ledge, though I am afraid that gratification will I think to come to Kettel Hall.'-I am, sir, be for a time withheld. your most affectionate, etc., 'I have, indeed, published my book [his Dictionary], of which I beg to know your father's judgment, and yours; and I have now stayed long enough to watch its progress in the world. It has, you see, no patrons, and I think has yet had no opponents, except the critics of the coffeehouse, whose outcries are soon dispersed into the air, and are thought on no more. From this, therefore, I am at liberty, and think of taking the opportunity of this interval to make an excursion, and why not then into Lincolnshire? or, to mention a stronger attraction, why not to dear Mr. Langton? I will give the true reason, which I know you will approve :-I have a mother more than eighty years old, who has counted the days to the publication of my book, in hopes of seeing me; and to her, if I can disengage myself here, I resolve to go. 'SAMUEL JOHNSON.' TO THE SAME. 'June 10, 1755. 'DEAR SIR,-It is strange how many things will happen to intercept every pleasure, though it [be] only that of two friends meeting together. I have promised myself every day to inform you when you might expect me at Oxford, and have not been able to fix a time. The time, however, is, I think, at last come, and I promise myself to repose in Kettel Hall one of the first nights of the next week. I am afraid my stay with you cannot be long; but what is the inference? We must endeavour to make it cheerful. I wish your brother could meet us, that we might go and drink tea with Mr. Wise in a body. I ‘As I know, dear sir, that to delay my visit hope he will be at Oxford, or at his nest of Bri ness. for a reason like this will not deprive me of your esteem, I beg it may not lessen your kindI have very seldom received an offer of friendship which I so earnestly desire to cultivate and mature. I shall rejoice to hear from you, till I can see you, and will see you as soon as I can; for when the duty that calls me to Lichfield is discharged, my inclination will carry me to Langton. I shall delight to hear the ocean roar, or see the stars twinkle, in the company of men to whom Nature does not spread her volumes or utter her voice in vain. 'Do not, dear sir, make the slowness of this letter a precedent for delay, or imagine that I approved the incivility that I have committed; for I have known you enough to love you, and sincerely to wish a further knowledge; and I assure you once more, that to live in a house that contains such a father and such a son, will be accounted a very uncommon degree of pleasure by, dear sir, your most obliged and most humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.' tish and Saxon antiquities. I shall expect to TO THE SAME. 'June 24, 1755. 'DEAR SIR,-To talk of coming to you, and not yet to come, has an air of trifling which I would not willingly have among you; and which, I believe, you will not willingly impute to me, when I have told you that since my promise two of our partners are dead, and that I was solicited to suspend my excursion till we could recover from our confusion. 'I have not laid aside my purpose; for every day makes me more impatient of staying from you. But death, you know, hears not supplications, nor pays any regard to the convenience of mortals. I hope now to see you next week; but next week is but another name for to-morrow, which has been noted for promising and deceiving. I am, etc., 'SAM. JOHNSON.' 'TO THE REVEREND MR. THOMAS WARTON. 'May 13, 1755. 'DEAR SIR,-I am grieved that you should think me capable of neglecting your letters; and beg you will never admit any such suspicion again. I purpose to come down next week, if you shall be there; or any other week that shall be more agreeable to you. Therefore let me know. I can stay this visit but a week, but intend to make preparations for a longer stay next time, being resolved not to lose sight of the University. How goes Apollonius? Don't let him be forgotten. Some things of this kind must be done, to keep us up. Pay my compli- Oxford, in 1793. It has since been converted into a ments to Mr. Wise, and all my other friends. 1 A translation of Apollonius Rhodius was now intended by Mr. Warton.-WARTON. 1 Kettel Hall is an ancient tenement, adjoining to Trinity College, built about the year 1615, by Dr. Ralph Kettel, then President, for the accommodation of Commoners of that society. In this ancient hostel, then in a very ruinous state, about forty years after Johnson had lodged there, Mr. Windham and the present writer were accommodated with two chambers of primitive simplicity, during the installation of the Duke of Portland as Chancellor of the University of commodious private house.-MALONE. 2 At Ellsfield, a village three miles from Oxford.WARTON. 3 Messrs. Paul Knapton and Thomas Longman, both of whom died in June 1755, booksellers concerned in his Dictionary. F TO THE SAME. 'Aug. 7, 1755. 'DEAR SIR,-I told you that among the manuscripts are some things of Sir Thomas More. I beg you to pass an hour in looking on them, and procure a transcript of the ten or twenty first lines of each, to be compared with what I have ; that I may know whether they are yet published. The manuscripts are these: 'Catalogue of Bodl. мs. pag. 122, F. 3, Sir Thomas More. 1. Fall of Angels. 