His criticisms of Milton's
Lycidas)
and of
Gray show him at his worst.
Gray show him at his worst.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v14 - Ibn to Juv
!
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. في
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8283
SAMUEL JOHNSON
(1709-1784)
BY GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL
AMUEL Johnson, the son of a bookseller, was born at Lich-
field, Staffordshire, England, September 18th, 1709. He was
educated mainly in the grammar school of that city; though
perhaps the best part of his education he gave himself, in the free
run which he had of the books in his father's shop. Lichfield was
the literary centre of a large district. Old Michael Johnson sup-
plied scholars with their folios, as well as less severe readers with
romances, poems, essays, and pamphlets. It was in climbing up to
search for some apples which young Samuel imagined his brother
had hidden behind a large folio, that he came across the works of
Petrarch, and fell to studying them. He was a mere child when,
reading Hamlet' in his father's kitchen, he was so greatly scared
by the ghost that he suddenly hurried up-stairs to the street door,
that he might see people about him. With the memory of this ter-
ror fresh in his mind, he wrote many years afterwards: “He that
peruses Shakespeare looks round him alarmed, and starts to find him-
self alone. ” He read with wonderful rapidity, ravenously as if he
devoured the book, and what he read his powerful memory retained.
“He knew more books,” said Adam Smith, «than any man alive. ”
At the age of nineteen he entered Pembroke College, Oxford,
“the best qualified for the university that his tutor had ever known
come there. »
Thence he was driven by poverty after a residence of
only fourteen months. During the next few years he lived partly by
teaching. At the age of twenty-six he married. Two years later he
went up to London with a half-finished tragedy in his pocket, and
David Garrick as his companion. There for five-and-twenty years he
lived the hard life of a poor scholar. His wife died after a long
illness. “ The melancholy of the day of her death hung long upon
me,” he recorded in his diary. His own body, though large and
powerful, was not sound, and his mind was often overcast by melan-
choly. My health,” he said in his old
«has been from my
twentieth year such as has seldom afforded me a single day of ease. ”
In this period of his life he did most of his work. He wrote the
Debates of Parliament, which were wholly in form and mainly in
age,
(
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8284
SAMUEL JOHNSON
substance his own invention; his great Dictionary; his two poems
(London' and 'The Vanity of Human Wishes'; the Rambler, the
Idler, and Rasselas,' and numerous minor pieces. He published
moreover Observations on Macbeth,' and he made a beginning of
his edition of Shakespeare.
In 1762, when he was in his fifty-third year, a pension of £300
from the King freed him from the pressure of poverty. The rest of
his life he passed in modest comfort. A friendship which he formed
a little later added greatly to his happiness. A wealthy London
brewer of the name of Thrale, a man of such strong sense that he
sought a comrade this rough genius, gave him a second home.
Both in his town house and in his beautiful country villa a room was
set apart for Johnson. Mrs. Thrale, «a lady of lively talents im-
proved by education,” flattered by the friendship of so great a man
and by the society which he drew round her table, tended him like
a daughter. Her kindness soothed twenty years of a life radically
wretched. ” To the Thrales he generally gave half the week, passing
the rest of his time in his own house. There he found constant
shelter for two humble friends; sometimes indeed for as many as
five.
His pen had long intervals of rest. He finished his Shakespeare,
wrote four political tracts which added nothing to his reputation, and
his Journey to the Western Islands. Happily he was roused from
his indolence by the request of the booksellers that he should under-
take that one of all his works by which he is best known,- the
(Lives of the English Poets. ' “I wrote it,” he says, “in my usual
way, dilatorily and hastily; unwilling to work, and working with
vigor and haste. ”
The indolence into which he seemed to have sunk was
apparent than real. That powerful mind was seldom long at rest.
