BON. RAMSAY. "I am old enough to have been a contemporary of Pope. His poetry was highly admired in his life-time, more a great deal than after his death." JOHN"Sir, it has not been less admired since his death; no authours ever had so much fame in their own life-time as Pope and Voltaire; and Pope's poetry has been as much admired since his death as during his life; it has only not been as much talked of, but that is owing to its being now more distant, and people having other writings to talk of. Virgil is less talked of than Pope, and Homer is less talked of than Virgil; but they are not less admired. We must read what the world reads at the moment. It has been maintained that this superfetation, this teeming of the press in modern times, is prejudicial to good literature, because it obliges us to read so much of what is of inferiour value, in order to be in the fashion; so that better works are neglected for want of time, because a man will have more gratification of his vanity in conversation, from having read modern books, than from having read the best works of antiquity. But it must be considered, that we have now more knowledge generally diffused; all our ladies read now, which is a great extension. Modern writers are the moons of literature; they shine with reflected light, with light borrowed from the ancients. Greece appears to me to be the fountain of knowledge; Rome of elegance." RAMSAY. "I suppose Homer's 'Iliad' to be a collection of pieces which had been written before his time. I should like to see a translation of it in poetical like the book of Ruth or Job." prose, ROBERTSON. “Would you, Dr. Johnson, who are a master of the English language, but try your hand upon a part of it." JOHN"Sir, you would not read it without the pleasure of verse 2." SON. We talked of antiquarian researches. JOHNSON. "All that is really known of the ancient state of Britain is contained in a few pages. We can know no more than what the old writers have told us; yet what large books have we upon it, the whole of which, excepting such parts as are taken from those old writers, is all a dream, such as Whitaker's Manchester.' I have heard Henry's History of Britain' well spoken of; I am told it is carried on in separate divisions, as the civil, the military, the religious history; I wish much to have one branch well done, and that is the history of manners, of common life." ROBERTSON. "Henry should have applied his attention to that alone, which is enough for any man; and he might have found a great deal scattered in various books, had he read solely with that view. Henry erred in not selling his first volume at a moderate price to the booksellers, that they might have pushed him on till he had got reputation. I sold my History of Scotland' at a moderate price, as a work by which the booksellers might either gain or not; and Cadell has told me, that Miller and he have got six thousand pounds by it. I afterwards received a much higher price for my writings. An authour should sell his first work for what the booksellers will give, till it shall appear whether he is an authour of merit, or, which is the same thing as to purchase-money, an authour who pleases the publick." 6 Dr. Robertson expatiated on the character of a certain nobleman 3; that he was one of the strongest-minded men that ever lived; that he would sit in company quite sluggish, while there was nothing to call forth his intellectual vigour; but the moment that any important subject was started, for instance, how this country is to be defended against a French invasion, he would rouse himself, and show his extraordinary talents with the most powerful ability and animation. JOHNSON. "Yet this man cut his own throat. The true strong and sound mind is the mind that can embrace equally great things and small. Now I am told the King of Prussia will say to a servant, Bring me a bottle of such a wine, which came in such a year; it lies in such a corner of the cellars.' I would have a man great in great things, and elegant in little things." He said to me afterwards, when we were by ourselves, "Robertson was in a mighty romantick humour, he talked of one whom he did not know; but I downed him with the King of Prussia." "Yes, sir," said I," you threw a bottle at his head."" An ingenious gentleman was mentioned, concerning whom both Robertson and Ramsay agreed that he had a constant firmness of mind; for after a laborious day, and amidst a multiplicity of cares and anxieties, he would sit down with his sisters and be quite cheerful and good-humoured. Such a disposition, it was observed, was the happy gift of nature. JOHNSON. "I do not think so: a man has from nature a certain portion of mind; the use he makes of it depends upon his own free will. That a man has always the same firmness of mind, I do not say: because every man feels his mind less firm at one time than another; but I think, a man's being in a good or bad hu 3 [Lord Clive.