equalled in foll, except by the two succeeding ones, show them me."

(1)

36. Catiline and Tom Thumb.

I asked him once concerning the conversation powers of a gentleman (2) with whom I was myself unacquainted :—" He talked to me at club one day," replies our Doctor, "concerning Catiline's conspiracy withdrew my attention, and thought about Tom Thumb."

so I

Dr.

(1) These are two lines of Swift's Verses to Stella, 1720. Johnson's censure was too violent, and indeed he seems not to have correctly understood the dean's illustration. He is laying down certain general rules for distinguishing what honour is, and he exposes the many false meanings which the world assigns to that word. He proceeds to say that men should not decide what is honourable by a reference to their own feelings and cirCurnstances, which naturally bias the judgment, but should consider, without reference to self, how a wise and good man would act.

"In points of honour to be tried,
All passion must be laid aside;
Ask no advice, but think alone;
Suppose the question not your own:
"How shall I act?' is not the case;
But how would Brutus in my place?
In such a case would Cato bleed?
And how would Socrates proceed?

It is plain here, and still plainer from the whole context of the
poem, that Brutus, Cato, and Socrates are here put as the repre-
sentatives of Patriotism and Virtue, and as the names of Zoilus,
Bavius, or Pandarus are used generically to signify infamous
persons: so here, Brutus, Cato, and Socrates (which might as
well have been Sidney, Somers, or Clarendon, or any other illus
trious names,) are used as terms of honour to give point and a
kind of dramatic effect to the general proposition. Swift never
dreamt (as Mrs. Piozzi's report would lead us to think that
Johnson supposed) to advise that our rules of conduct were to
be drawn from the actual events of Greek and Roman history
This would have been as absurd as Johnson's own introduction
of Roman manners into London in his description of the burn-
ing of Orgilio's palace, or the invocation of Democritus, which
sounds so strangely amidst the modern illustrations of his own
beautiful and splendid Vanity of Human Wishes. C.
(2) [Mr. Agmondesham Vesey. See iè Vol. VII. p 375.]

37. Modern Politics.

Modern politics fared no better. I was one time extolling the character of a statesman, and expatiating on the skill required to direct the different currents, reconcile the jarring interests, &c. :—" Thus,” replies he, a mill is a complicated piece of mechanism enough, but the water is no part of the workmanship."

66

On another occasion, when some one lamented the weakness of a then present minister, and complained that he was dull and tardy, and knew little of affairs, "You may as well complain, Sir," savs Johnson, "that the accounts of time are kept by the clock; for he certainly does stand still upon the stair-head — and we all know that he is no great chronologer."

38. French Invasion.

In the year 1777, or thereabouts, when all the talk was of an invasion, he said most pathetically one afternoon, "Alas! alas! how this unmeaning stuff spoils all my comfort in my friends' conversation! Will the people never have done with it; and shall I never hear a sentence again without the French in it? Here is no invasion coming, and you know there is none. Let the vexatious and frivolous talk alone, or suffer it at least to teach you one truth; and learn by this perpetual echo of even unapprehended distress, how historians magnify events expected, or calamities endured; when you know they are at this very moment collecting all the big words they can find, in which to describe a consternation never felt, for a misfortune which never happened. Among all your lamentations, who eats the less? Who sleeps the worse, for one general's ill success, or another's capitulation? Oh, pray let us hear no more of it!"

39. A good Hater. Whigs and Americans. No man was more zealously attached to his party;

he not only loved a Tory himself, but he loved a man the better if he heard he hated a Whig. "Dear Bathurst," said he to me one day, 66 was a man to my very heart's content: he hated a fool, and he hated a rogue, and he hated a Whig; he was a very good hater." Some one mentioned a gentleman of that party for having behaved oddly on an occasion where faction was not concerned : "Is he not a citizen of London, a na tive of North America, and a Whig?" says Johnson. "Let him be absurd, I beg of you: when a monkey is too like a man, it shocks one.'

40. Treatment of the Poor.

Severity towards the poor was, in Dr. Johnson's opinion, an undoubted and constant attendant or consequence upon Whiggism; and he was not contented with giving them relief, he wished to add also indulgence. He loved the poor as I never yet saw any one else do, with an earnest desire to make them happy. What signifies, says some one, giving halfpence to common beggars? they only lay it out in gin or tobacco. "And why should they be denied such sweeteners of their existence?" says Johnson; "It is surely very savage to refuse them every possible avenue to pleasure, reckoned too coarse for our own acceptance. Life is a pill which none of us can bear to swallow without gilding; yet for the poor we delight in stripping it still barer, and are not ashamed to show even visible displeasure, if ever the bitter taste is taken from their mouths."

41. Johnson's Pensioners.

In consequence of these principles he nursed whole nests of people in his house, where the lame, the blind, the sick, and the sorrowful found a sure retreat from all the evils whence his little income could secure them: and, commonly spending the

middle of the week at our house, he kept his numerous family in Fleet Street upon a settled allowance; but returned to them every Saturday, to give them three good dinners, and his company, before he came back to us on the Monday night treating them with the same, or perhaps more ceremonious civility, than he would have done by as many people of fashion - making the Holy Scriptures thus the rule of his conduct, and only expecting salvation as he was able to obey its precepts.

42. Sentimental Miseries. - Distresses of Friends. While Dr. Johnson possessed, however, the strongest compassion for poverty or illness, he did not even pretend to feel for those who lamented the loss of a child, a parent, or a friend. "These are the distresses of sentiment," he would reply, "which a man who is really to be pitied has no leisure to feel. The sight of people who want food and raiment is so common in great cities, that a surly fellow like me has no compassion to spare for wounds given only to vanity or softness. No man, therefore, who smarted from the ingratitude of his friends found any sympathy from our philosopher. "Let him do good on higher motives next time," would be the answer; "he will then be sure of his reward." It is easy to observe, that the justice of such sentences made them offensive; but we must be careful how we condemn a man for saying what we know to be true, only because it is so.

Few things which pass well enough with others would do with him: he had been a great reader of Mandeville, and was ever on the watch to spy out those stains of original corruption, so easily discovered by a penetrating observer, even in the purest minds. I mentioned an event, which if it had happened would greatly have injured Mr. Thrale and his family - and then, dear Sir, said I, how sorry you would have been! "I hope," replied he, after a long pause. "I should have

been very sorry;

maxim." () I would rather, answered I, remember Prior's verses, and ask

"What need of books these truths to tell,
Which folks perceive that cannot spell?
And must we spectacles apply,

To see what hurts our naked eye?"—

Will any body's mind bear this eternal microscope that you place upon your own so? "I never," replied he, 66 saw one that would, except that of my dear Miss Reynolds and hers is very near to purity itself."

Of slighter evils, and friends less distant than our own household, he spoke less cautiously. An acquaintance lost the almost certain hope of a good estate that had been long expected. Such a one will grieve, said I, at her friend's disappointment. "She will suffer as much, perhaps," said he, as your horse did when cow miscarried."

your

I professed myself sincerely grieved when accumulated distresses crushed Sir George Colebrook's family; and I was so. "Your own prosperity," said he, 66 may possibly have so far increased the natural tenderness of your heart, that for aught I know you may be a little sorry; but it is sufficient for a plain man if he does not laugh when he sees a fine new house tumble down all on a sudden, and a snug cottage stand by ready to receive the owner, whose birth entitled him to nothing better, and whose limbs are left him to go to work again with."

43. Hyperbole.

I used to tell him in jest, that his morality was easily contented; and when I have said something as if the

(1) ["In the misfortunes of our best friends we always find mething to please us.")