you no harm, when you have the shield of truth." It having been observed that there was little hospitality in London: JOHNSON. "Nay, Sir, any man who has a name, or who has the power of pleasing, will be very generally invited in London. The man Sterne, I have been told, has had engagements for three months." GOLDSMITH. "And a very dull fellow." JOHNSON. "Why, no, Sir." 1 Martinelli told us, that for several years he lived much with Charles Townshend, and that he ventured to tell him he was a bad joker. JOHNSON. “Why, Sir, thus much I can say upon the subject. One day he and a few more agreed to go and dine in the country, and each of them was to bring a friend in his carriage with him. Charles Townshend asked Fitzherbert to go with him, but told him," You must find somebody to bring you back: I can only carry you there." Fitzherbert did not much like this arrangement. He however consented, observing sarcastically, 'It will do very well; for then the same jokes will serve you in returning as in going." 3 แ not stick uniformly to a party, is only waiting to be bought. Why then, said I, he is only waiting to be what that gentleman is already." We talked of the king's coming to see Goldsmith's new play [She Stoops to Conquer.]— "I wish he would," said Goldsmith: adding, however, with an affected indifference, "Not that it would do me the least good." JOHNSON. "Well, then, Sir, let us say it would do him good (laughing). No, Sir, this affectation will not pass;—it is mighty idle. In such a state as ours, who would not wish to please the chief magistrate?" GOLDSMITH. "I do wish to please him. I remember a line in Dryden,— 'And every poet is the monarch's friend.' It ought to be reversed." JOHNSON. "Nay, there are finer lines in Dryden on this subject: For colleges on bounteous Kings depend, And never rebel was to arts a friend." General Paoli observed, that successful rebels might. MARTINELLI. "Happy rebellions." GOLDSMITH. "We have no such phrase." GENERAL PAOLI. “But have you not the thing?" GOLDSMITH. "Yes; all our happy revolutions. They have hurt our constitution, and will hurt it, till we mend it by another HAPPY REVOLUTION."-I never before discovered that my friend Goldsmith had so much of the old prejudice in him. General Paoli, talking of Goldsmith's new play, said, "Il a fait un compliment très-gracieux à une certaine grande dame;" meaning a duchess of the first rank.4 An eminent public character being mentioned: JOHNSON. "I remember being present when he showed himself to be so corrupted, or I expressed a doubt whether Goldsmith at least something so different from what I intended it, in order that I might hear the think right, as to maintain, that a member of truth from himself. It, perhaps, was not quite parliament should go along with his party, right fair to endeavour to bring him to a confession, or wrong. Now, Sir, this is so remote from as he might not wish to avow positively his native virtue, from scholastic virtue, that a taking part against the Court. He smiled and good man must have undergone a great change hesitated. The General at once relieved him, before he can reconcile himself to such a doc- by this beautiful image : "Monsieur Goldsmith trine. It is maintaining that you may lie to est comme la mer, qui jette des perles et beauthe public; for you lie when you call that right coup d'autres belles choses, sans s'en apperçevoir." which you think wrong, or the reverse. A GOLDSMITH. "Très-bien dit, et très-élégamment." friend of ours, who is too much an echo of A person was mentioned, who it was said that gentleman, observed, that a man who does could take down in short-hand the speeches in 1 Sterne, as may be supposed, was no great favourite with Dr. Johnson; and a lady once ventured to ask him how he liked Yorick's sermons: "I know nothing about them, Madam," was his reply. But some time afterwards, forgetting himself, he severely censured them, and the lady very aptly retorted. "I understood you to say, Sir, that you had never read them." "No, madam, I did read them, but it was in a stage-coach. I should never have deigned even to look at them had I been at large.". - Craddock's Mem. p. 208.— CROKER. The Right Hon. Charles Townshend, brother of the first Marquis Townshend, whose great but eccentric talents have been so celebrated by Horace Walpole and immortalized by Burke. He died Sep. 4. 1767.- Croker. 3This is an instance," as Sir James Mackintosh observed to me, which proves that the task of elucidating Boswell has not been undertaken too soon." Sir James, Lord Wellesley, Mr. Chalmers, and I doubted, at first, whether theeminent public character" was not Mr. Fox, and the friend of Johnson's, too much the echo" of the former, Mr. Burke; but we finally agreed that Mr. Burke and Sir Joshua Reynolds were meant; the designation of eminent public character was, in 1773, more appropriate to Burke than to Fox. Mr. Fox, too, had lately changed his party, while Burke always maintained (see post, 15th August, 1773), and was, indeed, the first who, in his " Thoughts on the Present Discontents," openly avowed and advocated the principle of inviolable adherence to political connections, putting," as Mr. Prior says, "to silence the hitherto common reproach applied to most public characters of being party-men."Life of Burke, vol. i. p. 232. This supposition being correct, the other was no doubt Sir Josua Reynolds. - CROKER. 