2. Creation and fall of mankind. 3. Determination of the Trinity for the rescue of mankind. 4. Five lectures of our Saviour's passion. 5. Of the institution of the Sacrament, three lectures. 6. How to receive the blessed body of our Lord sacramentally. 7. Neomenia, the new moon, 8. De tristitia, tædio, pavore, et oratione Christi ante captionem ejus. 'Catalogue, page 154. Life of Sir Thomas More. Qu. Whether Roper's? Page 363. De resignatione Magni Sigilli in manus Regis per D. Thomam Morum. Page 364. Mori Defensio Moria. 'If you procure the young gentleman in the library to write out what you think fit to be written, I will send to Mr. Prince the bookseller to pay him what you shall think proper. 'Be pleased to make my compliments to Mr. Wise, and all my friends.-I am, sir, your affectionate, etc. 'SAM. JOHNSON.' | has been often said, and I believe with justice, that there is for every thought a certain nice adaptation of words which none other could equal, and which, when a man has been so fortunate as to hit, he has attained, in that particular case, the perfection of language. The extensive reading which was absolutely necessary for the accumulation of authorities, and which alone may account for Johnson's retentive mind being enriched with a very large and various store of knowledge and imagery, must have occupied several years. The Preface furnishes an eminent instance of a double talent, of which Johnson was fully conscious. Sir Joshua Reynolds heard him say, 'There are two things which I am confident I can do very well: one is an introduction to any literary work, stating what it is to contain, and how it should be executed in the most perfect manner; the other is a conclusion, showing from various causes why the execution has not been equal to what the author promised to himself and to the public.' How should puny scribblers be abashed and disappointed, when they find him displaying a perfect theory of lexicographical excellence, yet at the same time candidly and modestly allowing that he had not satisfied his own expectations!' Here was a fair occasion for the exercise of Johnson's modesty, when he was called upon to compare his own arduous performance, not with those of other individuals (in which case his inflexible regard to truth would have been violated had he affected diffidence), but with speculative perfection; as he, who can outstrip all his competitors in the race, may yet be sensible of his deficiency when he runs against time. Well might he say, that 'the English Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned ;' for he told me, that the only aid which he received was a paper containing twenty etymologies, sent to him by a person then unknown, who, he was afterwards informed, was Dr. Pearce, Bishop of Rochester. The etymologies, though they exhibit learning and judgment, are not, I think, entitled to the first praise amongst the various parts of this immense work. The definitions have always appeared to me such astonishing proofs of acuteness of intellect and precision of language, as indicate a genius of the highest rank. This it is which marks the superior excellence of Johnson's Dictionary over others equally or even more voluminous, and must have made it a work of much greater mental labour than mere Lexicons, or Word The Dictionary, with a Grammar and History of the English Language, being now at length published, in two volumes folio, the world contemplated with wonder so stupendous a work achieved by one man, while other countries had thought such undertakings fit only for whole academies. Vast as his powers were, I cannot but think that his imagination deceived him, when he supposed that by constant application he might have performed the task in three years. Let the Preface be attentively perused, in which is given, in a clear, strong, and glowing style, a comprehensive yet particular view of what he had done; and it will be evident that the time he employed upon it was comparatively short. I am unwilling to swell my book with long quotations from what is in everybody's hands, and I believe there are few prose com positions in the English language that are read with more delight, or are more impressed upon the memory, than that preliminary discourse. One of its excellences has always struck me with peculiar admiration; I mean the perspi-Books, as the Dutch call them. They who will cuity with which he has expressed abstract scientific notions. As an instance of this, I shall quote the following sentence : 'When the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a consecutive series be formed of senses in their own nature collateral?' We have here an example of what make the experiment of trying how they can define a few words of whatever nature, will soon be satisfied of the unquestionable justice of this observation, which I can assure my readers is founded upon much study, and upon communication with more minds than my own. A few of his definitions must be admitted to be erroneous. Thus, Windward and Leeward, though directly of opposite meaning, are defined identically the same way; as to which inconsiderable specks it is enough to observe, that his Preface announces that he was aware there might be many such in so immense a work; nor was he at all disconcerted when an instance was pointed out to him. A lady