-ED.] mour depends upon his will." I, however, could not help thinking that a man's humour is often uncontrollable by his will. Johnson harangued against drinking wine. "A man," said he, "may choose whether he will have abstemiousness and knowledge, or claret and ignorance." Dr. Robertson, (who is very companionable), was beginning to dissent as to the proscription of claret. JOHNSON (with a placid smile). "Nay, sir, you shall not differ with me; as I have said that the man is most perfect who takes in the most things, I am for knowledge and claret." ROBERTSON (holding a glass of generous claret in his hand). "Sir, I can only drink your health." JOHNSON. "C Sir, I should be sorry if you should be ever in such a state as to be able to do nothing more." ROBERTSON. "Dr. Johnson, allow me to say, that in one respect I have the advantage of you; when you were in Scotland you would not come to hear any of our preachers; whereas, when I am here, I attend your publick worship without scruple, and, indeed, with great satisfaction." JOHNSON. Why, sir, that is not so extraordinary: the King of Siam sent ambassadors to Louis the Fourteenth, but Louis the Fourteenth sent none to the King of Siam 1.” Here my friend for once discovered a want of knowledge or forgetfulness; for Louis the Fourteenth did send an embassy to the King of Siam 2, and the Abbé Choisi, who was employed in it, published an account of it in two volumes. would not you wish to know old age? He who is never an old man does not know the whole of human life; for old age is one of the divisions of it." JOHNSON. Nay, sir, what talk is this?" BOSWELL. "1 mean, sir, the Sphinx's description of it:morning, noon, and night. I would know night, as well as morning and noon." JOHNSON. "What, sir, would you know what it is to feel the evils of old age? Would you have the gout? Would you have decrepitude?" Seeing him heated, I would not argue any farther; but I was confident that I was in the right. I would, in due time, be a Nestor, an elder of the people; and there should be some difference between the conversation of twenty-eight and sixty-eight 4. A grave picture should not be gay. There is a serene, solemn, placid old age. JOHNSON. "Mrs. Thrale's mother said of me what flattered me much. A clergyman was complaining of want of society in the country where he lived; and said, They talk of runts, (that is, young cows) 5. Sir (said Mrs. Salisbury), Mr Johnson would learn to talk of runts;' meaning that I was a man who would make the most of my situation, whatever it was.” He added, "I think myself a very polite man." Piozzi, p. 27-8, 199,200. [Johnson expressed a similar opinion of his own politeness to Mrs. Thrale, and, oddly enough, on two particular occasions, in which the want of that quality seemed remarkably apparent. Dr. Johnson delighted in his own partiality for Oxford; and one day, at her house, entertained five members of the other university with various instances of the superiority of Oxford, enumerating the gigantic names of many men whom it had produced, with apparent triumph. At last Next day, Thursday, April 30, I found him at home by himself. JOHNSON. "Well, sir, Ramsay gave us a splendid dinner. I love Ramsay. You will not find a man in whose conversation there is more instruction, more information, and more elegance, than in Ramsay's." BOSWELL. "What I admire in Ramsay, is his continuing to be often elsewhere mentioned), that he had none of 4 Johnson clearly meant (what the authour has so young." JOHNSON. Why, yes, sir, the listlessness of old age, that he had the same it is to be admired. I value myself upon activity and energy of mind, as formerly; not this, that there is nothing of the old man that a man of sixty-eight might dance in a pubin my conversation 3. I am now sixty-lick assembly with as much propriety as he could eight, and I have no more of it than at twenty-eight." BOSWELL. 66 "But, sir, at twenty-eight. His conversation being the product of much various knowledge, great acuteness, and extraordinary wit, was equally well suited to every period of life; and as in his youth it proba 1 Mrs. Piozzi confidently mentions this as having passed in Scotland.-Anecdotes, p. 62.-bly did not not exhibit any unbecoming levity, so BOSWELL. certainly in his later years it was totally free from the garrulity and querulousness of old age.—MALONE. The Abbé de Choisi was sent by Louis XIV. on an embassy to the King of Siam in 1683, with a view, it has been said, to convert the king of the country to Christianity.-MALONE. 3 [Johnson in his " Meditations" (April 20, ante, p. 179), congratulates himself on writing with all his usual vigour. "I have made sermons, says he, "as readily as formerly." Probably, those which were left for publication by Dr. Taylor, and written, perhaps (or some of them), at Ashbourne in the preceding autumn. Bee ante, p 124.- HALL } Such is the signification of this word in Scotland, and it should seem in Wales. (See Skinner in v.) But the heifers of Scotland and Wales, when brought to England, being always smaller than those of this country, the word runt has acquired a secondary sense, and generally signifies a heifer diminutive in size, small beyond the ordinary growth of that animal; and in this sense alone the word is acknowledged by Dr. Johnson in his Dictionary.