“He was a kind of public oracle, whom everybody thought they had
a right to visit and consult. ) David Hume might complain that
«men of letters have in London no rendezvous, and are indeed sunk
and forgotten in the general torrent of the world. Those who knew
Johnson felt no such want. «His house became an academy. ” So
did the taverns which he frequented, whose chairs he looked upon as
so many thrones of human felicity. “There I have,” he said, “free
conversation, and an interchange of discourse with those whom I
most love; I dogmatize and am contradicted, and in this conflict of
opinions and opinions I find delight. ” In Thrale's house too «the
society of the learned, the witty, and the eminent in every way, called
forth his wonderful powers. Among his friends he numbered Rey-
nolds, Burke, Goldsmith, Garrick, and Boswell. They were all mem-
bers of that famous club of which he was the light and centre. In
more
»
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
8285
the grave.
>
the world of letters his opinion was eagerly awaited. (((What does
Johnson say of such a book? ' was the question of every day. ”
This, the happiest period of his life, was brought to an end by the
death of Mr. Thrale in 1781. “I looked,” he recorded in his diary,
«for the last time upon the face that for fifteen years had never been
turned upon me but with respect or benignity. ” The widow, who had
scarcely buried her husband before she fell in love with an Italian
singer, began to feel the old man's friendship a burden and reproach,
and deserted him as she deserted her daughter. While he was
thus losing his second home, «death visited his mournful habitation. ”
Blind Miss Williams and that strange old surgeon Robert Levett,
whom he had sheltered so many years and who repaid his kindness
by companionship whenever he needed it, quickly followed Thrale to
His own health began to break, and he was attacked by
a succession of painful disorders.
Though the ranks of his friends were thinning and his strength
was failing, he did not lose heart. He tried “to keep his friendships
in constanț repair,” and he struggled hard for life. “I will be con-
quered,” he said: "I will not capitulate. ” Death had always been
terrible to him. Had Mr. Thrale outlived him he would have faced
it in the house of friends, who by their attentions and their wealth
would have screened some of its terrors from his view.
He now
faced it month after month in the gloom of solitude. He died on
December 13th, 1784. «His death,” wrote one of his contemporaries,
kept the public mind in agitation beyond all former example. It
made a kind of era in literature,” said Hannah More. Harriet Mar-
tineau was told, by an old lady who well remembered the time, that
«the world of literature was perplexed and distressed as a swarm of
bees that have lost their queen. ” The sovereign man of letters was
indeed dead. “Sir,) Goldsmith had one day said to him, you are
for making a monarchy of what should be a republic. ” The republic
was at length founded; the last monarch of the English world of lit-
erature was gathered to his fathers. The sceptre which Dryden had
handed down to Pope, and Pope to Johnson, fell to the ground, never
to be raised again. The Declaration of Independence was read in the
funeral service over the newly opened grave in Westminster Abbey.
High as Johnson still stands as a writer, his great reputation rests
mainly on his talk and on his character as a man, full as it was of
strange variety, rugged strength, great tenderness, dogged honesty
and truthfulness, a willingness to believe what was incredible com-
bined with an obstinate rationality” which ever prevented him, and
Toryism with the spirit of a rebel glowing beneath. He had in the
highest degree that element of manhood” (to quote Lowell's words)
(which we call character. It is something distinct from genius —
(
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8286
SAMUEL JOHNSON
»
though all great geniuses are endowed with it. Hence we always
think of Dante Alighieri, of Michael Angelo, of William Shakespeare,
of John Milton; while of such men as Gibbon and Hume we merely
recall the works, and think of them as the author of this or that. ”
This holds more true of Samuel Johnson than even of the four
mighty geniuses whom Lowell instances. It is in the pages of his
friend and disciple that he lives for us as no other man has ever
lived. Of all men he is best known. In his early manhood he set
up an academy, and failed. The school which he founded in his later
years still numbers its pupils by thousands and tens of thousands.
“We are,” said Sir Joshua Reynolds, of Dr. Johnson's school. He
may be said to have formed my mind, and to have brushed from it
a great deal of rubbish. He qualified it to think justly. ” He still
qualifies the mind to think; he still clears it of cant; he still brushes
from it all that rubbish which is heaped up by affectation, false sen-
timent, exaggeration, credulity, and indolence in thinking. "All who
were of his school,” Reynolds added, “are distinguished for a love
of truth and accuracy. ” “He taught me,” wrote Boswell, “to cross-
question in common life. ” The great master still finds many apt
scholars.
