6

seldom comes where he is not more ignorant than any one else." SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. "Yet there is no man whose company is more liked." JOHNSON. "To be sure, Sir. When people find a man of the most distinguished abilities as a writer, their inferior while he is with them, it must be highly gratifying to them. What Goldsmith comically says of himself is very true, he always gets the better when he argues alone; meaning, that he is master of a subject in his study, and can write well upon it; but when he comes into company, grows confused, and unable to talk. Take him as a poet, his Traveller' is a very fine performance; ay, and so is his 'Deserted Village,' were it not sometimes too much the echo of his 'Traveller.' Whether, indeed, we take him as a poet,-as a comic writer,- or as an historian, he stands in the first class." BOSWELL. "An historian! My dear Sir, you surely will not rank his compilation of the Roman History with the works of other his torians of this age?" JOHNSON." Why, who are before him?" BOSWELL. "Hume, Robertson,-Lord Lyttelton." JOHNSON (his antipathy to the Scotch beginning to rise). "I have not read Hume; but, doubtless, Goldsmith's History is better than the verbiage of Robertson, or the foppery of Dalrymple." BOSWELL. "Will you not admit the superiority of Robertson, in whose History we find such penetration, such painting?" JOHNSON. Sir, you must consider how that penetration and that painting are employed. It is not history, it is imagination. He who describes what he never saw, draws from fancy. Robertson paints minds as Sir Joshua paints faces in a history-piece: he imagines an heroic countenance. You must look upon Robertson's work as romance, and try it by that standard. History it is not. Besides, Sir, it is the great excellence of a writer to put into his book as much as his book will hold. Goldsmith has done this in his History. Now Robertson might have put twice as much into his book. Robertson is like a man who has packed gold in wool: the wool takes up more room than the gold. No, Sir; I always thought Robertson would be crushed by his own weight, -would be buried under his own ornaments. Goldsmith tells you shortly all you want to know: Robertson detains you a great deal too long. No man will read Robertson's cumbrous detail a second time; but Goldsmith's plain

66

1 Robertson's Charles V. and Goldsmith's Roman History were both published in 1769, WRIGHT.

2 See ante. Mr. Boswell's friendship for both Johnson and Robertson is here sorely perplexed- but there seems no ground for doubting that his real and decided opinion' of Robertson's works was very low he, on every occasion, repeats it with contemptuous consistency. CROKER.

And our name may, perhaps, be mixed with theirs! Ovid. de Art. Amand. 1. fil. v. 339.-C. 4 The heads of Messrs. Fletcher and Townley, executed on the 21st July, 1746, for the rebellion of 1745, were placed on Temple Bar: whether the heads of the rebels of 1715 remained there, or whether others were afterwards added, 1 do not know, CROKER.

In allusion to Dr, Johnson's supposed political principles,

narrative will please again and again. I would say to Robertson what an old tutor of a college said to one of his pupils: Read over your compositions, and wherever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out.' Goldsmith's abridgement better than that of Lucius Florus or Eutropius; and I will venture to say, that if you compare him with Vertot, in the same places of the Roman History, you will find that he excels Vertot. Sir, he has the art of compil ing, and of saying every thing he has to say in a pleasing manner. He is now writing a Natural History, and will make it as entertaining as a Persian tale."

I cannot dismiss the present topic without observing, that it is probable that Dr. Johnson, who owned that he often "talked for victory," rather urged plausible objections to Dr. Robertson's excellent historical works, in the ardour of contest, than expressed his real and decided opinion; for it is not easy to suppose, that he should so widely differ from the rest of the literary world.

JOHNSON. "I remember once being with Goldsmith in Westminster Abbey. While we surveyed the Poets' Corner, I said to him,

'Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur istis." When we got to Temple Bar he stopped me, pointed to the heads upon it, and slily whispered me,

• Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur ISTIS.'” 5 Johnson praised John Bunyan highly. "His Pilgrim's Progress' has great merit, both for invention, imagination, and the conduct of the story; and it has had the best evidence of its merit, the general and continued approbation of mankind. Few books, I believe, have had a more extensive sale. It is remarkable, that it begins very much like the poem of Dante: yet there was no translation of Dante when Bunyan wrote. There is reason to think that he had read Spenser."