-MALONE. Mrs. Thrale said to him, "Why there they remained with him, like gold in the happens to be no less than five Cambridge ore, unfashioned and unseen, except in his men in the room now." "I did not," said literary capacity, no person that I know of he, "think of that till you told me; but has made any inquiry though im general the wolf do n't count the sheep." When it has been spoken of as an unaccountable the company were retired, the domestic cir- inconsistency in his character. Much, too, cle happened to be talking of Dr. Barnard, may be said in excuse for an apparent asthe provost of Eton, who died about that perity of manners which were, at times at time; and after a long and just eulogium least, the natural effect of those inherent on his wit, his learning, and goodness of mental infirmities to which he was subject. heart, Dr. Johnson said, quite seriously, His corporeal defects also contributed large"He was the only man, too, that did jus-ly to the singularity of his manners; and a tice to my good breeding; and you may observe that I am well-bred to a degree of needless scrupulosity. No man," continued he, not observing the amazement of his hearers, "no man is so cautious not to interrupt another; no man thinks it so necessary to appear attentive when others are speaking; no man so steadily refuses preference to himself, or so willingly bestows it on another, as I do; nobody holds so strongly as I do the necessity of ceremony, and the ill effects which follow the breach of it: yet people think me rude; but Barnard did me justice."""Tis pity," said Mrs. Thrale, laughing, " that he had not heard you compliment the Cambridge men after dinner to-day!" Piozzi, p. 199, 200. On another occasion, he had been professing that he was very attentive not to offend, and very careful to maintain the ceremonies of life; and had told Mr. Thrale, that though he had never sought to please till he was past thirty, considering the matter as hopeless, yet he had been always studious not to make enemies, by apparent preference of himself. It happened, that this curious conversation, of which Mrs. Thrale was a silent auditress, passed, in her coach, in some distant province, either Shropshire or Derbyshire; and as soon as it was over, Dr. Johnson took out of his pocket a little book and was reading, when a gentleman, of no small distinction for his birth and elegance, suddenly rode up to the carriage, and paying them all his proper compliments, was desirous not to neglect Dr. Johnson; but observing that he did not see him, tapped him gently on the shoulder. "Tis Mr. Cholmondeley," said Mr. Thrale. "Well, sir! and what if it is Mr. Cholmondeley!" said the other sternly, just lifting his eyes a moment from his book, and returning to it again with renewed avidity.] ED. [Miss Reynolds describes these points of Johnson's character with more discrimination. little reflection on the disqualifying influence of blindness and deafness would suggest many apologies for Dr. Johnson's want of politeness. The particular instance 1 I have just mentioned, of his inability to discriminate the features of any one's face, deserves perhaps more than any other to be taken into consideration, wanting, as he did, the aid of those intelligent signs, or insinuations, which the counte nance displays in social converse; and which, in their slightest degree, influence and regulate the manners of the polite, or even the common observer. And to his defective hearing, perhaps, his unaccommodating manners may be equally ascribed, which not only precluded him from the perception of the expressive tones of the voice of others, but from hearing the boisterous sound of his own: and nothing, I believe, more conduced to fix upon his character the general stigma of ill-breeding, than his loud imperious tone of voice, which apparently heightened the slightest dissent to a tone of harsh reproof; and, with his corresponding aspect, had an intimidating influence on those who were not much acquainted with him, and excited a degree of resentment which his words in ordinary circumstances would not have provoked. I have often heard him on such occasions express great surprise, that what he had said could have given any offence. Under such disadvantages, it was not much to be wondered at that Dr. Johnson should have committed many blunders and absurdities, and excited surprise and resentment in company; one in particular I remember Being in company with Mr. Garrick and some others, who were unknown to Dr. Johnson, he was saying something tending to the disparagement of the character or of the works of a gentleman present-I have forgot which; on which Mr. Garrick touched his foot under the table, but he still went on, and Garrick, much alarmed, touched him a second time, and, I believe, the third; at last Johnson exclaimed, 'David, David, is it you? What makes you tread on my toes so?' This little anecdote, perhaps, indicates as much the want 1 [Ante, p. 18, n.