“He spoke as he wrote,” his hearers comme
monly asserted. This
was not altogether true. It might indeed be the case that every-
thing he said was as correct as a second edition”; nevertheless his
talk was never so labored as the more ornate parts of his writings.
Even in his lifetime his style was censured as “involved and turgid,
and abounding with antiquated and hard words. ” Macaulay went
so far as to pronounce it “systematically vicious. ” Johnson seems to
have been aware of some of his failings. "If Robertson's style be
faulty,” he said, “he owes it to me; that is, having too many words,
and those too big ones. ” As Goldsmith said of him, “If he were to
inake little fishes talk (in a fable), they would talk like whales. " In
the structure of his sentences he is as often at fault as in the use
of big words. He praised Temple for giving a cadence to English
prose, and he blamed Warburton for having his sentences unmeas-
ured. ” His own prose is too measured and has too much cadence.
It is in his Ramblers that he is seen at his worst, and in his Lives
of the Poets) at his best. In his Ramblers he was under the temp-
tation to expand his words beyond the thoughts they had to convey,
which besets every writer who has on stated days to fill up a certain
number of columns. In the Lives, out of the fullness of his mind
he gave far more than he had undertaken in his agreement with the
booksellers. With all its faults, his style has left a permanent and a
beneficial mark on the English language. It was not without reason
that speaking of what he had done, he said: “Something perhaps I
“
»
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
8287
>
»
have added to the elegance of its construction, and something to the
harmony of its cadence. ” If he was too fond of words of foreign
origin, he resisted the inroad of foreign idioms. No one could say
of him what he said of Hume: “The structure of his sentences is
French. ” He sturdily withstood “the license of translators who were
reducing to babble a dialect of France. ” Lord Monboddo complained
of his frequent use of metaphors. In this he was unlike Swift, in
whose writings, it was asserted, not a single one can be found. If
however he used them profusely, he used them as accurately as
Burke; of whom, as he was speaking one day in Parliament, a by-
stander said, “How closely that fellow reasons in metaphors! ” John-
son's writings are always clear. To him might be applied the words
he used of Swift: “He always understands himself, and his readers
always understand him. ” “He never hovers on the brink of mean-
ing. ” If he falls short of Swift in simplicity, he rises far above him
in eloquence. He cares for something more than “the easy and safe
conveyance of meaning. ” His task it was not only to instruct, but to
persuade; not only to impart truth, but to awaken “that inattention
by which known truths are suffered to be neglected. ” He was “the
great moralist. ” He was no unimpassioned teacher, as correct as he
is cold. His mind was ever swayed to the mood of what it liked
or loathed, and as it was swayed, so it gave harmonious utterance.
Who would look to find tenderness in the preface to a dictionary?
Nevertheless Horne Tooke, "the ablest and most malevolent of all
the enemies of his fame,” could never read Johnson's preface without
shedding a tear. He often rose to noble heights of eloquence; while
in the power of his honest scorn he has scarcely a rival. His letters
to Lord Chesterfield and James Macpherson are not surpassed by any
in our language. In his criticisms he is admirably clear. Whether
we agree with him or not, we know at once what he means; while
his meaning is so strongly supported by argument that we
neither neglect it nor despise it. Не may put his reader into a
rage, but he sets him thinking.
Of his original works, Irene) was the first written, though not the
first published. It is a declamatory tragedy. He had little dramatic
power, and he followed a bad model, for he took Addison as his mas-
ter. The criticism which in his old age he passed on that writer's
(Cato' equally well fits his own Irene. “It is rather a poem in
dialogue than a drama, rather a succession of just sentiments in ele-
gant language than a representation of natural affections, or of any
state probable or possible in human life. It was in his two imita-
tions of Juvenal's Satires, London and the Vanity of Human
Wishes,' that he first showed his great powers. Pope quickly dis-
covered the genius of the unknown author. In their kind they are
can
(C
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
masterpieces. Sir Walter Scott (had more pleasure in reading them
than any other poetical composition he could mention. ” The last
line of manuscript he sent to press was a quotation from the Van-
ity of Human Wishes. ' « 'Tis a grand poem,” said Byron, “and so
true! - true as the truth of Juvenal himself. ” Johnson had planned
further imitations of the Roman satirist, but he never executed them.