A proposition which had been agitated, that monuments to eminent persons should, for the time to come, be erected in St. Paul's church, as well as in Westminster Abbey, was mentioned; and it was asked, who should be ho noured by having his monument first erected there. Somebody suggested Pope. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, as Pope was a Roman Catholic, I would not have his to be first. I think Milton's rather should have the precedence. I think

and perhaps his own. - BosWELL. Goldsmith was certainly not a Jacobite, though he was a Tory. In a letter to Langton (Sept. 7. 1771) he says of some criticisms on his History of England: "However, they set me down as an arrant Tory, and consequently an honest man."- Prior's Life, i 330. CROKER, 1846.

Here is another instance of his high admiration of Milton as a poet, notwithstanding his just abhorrence of that sour republican's political principles. His candour and discrimination are equally conspicuous. Let us hear no more of his injustice to Milton." BOSWELL. A monument to Milton in St. Paul's Cathedral would, as Dr. Hall observes, be the more appropriate from his having received his early education in the adjoining school. - CROKER.

Some of the company expressed a wonder why the author of so excellent a book as "The Whole Duty of Man" should conceal himself.1 JOHNSON. "There may be different reasons assigned for this, any one of which would be very sufficient. He may have been a clergyman, and may have thought that his religious counsels would have less weight when known to come from a man whose profession was theology. He may have been a man whose practice was not suitable to his principles, so that his character might injure the effect of his book, which he had written in a season of penitence. Or he may have been a man of rigid self-denial, so that he would have no reward for his pious labours while in this world, but refer it all to a future state."

The gentlemen went away to their club, and I was left at Beauclerk's till the fate of my election should be announced to me. I sat in a state of anxiety which even the charming conversation of Lady Di Beauclerk could not entirely dissipate. In a short time I received the agreeable intelligence that I was chosen. I hastened to the place of meeting, and was introduced to such a society as can seldom be found. Mr. Edmund Burke, whom I then saw for the first time, and whose splendid talents had long made me ardently wish for his acquaintance; Dr. Nugent, Mr. Garrick, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. (afterwards Sir William) Jones, and the company with whom I had dined. Upon my entrance, Johnson placed himself behind a chair, on which he leaned as on a desk or pulpit, and with humorous formality gave me a charge, pointing out the conduct expected from me as a good member of this club.

Goldsmith produced some very absurd verses which had been publicly recited to an audience for money. JOHNSON. "I can match this non

In a manuscript in the Bodleian Library several circumstances are stated, which strongly incline me to believe that Dr. Accepted Frewen, Archbishop of York, was the author of this work. MALONE.

See, on the subject of the author of this celebrated and excellent work, Gent. Mag. vol. xxiv. p. 26., and Ballard's Memoirs of Learned Ladies, p. 300. The late eccentric but learned Dr. Barrett, of Trinity College, Dublin, believed, I know not on what evidence, that Dr. Chapel, formerly proTost of that college, was the author. - CROKER.

Dr. Johnson's memory here was not perfectly accurate : "Eugenio" does not conclude thus. There are eight more lines after the last of those quoted by him; and the passage which he meant to recite is as follows:

"Say now, ye fluttering, poor assuming elves,
Stark full of pride, of folly, of-yourselves;
Say, where's the wretch of all your impious crew
Who dares confront his character to view?
Behold Eugenio, &c. &c.

Mr. Reed informs me that the author of Eugenio, Thomas Beech, a wine-merchant at Wrexham in Denbighshire, soon after its publication, viz. May 17. 1737, cut his own throat; and that it appears by Swift's works, that the poem had been shown to him, and received some of his corrections. Johnson had read "Eugenio" on his first coming to town, for we see it mentioned in one of his letters to Mr. Cave, which has been inserted in this work. - BOSWELL. One wonders at

Then we upon our globe's last verge shall go,
And see the ocean leaning on the sky;
From thence our rolling neighbours we shall know,
And on the lunar world securely pry.'"