once asked him how he came to define Pastern the knee of a horse; instead of making an elaborate defence, as she expected, he at once answered, 'Ignorance, madam,-pure ignorance.' His definition of Network has been often quoted with sportive malignity, as obscuring a thing in itself very plain. But to these frivolous censures no other answer is necessary than that with which we are furnished by his own Preface: 'To explain, requires the use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained, and such terms cannot always be found; for as nothing can be proved but by supposing something intuitively known, and evident without proof, so nothing can be defined but by the use of words too plain to admit of definition. Sometimes easier words are changed into harder; as burial into sepulture or interment; dry, into desiccative; dryness, into siccity or aridity; fit, into paroxysm: for the easiest word, whatever it be, can never be translated into one more easy.' His introducing his own opinions, and even prejudices, under general definitions of words, while at the same time the original meaning of the words is not explained, as his Tory, Whig, Pension, Oats, Excise, and a few more, cannot He owns in his Preface the deficiency of the technical part of his work; and he said he should be much obliged to me for definitions of musical terms for his next edition, which he did not live to superintend.-BURNEY. 2 He thus defines Excise: A hateful tax levied upon commodities, and adjudged not by the common judges of property, but wretches hired by those to whom Excise is paid.' The Commissioners of Excise being offended by this severe reflection, consulted Mr. Murray, then Attorney-General, to know whether redress could be legally obtained. I wished to have proeured for my readers a copy of the opinion which he gave, and which may now be justly considered as history; but the mysterious secrecy of office, it seems, would not permit it. I am, however, informed by very good authority, that its import was, that the passage might be considered as actionable; but that it would be more prudent in the board not to prosecute. Johnson never made the smallest alteration in this passage. We find he still retained his early prejudice against Excise; for in the Idler, No. 65, there is the following very extraordinary paragraph:-'The authenticity of Clarendon's History, though printed with the sanction of one of the first Universities of the world, had not an unexpected manuscript been happily discovered, would, with the help of factious credulity, have been brought into question by the two lowest of all human beings, a scribbler for a party, and a Commisssioner of Excise.' The persons to whom he alludes were Mr. John Oldmixon and George Ducket, Esq.-BOSWELL. be fully defended, and must be placed to the account of capricious and humorous indulgence. Talking to me upon this subject when we were at Ashbourne in 1777, he mentioned a still stronger instance of the predominance of his private feelings in the composition of this work, than any now to be found in it. You know, sir, Lord Gower forsook the old Jacobite interest. When I came to the word renegado, after telling that it meant " one who deserts to the enemy, a revolter," I added, Sometimes we say a GOWER. Thus it went to the press; but the printer had more wit than I, and struck it out.' Let it, however, be remembered, that this indulgence does not display itself only in sarcasm towards others, but sometimes in playful allusion to the notions commonly entertained of his own laborious task. Thus: 'Grub Street, the name of a street in London, much inhabited by writers of small histories, dictionaries, and temporary poems; whence any mean production is called Grub Street.'- Lexicographer, a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.' At the time when he was concluding his very eloquent Preface, Johnson's mind appears to have been in such a state of depression, that we cannot contemplate without wonder the vigorous and splendid thoughts which so highly distinguish that performance. 'I,' says he, 'may surely be contented without the praise of perfection, which if I could obtain in this gloom of solitude, what would it avail me? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave; and success and miscarriage are empty sounds. I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise.' That this indifference was rather a temporary than an habitual feeling, appears, I think, from his letters to Mr. Warton; and however he may have been affected for the moment, certain it is that the honours which his great work procured him, both at home and abroad, were very grateful to him. His friend the Earl of Cork and Orrery, being at Florence, presented it to the Academia della Crusca. That Academy sent Johnson their Vocabulario, and the French Academy sent him their Dictionnaire, which Mr. Langton had the pleasure to convey to him. It must undoubtedly seem strange that the conclusion of his Preface should be expressed in terms so desponding, when it is considered that the author was then only in his forty-sixth year. But we must ascribe its gloom to that miserable dejection of spirits to which he was constitutionally subject, and which was aggravated by the death of his wife two years before. I have heard it ingeniously observed