—Er ] of prudence in Dr. Johnson as the want of sight. But had he at first seen Garrick's expressive countenance, and (probably) the embarrassment of the rest of the company on the occasion, it doubtless would not have happened." "It were also much to be wished, in justice to Dr. Johnson's character for good manners, that many jocular and ironical speeches which have been reported had been noted as such, for the information of those who were unacquainted with him. Though he was fond of drawing characters, and did so con amore, to the delight of all who heard him, I cannot say (though he said he loved a good hater) that I ever heard him draw one con odio."] "DR. JOHNSON TO MRS. THRALE. Letters. "[Thursday,] 30th April, 1778. "Since I was fetched away from Streatham, the journal [of engagements] stands thus: Saturday, Sir Joshua. Saturday, Sir Joshua. Sunday, Lady Lucan. "Monday. Pray let it be Streatham, and very early; do, now, let it be very early. For I may be carried away-just like Ganymede of Troy. "Do, now, let me know whether you will send for me-early-on Monday. But take some care, or your letter will not come till Tuesday." On Saturday, May 2, I dined with him at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, where there was a very large company, and a great deal of conversation; but, owing to some circumstance which I cannot now recollect, I have no record of any part of it, except that there were several people there by no means of the Johnsonian school; so that less attention was paid to him than usual, which put him out of humour: and upon some imaginary offence 2 from me, he attacked me with [There is a dinner given at the Old Bailey to the judges, council, and a few guests-perhaps it was to one of these dinners that Johnson was invited. After the foregoing note had been written, the Editor learned that the venerable Mr. Chamberlain Clarke, now in his ninety-first year, remembers to have taken Johnson to his dinner, he being then sheriff. The judges were Blackstone and Eyre. Mr. Justice Blackstone conversed with Johnson on the subject of their absent friend, Sir Robert Chambers.-ED.] 2 [Lord Wellesley has been so obliging as to give the Editor the following account of the cause such rudeness, that I was vexed and angry because it gave those persons an opportu nity of enlarging upon his supposed ferocity, and ill treatment of his best friends. I was so much hurt, and had my pride so much roused, that I kept away from him for a week; and, perhaps, might have kept away much longer, nay, gone to Scotland without seeing him again, had not we fortunately met and been reconciled. To such unhappy chances are human friendships liable. On Friday, May 8, I dined with him at Mr. Langton's. I was reserved and silent, which I suppose he perceived, and might recollect the cause. After dinner, when Mr. Langton was called out of the room, and we were by ourselves, he drew his chair near to mine, and said, in a tone of conciliating courtesy, "Well, how have you done?" BOSWELL. "Sir, you have made me very uneasy by your behaviour to me when we were last at Sir Joshua Reynolds's. You know, my dear sir, no man has a greater respect and affection for you, or would sooner go to the end of the world to serve you. Now to treat me so-." He insisted that I had interrupted, which I assured him was not the case; and proceeded-" But why treat me so before people who neither love you nor me?" JOHNSON. "Well, I am sorry for it. I'll make it up to you twenty different ways, as you please." BOSWELL. "Isaid to-day to Sir Joshua, when he observed that you tossed me sometimes, I don't care how often, or how high he tosses me, when only friends are present, for then I fall upon soft ground; but I do not like falling on of this quarrel: "Boswell, one day at Sir Joshua's table, chose to pronounce a high-flown panegyric on the wits of Queen Anne's reign, and exclaimed, How delightful it must have been to have lived in the society of Pope, Swift, Arbuthnot, Gay, and Bolingbroke! We have no such society in our days.' SIR JOSHUA. I think, Mr. Boswell you might be satisfied with your great friend's conversation' JOHNSON. Nay, sir, Boswell is right; every man wishes for preferment, and if Boswell had lived in those days, he would have obtained promotion.' SIR JOSHUA. sir?' JOHNSON. Sir, he would have had a high place in the Dunciad.' This anecdote Lord Wellesley heard from Mr. Thomas Sydenham, who received it from Mr. Knight, on the authority of Sir Joshua Reynolds himself." The Editor, however, suspects that this is but another ver sion of the repartee of the same kind, in reference to the Dunciad, made in Sir Joshua's presence, though not at his house, some years before (see ante, vol. i. p. 259). Johnson's playful retort seems so much less offensive than fifty others, that Boswell relates himself to have endured patiently, that it is improbable that he should have resented it so deeply. The anecdote, in passing through the hands of Mr. Knight and Mr. Sydenham, may have lost its true date, and acquired something beyond its true expression.- -ED.] 'How so, stones, which is the case when enemies are knowledge or vivacity of imagination. His present. I think this a pretty good image, conversation is like that of any other sensisir." JOHNSON. 