Talking of puns, Johnson, who had a great contempt for that species of wit, deigned to allow that there was one good pun in "Menagiana," I think on the word corps.+

Much pleasant conversation passed, which Johnson relished with great good humour. But his conversation alone, or what led to it, or was interwoven with it, is the business of this work.

On Saturday, May 1., we dined by ourselves at our old rendezvous, the Mitre tavern. He was placid, but not much disposed to talk. He observed, that "the Irish mix better with the English than the Scotch do; their language is nearer to English; as a proof of which, they succeed very well as players, which Scotchmen do not. Then, Sir, they have not that extreme nationality which we find in the Scotch. I will do you, Boswell, the justice to say, that you are the most unscottified of your countrymen. You are almost the only instance of a Scotchman that I have known, who did not at every other sentence bring in some other Scotchman." 5

We drank tea with Mrs. Williams. I introduced a question which has been much agitated in the church of Scotland, whether the claim of lay-patrons to present ministers to parishes be well founded; and supposing it to be well

the patience and good nature with which Swift read and corrected this stupid poem. - CROKER.

3 There is no such poem ;-the lines are part of an allusion to the Royal Society, in the Annus Mirabilis, stanza 164.-CROKER.

I formerly thought that I had perhaps mistaken the word, and imagined it to be corps, from its similarity of sound to the real one. For an accurate and shrewd unknown gentleman, to whom I am indebted for some remarks on my work, observes on this passage: —“ Q. if not on the word, fort? A vociferous French preacher said of Bourdaloue, Il prêche fort bien, et moi bien fort.'- - Menagiana. See also Anecdotes Littéraires, art. Bourdaloue." But my ingenious and obliging correspondent, Mr. Abercrombie of Philadelphia, has pointed out to me the following passage; which renders the preceding conjecture unnecessary, and confirms my original statement:

"Madame de Bourdonne, chanoinesse de Remiremont, venoit d'entendre un discours plein de feu et d'esprit, mais fort peu solide, et très-irrégulier. Une de ses amies, qui y prenoit intérêt pour l'orateur, lui dit en sortant, Eh bien, Madame, que vous semble-t-il de ce que vous venez d'entendre? Qu'il y a d'esprit? Il y a tant,' répondit Madame de Bourdonne, que je n'y ai pas vu de corps.' Menagiana, tome ii. p. 64. - BOSWELL.

5 Boswell confesses that Garrick used to rally him on his nationality, and.there are abundant instances in these volumes to show that he was not exempt from that amiable prejudice. - CROKER.

founded, whether it ought to be exercised without the concurrence of the people? That church is composed of a series of judicatures: a presbytery, a synod, and finally, a general assembly; before all of which this matter may be contended and in some cases the presbytery having refused to induct or settle, as they call it, the person presented by the patron, it has been found necessary to appeal to the General Assembly. He said, I might see the subject well treated in the "Defence of Pluralities;" and although he thought that a patron should exercise his right with tenderness to the inclinations of the people of a parish, he was very clear as to his right. Then, supposing the question to be pleaded before the General Assembly, he dictated to me what follows. [See APPENDIX.]

Though I present to my readers Dr. Johnson's masterly thoughts on the subject, I think it proper to declare, that notwithstanding I am myself a lay patron, I do not entirely subscribe to his opinion.

On Friday, May 7., I breakfasted with him at Mr. Thrale's in the Borough. While we were alone, I endeavoured as well as I could to apologise for a lady2 who had been divorced from her husband by act of parliament. I said that he had used her very ill, had behaved brutally to her, and that she could not continue to live with him without having her delicacy contaminated; that all affection for him was thus destroyed; that the essence of conjugal union being gone, there remained only a cold form, a mere civil obligation; that she was in the prime of life, with qualities to produce happiness; that these ought not to be lost; and, that the gentleman on whose account she was divorced had gained her heart while thus unhappily situated. Seduced, perhaps, by the charms of the lady in question, I thus attempted to palliate what I was sensible could not be justified; for when I had finished my harangue, my venerable friend gave me a proper check:-"My dear Sir, never accustom your mind to mingle virtue and vice. The woman's a —, and there's an end on't." 3

He described the father of one of his friends thus: "Sir, he was so exuberant a talker at public meetings, that the gentlemen of his

1 This question has been still more seriously debated in our own day, and is not at all, I fear, satisfactorily settled.CROKER, 1846.