by a lady of rank and elegance, that his melancholy was then at its meridian.' It pleased God to grant him almost thirty years of life after this time; and once, when he was in a placid frame of mind, he was obliged to own to me that he had enjoyed happier days, and had many more friends, since that gloomy hour than before. It is a sad saying, that 'most of those whom he wished to please had sunk into the grave;' and his case at forty-five was singularly unhappy, unless the circle of his friends was very narrow. I have often thought, that as longevity is generally desired, and I believe generally expected, it would be wise to be continually adding to the number of our friends, that the loss of some may be supplied by others. Friendship, the wine of life,' should, like a wellstocked cellar, be thus continually renewed; and it is consolatory to think, that although we can seldom add what will equal the generous first growths of our youth, yet friendship becomes insensibly old in much less time than is commonly imagined, and not many years are required to make it very mellow and pleasant. Warmth will, no doubt, make a considerable difference. Men of affectionate temper and bright fancy will coalesce a great deal sooner than those who are cold and dull. The proposition which I have now endeavoured to illustrate was, at a subsequent period of his life, the opinion of Johnson himself. He said to Sir Joshua Reynolds, 'If a man does not make new acquaintance as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in constant repair.' The celebrated Mr. Wilkes, whose notions and habits of life were very opposite to his, but who was ever eminent for literature and vivacity, sallied forth with a little jeu d'esprit upon the following passage in his Grammar of the English Tongue, prefixed to the Dictionary:-'H seldom, perhaps never, begins any but the first syllable.' In an essay printed in the Public Advertiser, this lively writer enumerated many instances in opposition to this remark: for example, 'The author of this observation must be a man of quick appre-hension, and of a most compre-hensive genius.' The position is undoubtedly expressed with too much latitude. This light sally, we may suppose, made no great impression on our lexicographer; for we find that he did not alter the passage till many years afterwards.1 He had the pleasure of being treated in a very different manner by his old pupil Mr. Garrick, in the following complimentary epigram: 'ON JOHNSON'S DICTIONARY. "Talk of war with a Briton, he'll boldly advance That one English soldier will beat ten of France; 1 In the third edition, published in 1773, he left out the words perhaps never, and added the following paragraph: 'It sometimes begins middle or final syllables in words compounded, as block-head, or derived from the Iatiu, as compre-hended.'-BOSWELL. Would we alter the boast from the sword to the pen, Can their strength be compared to Locke, Newton, and Boyle? Let them rally their heroes, send forth all their pow'rs, Their verse-men and prose-men, then match them with ours! First Shakspeare and Milton, like gods in the fight, Have put their whole drama and epic to flight; In satires, epistles, and odes would they cope, Their numbers retreat before Dryden and Pope; And Johnson, well-arm'd, like a hero of yore, Has beat forty French, and will beat forty more!' Johnson this year gave at once a proof of his benevolence, quickness of apprehension and admirable art of composition, in the assistance which he gave to Mr. Zachariah Williams, father of the blind lady whom he had humanely received under his roof. Mr. Williams had followed the profession of physic in Wales; but having a very strong propensity to the study of natural philosophy, had made many ingenious advances towards a discovery of the longitude, and repaired to London in hopes of obtaining the great parliamentary reward. He failed of success; but Johnson having made himself master of his principles and experiments, wrote for him a pamphlet, published in quarto, with the following title: 'An account of an Attempt to ascertain the Longitude at Sea, by an exact Theory of the Variation of the Magnetical Needle; with a Table of the Variations at the most remarkable Cities in Europe, from the year 1660 to 1860'[t]. To diffuse it more extensively, it was accompanied with an Italian translation on the opposite page, which it is supposed was the work of Signor Baretti, an Italian of considerable literature, who, having come to England a few years before, had been employed in the capacity both of a language master and an author, and formed an intimacy with Dr. John 1 The number of the French Academy employed in settling their language.-BOSWELL. 2 This ingenious foreigner, who was a native of Piedmont, came to England about the year 1753, and died in London, May 5, 1789. A very candid and judicious account of him and his works, beginning with the words So much asperity,' and written, it is believed, by a distinguished dignitary in the Church, may be found in the Gentleman's Magazine for that year, p. 469.-MALONE. 