What he has done in these two longer poems and in many of his
minor pieces is so good that we may well grieve that he left so
little in verse. Like his three contemporaries Collins, Gray, and
Goldsmith, as a poet he died in debt to the world.
In the 'Rambler he teaches the same great lesson of life as in his
serious poems. He gave variety, however, by lighter papers modeled
on the Spectator, and by critical pieces. Admirable as was his humor
in his talk,-“in the talent of humor,” said Hawkins, there hardly
ever was his equal,” — yet in his writings he fell unmeasurably short
of Addison. His criticisms are acute; but it is when he reasons of
righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come that he is seen at
his strongest.
(Rasselas,' struck off at a heat when his mother lay dying, tells
in prose what the Vanity of Human Wishes, tells in verse. It is
little known to the modern reader, who is not easily reconciled to its
style. At no time could it have been a favorite with the young and
thoughtless. Nevertheless, as years steal over us, we own, as we lay
it down with a sigh, that it gives a view of life as profound and true
as it is sad.
His Dictionary, faulty as it is in its etymologies, is a very great
performance. Its definitions are admirable; while the quotations are
so happily selected that they would afford the most pleasant reading
were it possible to read a heavy folio with pleasure. That it should
be the work of one man is a marvel. He had hoped to finish it in
three years; it took him more than seven. To quote his own words,
“He that runs against time has an antagonist not subject to casual-
ties. ” He was hindered by ill health, by his wife's long and fatal
illness, and by the need that he was under of making provision for
the day that was passing over him. ” During two years of the seven
years he was writing three Ramblers a week.
Of his Shakespeare, Macaulay said: “It would be difficult to name
a more slovenly, a more worthless edition of any great classic. I
doubt whether when he passed this sweeping judgment, he had read
much more than those brief passages in which Johnson sums up the
merits of each play. The preface, Adam Smith, no friend of John-
son's fame, described as “the most manly piece of criticism that was
ever published in any country. ” In the notes the editor anticipated
modern critics in giving great weight to early readings. Warburton,
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
8289
in the audacity of his conjectural emendations, almost rivaled Bentley
in his dealings with Milton. He floundered, but this time he did
not flounder well. Johnson was unwilling to meddle with the text so
long as it gave a meaning. Many of his corrections are ingenious,
but in this respect he came far behind Theobald. His notes on
character are distinguished by that knowledge of mankind in which
he excelled. The best are those on Falstaff and Polonius. The
booksellers who had employed him did their part but ill. There
are numerous errors which the corrector of the press should have
detected, while the work is ill printed and on bad paper.
His four political tracts were written at the request of govern-
ment. In one of them, in a fine passage, he shows the misery and
suffering which are veiled from men's sight by the dazzle of the glory
of war.
In the struggle between England and her colonies he with
Gibbon stood by George III. , while Burke, Hume, and Adam Smith
were on the side of liberty.
In his Journey to the Western Islands) he describes the tour
which he made with Boswell in 1773. In this work he took the part
of the oppressed tenants against their chiefs, who were, he wrote,
«gradually degenerating from patriarchal rulers to rapacious land-
lords. » His narrative is interesting; while the facts which he gathered
about a rapidly changing society are curious. « Burke thought well
of the philosophy of the book. ”
His last work was the Lives of the English Poets. '
It was
undertaken at the request of the chief London booksellers,
had determined to publish a body of English poetry,” for which he
was to furnish brief prefaces. These prefaces swelled into Lives.