4 The lady was Anne Luttrell, sister of Lord Carhampton, widow of Mr Horton, whose marriage with the Duke of Cumberland had recently made a great noise, and was marked with the severe disapprobation of the king. The "compliment" no doubt was Hastings' speech to Miss Neville, in the second act, when he proposes to her to fly "to France, where, even among slaves, the laws of marriage are respected. The audience the first night applied this to the Duke of Cumberland, who happened to be present, with a burst of applause: but this, though it could not have pleased the king, did not prevent his ordering the play on its tenth night. - CROKER. parliament with perfect exactness. JOHNSON. "Sir, it is impossible. I remember one Angel, who came to me to write for him a preface or dedication to a book upon short-hand, and he professed to write as fast as a man could speak. In order to try him, I took down a book, and read while he wrote; and I favoured him, for I read more deliberately than usual. I had proceeded but a very little way, when he begged I would desist, for he could not follow me." Hearing now for the first time of this preface or dedication, I said, “What an expense, Sir, do you put us to in buying books, to which you have written prefaces or dedications." JOHNSON. "Why, I have dedicated to the royal family all round; that is to say, to the last generation of the royal family." GOLDSMITH. "And perhaps, Sir, not one sentence of wit in a whole dedication." JOHNSON. "Perhaps not, Sir." BOSWELL. "What then is the reason for applying to a particular person to do that which any one may do as well?" JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, one man has greater readiness at doing it than another." "I spoke of Mr. Harris, of Salisbury, as being a very learned man, and in particular an eminent Grecian. JOHNSON. “I am not sure of that. His friends give him out as such, but I know not who of his friends are able to judge of it." GOLDSMITH. "He is what is much better: he is a worthy humane man." JOHNSON. "Nay, Sir, that is not to the purpose of our argument: that will as much prove that he can play upon the fiddle as well as Giardini, as that he is an eminent Grecian." GOLDSMITH."The greatest musical performers have but small emoluments. Giardini, I am told, does not get above seven hundred a year." JOHNSON. "That is indeed but little for a man to get, who does best that which so many endeavour to do. There is nothing, I think, in which the power of art is shown so much as in playing on the fiddle. In all other things we can do something at first. Any man will forge a bar of iron, if you give him a hammer; not so well as a smith, but tolerably. A man will saw a piece of wood, and make a box, though a clumsy one; but give him a fiddle and a fiddlestick, and he can do nothing." On Monday, April 19., he called on me with Mrs. Williams, in Mr. Strahan's coach, and carried me out to dine with Mr. Elphinston, at his academy at Kensington. A printer having acquired a fortune sufficient to keep his coach, was a good topic for the credit of literature. Mrs. Williams said, that another printer, Mr. Hamilton, had not waited so long as Mr. Strahan, but had kept his coach several years sooner. JOHNSON. "He was in the right. Life is short. The sooner that a man begins to enjoy his wealth, the better.” Mr. Elphinston talked of a new book that was much admired, and asked Dr. Johnson if he had read it. JOHNSON. "I have looked into it." "What," said Elphinston, “have you not read it through?" Johnson, offended at being thus pressed, and so obliged to own his cursory mode of reading, answered tartly, “No, Sir; do you read books through?” He this day again defended duelling, and put his argument upon what I have ever thought the most solid basis; that if public war be allowed to be consistent with morality, private war must be equally so. Indeed we may observe what strained arguments are used to reconcile war with the Christian religion. But, in my opinion, it is exceedingly clear that duelling, having better reasons for its barbarous violence, is more justifiable than war, in which thousands go forth without any cause of personal quarrel, and massacre each other. On Wednesday, April 21., I dined with him at Mr. Thrale's. A gentleman attacked Garrick for being vain. JOHNSON. "No wonder, Sir, that he is vain; a man who is perpetually flattered in every mode that can be conceived. So many bellows have blown the fire, that one wonders he is not by this time become a cinder." BOSWELL. "And such bellows too! Lord Mansfield with his cheeks like to burst : Lord Chatham like an Eolus. I have read such notes from them to him, as were enough to turn his head." JOHNSON. "True. When he whom every body else flatters, flatters me, I then am truly happy." MRS. THRALE. "The sentiment is in Congreve, I think." JOHNSON. "Yes, Madam, in 'The Way of the World :' "If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see That heart which others bleed for, bleed for me.” No, Sir, I should not be surprised though Garrick chained the ocean and lashed the winds" BOSWELL "Should it not be, Sir, lashed the ocean and chained the winds?" JOHNSON. "No, Sir; recollect the original: Mr. Boswell does not include this dedication of " Angel's Stenography," published in 1758, in his list of Johnson's compositions. CROKER. 