3 On Saturday the 12th, about twelve at night, died Mr. Zachariah Williams, in his eighty-third year, after an illness of eight months, in full possession of his mental faculties. He has been long known to philosophers and seamen for his skill in magnetism, and his proposal to ascertain the longitude by a peculiar In July this year he had formed some scheme of mental improvement, the particular purpose of which does not appear. But we find in his Prayers and Meditations, p. 25, a prayer entitled, 'On the Study of Philosophy as an instrument of living;' and after it follows a note, This study was not pursued.' On the 13th of the same month he wrote in his Journal the following scheme of life, for Sunday; 'having lived,' as he with tenderness of conscience expresses himself, 'not without an habitual reverence for the Sabbath, yet without that attention to its religious duties which Christianity requires :' work, the money for which he had contracted to write his Dictionary. We have seen that the reward of his labour was only fifteen hundred and seventy-five pounds; and when the expense of amanuenses and paper, and other articles, are deducted, his clear profit was very inconsiderable. I once said to him, I am sorry, sir, you did not get more for your Dictionary.' His answer was, I am sorry too. But it was very well. The booksellers are generous, liberal-minded men.' He, upon all occasions, did ample justice to their character in this respect. He considered them as the patrons of literature; and, indeed, although 1. To rise early; and in order to it, to go to they have eventually been considerable gainers sleep early on Saturday. by his Dictionary, it is to them that we owe 2. To use some extraordinary devotion in its having been undertaken and carried through the morning. at the risk of great expense, for they were not absolutely sure of being indemnified. '3. To examine the tenor of my life, and particularly the last week; and to mark my advances in religion, or recession from it. On the first day of this year we find from his private devotions that he had then recovered 4. To read the Scripture methodically, with from sickness [Pr. and Med.], and in February such helps as are at hand. 5. To go to church twice. that his eye was restored to its use [Pr. and Med. p. 27]. The pious gratitude with which he '6. To read books of divinity, either specula- acknowledges mercies upon every occasion is tive or practical. 7. To instruct my family. very edifying; as is the humble submission which he breathes, when it is the will of his '8. To wear off by meditation any worldly heavenly Father to try him with afflictions. soil contracted in the week.' CHAPTER XI. 1756-1758. IN 1756 Johnson found that the great fame of his Dictionary had not set him above the necessity of making provision for the day that was passing over him.'1 No royal or noble patron extended a munificent hand to give independence to the man who had conferred stability on the language of his country. We may feel indignant that there should have been such unworthy neglect; but we must, at the same time, congratulate ourselves when we consider, that to this very neglect, operating to rouse the natural indolence of his constitution, we owe many valuable productions, which otherwise perhaps might never have appeared. He had spent, during the progress of the system of the variation of the compass. He was a man of industry indefatigable, of conversation inoffensive, patient of adversity and disease, eminently sober, temperate, and pious, and worthy to have ended life with better fortune.-BOSWELL. 1 He was so far from being set above the necessity of making provision for the day that was passing over him,' that he appears to have been in this year in great pecuniary distress, having been arrested for debt; on which occasion his friend Samuel Richardson became his surety. See a letter from Johnson to him on that subject, dated Feb. 19, 1756. Richardson's Correspondence, vol. v. p. 283.-MALONE. As such dispositions become the state of man here, and are the true effects of religious discipline, we cannot but venerate in Johnson one of the most exercised minds that our holy religion hath ever formed. If there be any thoughtless enough to suppose such exercise the weakness of a great understanding, let them look up to Johnson, and be convinced that what he so earnestly practised must have a rational foundation. His works this year were, an abstract or epitome, in octavo, of his folio Dictionary, and a few essays in a monthly publication entitled The Universal Visitor. Christopher Smart, with whose unhappy vacillation of mind he sincerely sympathized, was one of the stated undertakers of this miscellany; and it was to assist him that Johnson sometimes employed his pen. All the essays marked with two asterisks have been ascribed to him; but I am confident, from internal evidence, that of these, neither The Life of Chaucer,' Reflections on the State of Portugal,' nor an Essay on Architecture,' were written by him. I am equally In April in this year, Johnson wrote a letter to Dr. Joseph Warton, in consequence of having read a few pages of that gentleman's newly published Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope. The only paragraph in it that respects Johnson's personal history is this: For my part, I have not lately done much. I have been ill in the winter, and my eye has been inflamed; but I please myself with the hopes of doing many things, with which I have long pleased and deceived myself!' Memoirs of Dr. J. Warton, etc., 4to, 1806. -MALONE. |