"I have,” he wrote, “been led beyond my intention, I hope by the
honest desire of giving useful pleasure. ” For payment he had re-
quired only two hundred guineas. “Had he asked one thousand, or
even fifteen hundred,” said Malone, the booksellers would doubtless
readily have given it. ” In this great work he traveled over the
whole field of English poetry, from Milton who was born in 1608
to Lyttleton who died in 1773. To such a task no man ever came
better equipped. He brought to it wide reading, a strong memory,
traditional knowledge gathered from the companions of his early
manhood, his own long acquaintance with the literary world of Lon-
don, and the fruits of years of reflection and discussion. He had
studied criticism deeply, and he dared to think for himself. No
man was ever more fearless in his judgments. He was overpowered
by no man's reputation.
His criticisms of Milton's Lycidas) and of
Gray show him at his worst. Nevertheless they are not wholly with-
out foundation. 'Lycidas,' great as it is, belongs to an unnatural
school of poetry. It is a lament that never moved a single reader to
XIV-519
(( who
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
tears. No one mourns over young Lycidas. Blind as Johnson was
to the greatness of the poem, he has surpassed all other critics in
the splendor of the praise he bestowed on the poet. To the exquisite
beauties of Gray, unhappily, he was insensible. His faults he makes
us see only too clearly. We have to admit, however unwillingly,
that at times Gray is “tall by standing on tiptoe,” and does indulge in
commonplaces to which criticism disdains to chase him. ” Scarcely
less valuable than Johnson's critical remarks are the anecdotes which
he collected and the reflections which he made. In these Lives, and
in his own Life as told by Boswell, we have given us an admirable
view of literature and literary men, from the end of the age of
Elizabeth to close upon the dawn of the splendor which ushered in
the nineteenth century.
G Barkhurst Hill
FROM "THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES)
L
ET observation, with extensive view,
Survey mankind, from China to Peru;
Remark each anxious toil, each eager strife,
And watch the busy scenes of crowded life;
Then say how hope and fear, desire and hate,
O'erspread with snares the clouded maze of fate,
Where wavering man, betrayed by venturous pride
To tread the dreary paths without a guide,
As treacherous phantoms in the mist delude,
Shuns fancied ills, or chases airy good;
How rarely reason guides the stubborn choice,
Rules the bold hand, or prompts the suppliant voice;
How nations sink, by darling schemes oppressed,
When vengeance listens to the fool's request.
Fate wings with every wish the afflictive dart,
Each gift of nature, and each grace of art;
With fatal heat impetuous courage glows,
With fatal sweetness elocution flows,
Impeachment stops the speaker's powerful breath,
And restless fire precipitates on death.
Let history tell where rival kings command,
And dubious title shakes the maddened land.
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
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When statutes glean the refuse of the sword,
How much more safe the vassal than the lord !
Low skulks the hind beneath the rage of power,
And leaves the wealthy traitor in the tower;
Untouched his cottage, and his slumbers sound,
Though confiscation's vultures hover round.
On what foundation stands the warrior's pride,
How just his hopes, let Swedish Charles decide:
A frame of adamant, a soul of fire,
No dangers fright him, and no labors tire;
O'er love, o'er fear, extends his wide domain,
Unconquered lord of pleasure and of pain.
No joys to him pacific sceptres yield, -
War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field;
Behold surrounding kings their powers combine,
And one capitulate, and one resign;
Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in vain:
« Think nothing gained,” he cries, «till naught remain,
On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly,
And all be mine beneath the polar sky. ”
The march begins in military state,
And nations on his eye suspended wait ;
Stern famine guards the solitary coast,
And winter barricades the realms of frost.
He comes,
nor want nor cold his course delay:
Hide, blushing glory, hide Pultowa's day!
The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands,
And shows his miseries in distant lands;
Condemned a needy supplicant to wait,
While ladies interpose, and slaves debate.
But did not chance at length her error mend ?
Did no subverted empire mark his end ?
Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound,
Or hostile millions press him to the ground ?
His fall was destined to a barren strand,
A petty fortress, and a dubious hand;
He left the name at which the world grew pale
To point a moral, or adorn a tale.