2 No doubt Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of Charles Duke of Marlborough, born in 1734, married in 1757 to Viscount Bolingbroke, from whom she was divorced in 1768, and married immediately after Mr. Topham Beauclerk. All that Johnson says is very true; but he would have been better entitled to hold such high language if he had not practically waived his right by living in that lady's private society. He should either, as a strict moralist, have refused her his countenance, or, as a man of honour and gratitude, been silent as to her frailties. It was not fair to enjoy her society, and disparage her character. - CROKER.

3" One evening," says Mrs. Piozzi, "in the rooms at Bright. helmstone, he fell into a comical discussion with Lord Bolingbroke, that lady's first husband: happening to sit by him, he chose to harangue very loudly about the nature, and use, and abuse of divorces. Many people gathered round them to hear what was said, and when my husband called him away, and told him to whom he had been talking, he

county were afraid of him. No business could be done for his declamation."

He did not give me full credit when I mentioned that I had carried on a short conversation by signs with some Esquimaux, who were then in London, particularly with one of them, who was a priest. He thought I could not make them understand me. No man was more incredulous as to particular facts which were at all extraordinary; and therefore no man was more scrupulously inquisitive, in order to discover the truth.

I dined with him this day at the house of my friends, Messieurs Edward and Charles Dilly, booksellers in the Poultry: there were present, their elder brother Mr. Dilly of Bedfordshire, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. Langton, Mr. Claxton, Rev. Dr. Mayo, a dissenting minister, the Rev. Mr. Toplady 6, and my friend the Rev. Mr. Temple.7

Hawkesworth's compilation of the Voyages to the South Sea being mentioned; - JOHNSON. "Sir, if you talk of it as a subject of commerce, it will be gainful; if as a book that is to increase human knowledge, I believe there will not be much of that. Hawkesworth can tell only what the voyagers have told him; and they have found very little, only one new animal, I think." BOSWELL. "But many insects, Sir." JOHNSON. "Why Sir, as to insects, Ray reckons of British insects twenty thousand species. They might have staid at home and discovered enough in that way."

Talking of birds, I mentioned Mr. Daines Barrington's ingenious Essay against the received notion of their migration. JOHNSON. "I think we have as good evidence for the migration of woodcocks as can be desired. We find they disappear at a certain time of the year, and appear again at a certain time of the year; and some of them, when weary in their flight, have been known to alight on the rigging of ships far out at sea." One of the company observed, that there had been instances of some of them found in summer in Essex. JOHNSON. "Sir, that strengthens our argument. Exceptio probat regulam. Some being found, shows that, if all remained, many would be found. A few sick or lame ones may be found." GOLDSMITH. "There is a partial mi

received an answer which I will not venture to write down.” Something, no doubt, equivalent to what Boswell repeats in the text. CROKER.

4 Old Mr. Langton.

I suppose John Claxton, Esq. F.A.S., author of a paper in the Archeologia. — CROKER.

6 A. M. Toplady, Vicar of Broad Hembury, in Devon: author of Historic Proof of the Doctrinal Calvinism of the Church of England," and many works of the same Calvinistic principle: he died in 1778, æt. 38. - CROKER.

7 In his letter to Mrs. Thrale, 20th May, 1775, he says. “ | dined yesterday in a large company at a Dissenting bookseller's, and disputed against toleration with one Dr. Mager.” This must have been the dinner noted in the text, but I cannot reconcile the dates, and the mention of the death of the Queen of Denmark, which happened on the 10th May, 1773. ascertains that the date of the letter is correct. Boswell, who made many of his notes on mere scraps, and in a very confused way, must, I think, have misdated and misplaced his note of this conversation.