2 James Harris, Esq., father of the first Earl of Malmesbury, was born in 1709, and died in 1780. In 1801, his son published a magnificent edition of his works in two volumes quarto. WRIGHT. Johnson had a strong prejudice against Mr. Harris; I know not why. Of the Dedication to his "Hermes," Mrs. Piozzi heard Johnson observe, that, though but fourteen lines long, there were six grammatical faults in it. And see post, 2d Nov. 1773, where he calls him "a coxcomb." — CROKER. 3 The Hamiltons were respectable publishers for three generations. - CROKER. 4 Lord Chatham addressed to him, while on a visit at Mount Edgecumbe, the pretty lines: -- "Leave, Garrick, leave the landscape, proudly gay, Who, rich in rural peace, ne'er thought of pomp w gold.“ - C In Corum atque Eurum solitus sævire flagellis This does very well, when both the winds and the sea are personified, and mentioned by their mythological names, as in Juvenal; but when they are mentioned in plain language, the application of the epithets suggested by me is the most obvious; and accordingly my friend himself, in his imitation of the passage which describes Xerxes, has— "The waves he lashes, and enchains the wind." The modes of living in different countries, and the various views with which men travel in quest of new scenes, having been talked of, a learned gentleman who holds a considerable office in the law, expatiated on the happiness of a savage life; and mentioned an instance of an officer who had actually lived for some time in the wilds of America, of whom, when in that state, he quoted this reflection with an air of admiration, as if it had been deeply philosophical: Here am I, free and unrestrained, amidst the rude magnificence of Nature, with this Indian woman by my side, and this gun, with which I can procure food when I want it: what more can be desired for human happiness?" It did not require much sagacity to foresee that such a sentiment would not be permitted to pass without due animadversion. JOHNSON. "Do not allow yourself, Sir, to be imposed upon by such gross absurdity. It is sad stuff; it is brutish. If a bull could speak, he might as well exclaim,-Here am I with this cow and this grass; what being can enjoy greater felicity?" We talked of the melancholy end of a gentleman who had destroyed himself. JOHNSON. "It was owing to imaginary difficulties in his affairs, which, had he talked of with any friend, would soon have vanished." BOSWELL. "Do you think, Sir, that all who commit suicide are mad?" JOHNSON. "Sir, they are often not universally disordered in their intellects, but one passion presses so upon them, that they yield to it, and commit suicide, as a passionate man will stab another." He added, "I have often thought, that after a man has taken the resolution to kill himself, it is not courage in him to do any thing, however des 1 "The proud Barbarian, whose impatient ire * So also Butler, Hudibras, p. ii. c. i. v. 845.:- 1 presume Mr., afterwards Sir W. W. Pepys, a Master in Chancery, a frequent visitor at Streatham, but between whom and Johnson there was not much good will.-CROKER. 4 The gentleman here meant was, no doubt, Johnson's friend, William Fitzherbert, Esq., Member for Derby, who terminated his own existence in January, 1772. — CROKER, 1835. perate, because he has nothing to fear." GOLDSMITH. "I don't see that." JOHNSON. "Nay, but, my dear Sir, why should you not see what GOLDSMITH. every one else sees? for fear of something that he has resolved to "It is kill himself: and will not that timid disposition restrain him?" JOHNSON. "It does not sig nify that the fear of something made him resolve; it is upon the state of his mind, after the resolution is taken, that I argue. Suppose a man, either from fear, or pride, or conscience, or whatever motive, has resolved to kill himself; when once the resolution is taken, take the king of Prussia by the nose, at the he has nothing to fear. He may then go and head of his army. He cannot fear the rack, who is resolved to kill himself. When Eustace Budgel 6 was walking down to the Thames, determined to drown himself, he might, if he pleased, without any apprehension of danger, have turned aside, and first set fire to St. James's Palace." On Tuesday, April 27., Mr. Beauclerk and I called on him in the morning. As we walked up Johnson's Court, I said, "I have a veneration for this court;" and was glad to find that Beauclerk had the same reverential enthusiasm. We found him alone. We talked of Mr. Andrew Stuart's elegant and plausible Letters to Lord Mansfield: a copy of which had been sent by the author to Dr. Johnson. JOHNSON. "They have not answered the end. They have not been talked of; I have never heard of them. This is owing to their not being sold. People seldom read a book which is given to them; and few are given. The way to spread a work is to sell it at a low price. No man will send to buy a thing that costs even sixpence, without an intention to read it." BosWELL. May it not be doubted, Sir, whether it be proper to publish letters, arraigning the 5 This goes far beyond Johnson's original thesis, and is undoubtedly erroneous. Suicide is often attempted to avoid an ignominious death, and would be, no doubt, still more frequently to avoid torture, - CROKER. 