Must helpless man, in ignorance sedate,
Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?
Must no dislike alarm, no wishes rise,
No cries invoke the mercies of the skies?
Inquirer, cease: petitions yet remain,
Which Heaven may hear; nor deem religion vain.
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
Still raise for good the supplicating voice,
But leave to Heaven the measure and the choice.
Safe in His power, whose eyes discern afar
The secret ambush of a specious prayer,
Implore his aid, in his decisions rest,
Secure, whate'er he gives, he gives the best.
Yet when the sense of sacred presence fires,
And strong devotion to the skies aspires,
Pour forth thy fervors for a healthful mind,
Obedient passions, and a will resigned:
For love, which scarce collective man can fill;
For patience, sovereign o'er transmuted ill;
For faith, that, panting for a happier seat,
Counts death kind nature's signal of retreat:
These goods for man the laws of Heaven ordain,
These goods He grants who grants the power to gain;
With these celestial wisdom calms the mind,
And makes the happiness she does not find.
LETTER TO LORD CHESTERFIELD AS TO THE DICTIONARY)
I
FEBRUARY 7th, 1755.
My Lord:
HAVE been lately informed by the proprietor of the World
that two papers, in which my Dictionary is recommended
to the public, were written by your Lordship. To be so
distinguished is an honor, which, being very little accustomed
to favors from the great, I know not well how to receive, or in
what terms to acknowledge.
When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your
Lordship, I was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the
enchantment of your address, and could not forbear to wish that
I might boast myself le vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre,
that I might obtain that regard for which I saw the world con-
tending; but I found my attendance so little encouraged, that
neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to continue it. When
I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I had exhausted
all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly scholar can
possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well pleased
to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.
Seven years, my lord, have now passed since I waited in your
outward rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
8293
time I have been pushing on my work through difficulties of
which it is useless to complain, and have brought it at last to
the verge of publication, without one act of assistance, one word
of encouragement, or one smile of favor. Such treatment I did
not expect, for I never had a patron before.
The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and
found him a native of the rocks.
Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a
man struggling for life in the water, and when he has reached
ground, incumbers him with help? The notice which you have
been pleased to take of my labors, had it been early had been
kind: but it has been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot
enjoy it; till I am solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am
known, and do not want it. I hope it is no very cynical asper-
ity not to confess obligations where no benefit has been received,
or to be unwilling that the public should consider me as owing
that to a patron which Providence has enabled me to do for
myself.
Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation
to any favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I
should conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been
long wakened from that dream of hope in which I once boasted
myself with so much exultation, my lord,
Your Lordship's most humble, most obedient servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
DR. JOHNSON'S LAST LETTER TO HIS AGED MOTHER
NET
Dear Honored Mother:
EITHER your condition nor your character make it fit for me
to say much. You have been the best mother, and I be-
lieve the best woman, in the world. I thank
you
for
your
indulgence to me, and beg forgiveness of all that I have done
ill, and all that I have omitted to do well. God grant you his
Holy Spirit, and receive you to everlasting happiness, for Jesus
Christ's sake. Amen. . Lord Jesus receive your spirit. Amen.
I am, dear, dear Mother,
Your dutiful Son,
JAN. 20, 1759.
SAM. JOHNSON.
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
FROM A LETTER TO HIS FRIEND MR. JOSEPH BARETTI, AT
MILAN
I
sons.
Know my Baretti will not be satisfied with a letter in which I
give him no account of myself; yet what account shall I give
him? I have not, since the day of our separation, suffered or
done anything considerable. The only change in my way of life
is, that I have frequented the theatre more than in former sea-
But I have gone thither only to escape from myself. We
have had many new farces, and the comedy called “The Jealous
Wife,' — which, though not written with much genius, was yet
so well adapted to the stage, and so well exhibited by the actors,
that it was crowded for near twenty nights. I am digressing
from myself to the play-house; but a barren plan must be filled
with episodes. Of myself I have nothing to say, but that I have
hitherto lived without the concurrence of my own judgment; yet
I continue to flatter myself that when you return, you will find
me mended. I do not wonder that where the monastic life is per-
mitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabit-
ants. Men will submit to any rule by which they may be exempt
from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to
supply by external authority their own want of constancy and
resolution, and court the government of others when long experi-
ence has convinced them of their own inability to govern them-
selves. If I were to visit Italy, my curiosity would be more
attracted by convents than by palaces; though I am afraid I
should find expectation in both places equally disappointed, and
life in both places supported with impatience and quitted with
reluctance. That it must be so soon quitted is a powerful rem-
edy against impatience; but what shall free us from reluctance ?