66 Sir, it is one of the hap-ble man. He talks with no wish either to piest I have ever heard 1." inform or to hear, but only because he thinks it does not become a company and say nothing." Mr. Langton having repeated the anec to sit in The truth is, there was no venom in the wounds which he inflicted at any time, unless they were irritated by some malignant infusion by other hands. We were instant-dote of Addison having distinguished bely as cordial again as ever, and joined in hearty laugh at some ludicrous but innocent peculiarities of one of our friends. BosWELL. "Do you think, sir, it is always culpable to laugh at a man to his face?" JOHNSON. 66 Why, sir, that depends upon the man and the thing. If it is a slight man, and a slight thing, you may; for you take nothing valuable from him.' He said, "I read yesterday Dr. Blair's sermon on devotion, from the text Cornelius, a devout man.' His doctrine is the best limited, the best expressed: there is the most warmth without fanaticism, the most rational transport. There is one part of it which I disapprove, and I'd have him correct it; which is, that he who does not feel joy in religion is far from the kingdom of heaven!' there are many good men whose fear of God predominates over their love. It may discourage. It was rashly said 2. A noble sermon it is indeed. I wish Blair would come over to the church of England." When Mr. Langton returned to us, the "flow of talk went on." An eminent authour 3 being mentioned: JoHNSON. "He 's not a pleasant man. His conversation is neither instructive nor brilliant. He does not talk as if impelled by any fulness of [The simplicity with which Boswell repeats this flattery, without seeing that it was only a peace-offering, is very characteristic and amusing. -ED.] 2 [The passage referred to is, "Of what nature must that man's religion be, who professes to worship God and to believe in Christ, and yet raises his thoughts towards God and his Saviour without any warmth of gratitude or love? This is not the man whom you would choose for your bosom friend, or whose heart you would expect to answer with reciprocal warmth to yours; such a person must as yet be far from the kingdom of heaven.”—Blair's Sermons, vol. i. P. 261. Dr. Johnson's remark is certainly just; and may be, moreover, observed that, from Blair's expressions, and his reference to human friendships and affections, he might be understood to mean, that unless we feel the same kind of "warmth and affection towards God that we do towards the objects of human love, we are far from the kingdom of heaven-an idea which seems to countenance fanaticism, and which every sober-minded christian feels to be a mere play on words; for the love of God and the love of one's wife and friend are certainly not the same pas sion.-ED.] 3 [Probal'y Dr. Robertson.-ED.] tween his powers in conversation and in writing, by saying "I have only ninepence in my pocket; but I can draw for a thousand pounds; "-JOHNSON. "He had not that retort ready, sir; he had prepared it before-hand." LANGTON (turning to me) "A fine surmise. Set a thief to catch a thief." Johnson called the East Indians barbarians. Boswell. "You will except the Chinese, sir?" JOHNSON. "No, sir." BOSWELL. "Have they not arts?" JOHN SON. "They have pottery." BOSWELL "What do you say to the written characters of their language?" JOHNSON. "Sir, they have not an alphabet. They have not been able to form what all other nations have formed." BOSWELL. "There is more learning in their language than in any other, from the immense number of their characters." JOHNSON. "It is only more difficult from its rudeness; as there is more labour in hewing down a tree with a stone than with an axe." He said, "I have been reading Lord Kames's Sketches of the History of Man.' In treating of severity of punishment, he mentions that of Madame Lapouchin, in Russia, but he does not give it fairly; for I have looked at Chappe D'Auteroche, from whom he has taken it. He stops where it is said that the spectators thought her innocent, and leaves out what follows; that she nevertheless was guilty. Now this is being as culpable as one can conceive, to misrepresent fact in a book, and for what motive? It is like one of those lies which people tell, one cannot see why. The woman's life was spared; and no punishment was too great for the favourite of an empress, who had conspired to dethrone her mistress." BOSWELL. "He was only giving a picture of the lady in her sufferings." JOHNSON. "Nay, don't endeavour to palliate this. Guilt is a principal feature in the picture. Kames is puzzled with a question that puzzled me when I was a very young man. Why is it that the interest of money is lower, when money is plentiful; for five pounds has the same proportion of value to a hundred pounds when money is plentiful, as when it is scarce? A lady explained it to me. It is (said she) because when money is plentiful there are so many more who have money to lend, that they bid down one another. Many have then a hundred pounds; and one says-Take mine rather than another's, and you shall have it at four per cent." BOSWELL. "Does Lord Kames |