6 A friend and relative of Addison's, who drowned himself [in 1737] to escape a prosecution on account of forging the will of Dr. Tindal, in which Budgel had provided himself with a legacy of 2000. To this Pope alludes: "Let Budgell charge low Grub Street on his quill, And write whate'er he please except my will." - CROKER. 7 Boswell makes no mention of this excursion, which, I suppose, did not take place, as Boswell saw him in London on the 27th, and Johnson attended Boswell's election at the Club on the 30th.- CROKER. On the Douglas cause, in 1773. CROKER. ultimate decision of an important cause by the supreme judicature of the nation?" JOHNSON. "No, Sir, I do not think it was wrong to publish these letters. If they are thought to do harm, why not answer them? But they will do no harm. If Mr. Douglas be indeed the son of Lady Jane, he cannot be hurt: if he be not her son, and yet has the great estate of the family of Douglas, he may well submit to have a pamphlet against him by Andrew Stuart. Sir, I think such a publication does good, as it does good to show us the possibilities of human life. And, Sir, you will not say that the Douglas cause was a cause of easy decision, when it divided your Court as much as it could do, to be determined at all. When your judges are seven and seven, the casting vote of the president must be given on one side or other; no matter, for my argument, on which; one or the other must be taken; as when I am to move, there is no matter which leg I move first. And then, Sir, it was otherwise determined here. No, Sir, a more dubious determination of any question cannot be imagined."1 He said, "Goldsmith should not be for ever attempting to shine in conversation: he has not temper for it, he is so much mortified when he fails. Sir, a game of jokes is composed partly of skill, partly of chance; a man may be beat at times by one who has not the tenth part of his wit. Now Goldsmith's putting himself against another, is like a man laying a hundred to one, who cannot spare the hundred. It is not worth a man's while. A man should not lay a hundred to one, unless he can easily spare it, though he has a hundred chances for him he can get but a guinea, and may lose a hundred. Goldsmith is in this state. When he contends, if he gets the better, it is a very little addition to a man of his literary reputation if he does not get the better, he is miserably vexed." Johnson's own superlative powers of wit set him above any risk of such uneasiness. Garrick had remarked to me of him, a few days before, "Rabelais and all other wits are nothing compared with him. You may be diverted by them; but Johnson gives you a forcible hug, and shakes laughter out of you, whether you will or no." Goldsmith, however, was often very fortunate in his witty contests, even when he entered the lists with Johnson himself. Sir Joshua Reynolds was in company with them one day, when Goldsmith said, that he thought he could write a good fable, mentioned the simplicity which that kind of composition requires, and observed, that in most fables the animals intro 1 I regretted that Dr. Johnson never took the trouble to study a question which interested nations. He would not even read a pamphlet which I wrote upon it, entitled," The Essence of the Douglas Cause;" which, I have reason to Blatter myself, had considerable effect in favour of Mr. Douglas; of whose legitimate filiation I was then, and am still, firmly convinced. Let me add, that no fact can be more duced seldom talk in character. "For instance," said he, "the fable of the little fishes, who saw birds fly over their heads, and, envying them, petitioned Jupiter to be changed into birds. The skill," continued he, "consists in making them talk like little fishes." While he indulged himself in this fanciful reverie, he observed Johnson shaking his sides, and laughing. Upon which he smartly proceeded, Why, Dr. Johnson, this is not so easy as you seem to think: for if you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like WHALES." Johnson, though remarkable for his great variety of composition, never exercised his talents in fable, except we allow his beautiful [fairy] tale [the Fountains] published in Mrs. Williams's Miscellanies to be of that species. I have, however, found among his manuscript collections the following sketch of one: "Glow-worm lying in the garden saw a candle in a neighbouring palace, and complained of the littleness of its own light; — another observed wait a little; -soon dark, have outlasted o [many] of these glaring lights, which are only brighter as they haste to nothing." On Thursday, April 29., I dined with him at General Oglethorpe's, where were Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Langton, Dr. Goldsmith, and Mr. Thrale. I was very desirous to get Dr. Johnson absolutely fixed in his resolution to go with me to the Hebrides this year; and I told him that I had received a letter from Dr. Robertson, the historian, upon the subject, with which he was much pleased, and now talked in such a manner of his long intended tour, that I was satisfied he meant