Those who have endeavored to teach us to die well, have taught
few to die willingly; yet I cannot but hope that a good life might
end at last in a contented death,
DR. JOHNSON'S FAREWELL TO HIS MOTHER'S AGED SERVANT
UNDAY, Oct. 18, 1767. -Yesterday, Oct. 17, at about ten in the
morning, I took my leave forever of my dear old friend
Catherine Chambers, who came to live with my mother
about 1724, and has been but little parted from us since. She
## p. 8295 (#499) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8295
buried my father, my brother, and my mother. She is now
fifty-eight years old.
I desired all to withdraw, then told her that we were to part
forever; that as Christians, we should part with prayer, and that
I would, if she was willing, say a short prayer beside her. She
expressed great desire to hear me; and held up her poor hands,
as she lay in bed, with great fervor while I prayed, kneeling by
her, nearly in the following words:
"Almighty and most merciful Father, whose loving kindness
is over all thy works, behold, visit, and relieve this thy serv-
ant, who is grieved with sickness. Grant that the sense of her
weakness may add strength to her faith, and seriousness to her
repentance. And grant that by the help of thy Holy Spirit, after
the pains and labors of this short life, we may all obtain ever-
lasting happiness through Jesus Christ our Lord; for whose sake
hear our prayers.
Amen. Our Father,” etc.
.
"
I then kissed her. She told me that to part was the greatest
pain that she had ever felt, and that she hoped we should meet
again in a better place. I expressed, with swelled eyes and great
emotion of tenderness, the same hopes. We kissed and parted,
I humbly hope to meet again and to part no more.
West
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
Dear Sir:
HAT can possibly have happened that keeps us two such
strangers to each other? I expected to have heard from
you when you came home; I expected afterwards. I
went into the country and returned; and yet there is no letter
from Mr. Boswell. No ill I hope has happened; and if ill should
happen, why should it be concealed from him who loves you? Is
it a fit of humor, that has disposed you to try who can hold out
longest without writing ? If it be, you have the victory. But
I am afraid of something bad; set me free from my suspicions.
My thoughts are at present employed in guessing the reason
of your silence: you must not expect that I should tell you any-
thing, if I had anything to tell. Write, pray write to me, and
let me know what is, or what has been, the cause of this long
interruption. I am, dear Sir,
Your most affectionate humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
JULY 13, 1779.
## p. 8296 (#500) ###########################################
8296
SAMUEL JOHNSON
A
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
My Dear Sir
RE you playing the same trick again, and trying who can
keep silence longest ? Remember that all tricks are either
knavish or childish; and that it is as foolish to make ex-
periments upon the constancy of a friend as upon the chastity of
a wife.
What can be the cause of this second fit of silence I cannot
conjecture; but after one trick, I will not be cheated by another,
nor will I harass my thoughts with conjectures about the motives
of a man who probably acts only by caprice. I therefore suppose
you are well, and that Mrs. Boswell is well too; and that the fine
summer has restored Lord Auchinleck. I am much better, better
than you left me; I think I am better than when I was in Scot-
land.
I forgot whether I informed you that poor Thrale has been
in great danger. Mrs. Thrale likewise has
been much
indisposed. Everybody else is well; Langton is in camp.
intend to put Lord Hailes's description of Dryden into another
edition; and as I know his accuracy, wish he would consider the
dates, which I could not always settle to my own mind.