to fulfil his engagement. The custom of eating dogs at Otaheite being mentioned, Goldsmith observed, that this was also a custom in China; that a dog-butcher is as common there as any other butcher; and that when he walks abroad all the dogs fall on him. JOHNSON. "That is not owing to his killing dogs, Sir. I remember a butcher at Lichfield, whom a dog that was in the house where I lived, always attacked. It is the smell of carnage which provokes this, let the animals he has killed be what they may." GOLDSMITH. "Yes, there is a general abhor rence in animals at the signs of massacre. you put a tub full of blood into a stable, the horses are like to go mad." JOHNSON. "I doubt that." GOLDSMITH. "Nay, Sir, it is a fact well authenticated." THRALE. “You had better prove it before you put it into your book on natural history. You may do it in my stable if you will." JOHNSON. 66 Nay, Sir, I If respectably ascertained, than by the judgment of the most august tribunal in the world; a judgment in which Lord Mansfield and Lord Camden united in 1769, and from which only five of a numerous body entered a protest. BoswELL. It has already been observed [ante, p. 46.] that one of his first Essays was a Latin poem on a Glow-worm; but whether it be any where extant, has not been ascertained. —) - MALONE would not have him prove it. If he is content to take his information from others, he may get through his book with little trouble, and without much endangering his reputation. But if he makes experiments for so comprehensive a book as his, there would be no end to them; his erroneous assertions would then fall upon himself; and he might be blamed for not having made experiments as to every particular." success. Sir, it is right, at a time when the royal family is not generally liked, to let it be seen that the people like at least one of them." SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. "I do not perceive why the profession of a player should be despised; for the great and ultimate end of all the employments of mankind is to produce amusement. Garrick produces more amusement than any body." BOSWELL. "You say, Dr. Johnson, that Garrick exhibits himself for The character of Mallet having been intro- a shilling. In this respect he is only on a footduced, and spoken of slightingly by Gold- ing with a lawyer, who exhibits himself for his smith;-JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, Mallet had fee, and even will maintain any nonsense or talents enough to keep his literary reputation absurdity, if the case require it. Garrick realive as long as he himself lived; and that, let fuses a play or a part which he does not like: me tell you, is a good deal." GOLDSMITH. a lawyer never refuses." JOHNSON. " Why, "But I cannot agree that it was so. His Sir, what does this prove? only that a lawyer literary reputation was dead long before his is worse. Boswell is now like Jack in 'The natural death. I consider an author's literary Tale of a Tub,' 3 who, when he is puzzled by reputation to be alive only while his name will an argument, hangs himself. He thinks I insure a good price for his copy from the book- shall cut him down, but I'll let him hang”. sellers. I will get you (to Johnson) a hundred (laughing vociferously). SIR JOSHUA REYguineas for any thing whatever that shall NOLDS. you "Mr. Boswell thinks that the profeswrite, if you put your name to it." sion of a lawyer being unquestionably honourable, if he can show the profession of a player to be more honourable, he proves his argument." Dr. Goldsmith's new play, "She Stoops to Conquer," being mentioned;-JOHNSON. "I know of no comedy for many years that has so much exhilarated an audience, that has answered so much the great end of comedy— making an audience merry." Goldsmith having said, that Garrick's compliment to the Queen, which he introduced into the play of "The Chances," which he had altered and revised this year, was mean and gross flattery';- JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, I would not write, I would not give solemnly under my hand, a character beyond what I thought really true; but a speech on the stage, let it flatter ever so extravagantly, is formular. It has always been formular to flatter kings and queens; so much so, that even in our church-service we have 'our most religious king,' used indiscriminately, whoever is king. Nay, they even flatter themselves;-'we have been graciously pleased to grant. No modern flattery, however, is so gross as that of the Augustan age, where the emperor was deified;-Præsens Divus habebitur Augustus.'2 And as to meanness". (rising into warmth)-"how is it mean in a player,a showman,- -a fellow who exhibits himself for a shilling, to flatter his queen? The attempt, indeed, was dangerous; for if it had missed, what became of Garrick, and what became of the queen? As Sir William Temple says of a great general, it is necessary not only that his designs be formed in a masterly manner, but that they should be attended with 3 The allusion is not to the Tale of a Tub, but to the History of John Bull, part iv. chap. ii. ; where however Jack does not hang himself for any such reason; but the misrepre sentation turned the laugh against Boswell, and that was all Johnson cared for. - LoCKHART. 8 |