Mr. Thrale goes to Brighthelmstone about Michaelmas, to
be jolly and ride a-hunting. I shall go to town, or perhaps to
Oxford. Exercise and gayety, or rather carelessness, will I hope
dissipate all remains of his malady; and I likewise hope, by the
change of place, to find some opportunities of growing yet better
myself. I am, dear Sir, your humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON.
STREATHAM, Sept. 9, 1779.
WY
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
Dear Sir:
Hy should you importune me so earnestly to write? Of
what importance can it be to hear of distant friends to a
man who finds himself welcome wherever he goes, and
makes new friends faster than he can want them? If to the
delight of such universal kindness of reception, anything can be
added by knowing that you retain my good-will, you may indulge
yourself in the full enjoyment of that small addition.
I am glad that you made the round of Lichfield with so much
success: the oftener
ou are seen, the inore you will be liked.
## p. 8297 (#501) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8297
It was pleasing to me to read that Mrs. Aston was so well, and
that Lucy Porter was so glad to see you.
In the place where you now are, there is much to be ob-
served; and you will easily procure yourself skillful directors.
But what will you do to keep away the black dog that worries
you at home ?
If you would, in compliance with your father's
advice, inquire into the old tenures and old charters of Scotland,
you would certainly open to yourself many striking scenes of the
manners of the Middle Ages. The feudal system, in a country
half barbarous, is naturally productive of great anomalies in civil
life. The knowledge of past times is naturally growing less in
all cases not of public record; and the past time of Scotland is
so unlike the present, that it is already difficult for a Scotchman
to image the economy of his grandfather. Do not be tardy nor
negligent; but gather up eagerly what can yet be found.
We have, I think, once talked of another project,-a history
of the late insurrection in Scotland, with all its incidents. Many
falsehoods are passing into uncontradicted history. Voltaire, who
loved a striking story, has told what he could not find to be
true.
You may make collections for either of these projects, or for
both, as opportunities occur, and digest your materials at leisure.
The great direction which Burton has left to men disordered like
you, is this: Be not solitary; be not idle - which I would thus
modify: If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be
not idle.
There is a letter for you, from
Your humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
LONDON, October 27, 1779.
TO MRS. LUCY PORTER IN LICHFIELD
L'
Dear Madam :
IFE is full of troubles. I have just lost my dear friend Thrale.
I hope he is happy; but I have had a great loss. I am
otherwise pretty well. I require some care of myself, but
that care is not ineffectual; and when I am out of order I think
it often my own fault.
The spring is now making quick advances. As it is the sea-
son in which the whole world is enlivened and invigorated, I
## p. 8298 (#502) ###########################################
8298
SAMUEL JOHNSON
hope that both you and I shall partake of its benefits. My de-
sire is to Lichfield; but being left executor to my friend, I
know not whether I can be spared; but I will try, for it is now
long since we saw one another; and how little we can promise
ourselves many more interviews, we are taught by hourly exam-
ples of mortality. Let us try to live so as that mortality may
not be an evil. Write to me soon, my dearest; your letters will
give me great pleasure.
I am sorry that Mr. Porter has not had his box; but by
sending it to Mr. Mathias, who very readily undertook its convey-
ance, I did the best I could, and perhaps before now he has it.
Be so kind as to make my compliments to my friends: I have
a great value for their kindness, and hope to enjoy it before
summer is past. Do write to me.
I am, dearest love,
Your most humble servant,
LONDON, April 12, 1781.
SAM. JOHNSON.
I
I.
2.
TO MR. PERKINS
Dear Sir:
AM much pleased that you are going a very long journey,
which may, by proper conduct, restore your health and pro-
long your life.
Observe these rules:-
Turn all care out of your head as soon as you mount the
chaise.
Do not think about frugality: your health is worth more
than it can cost.
3.
Do not continue any day's journey to fatigue.
Take now and then a day's rest.
5.
Get a smart sea-sickness if you can.
6. Cast away all anxiety, and keep your mind easy.
This last direction is the principal; with an unquiet mind
neither exercise, nor diet, nor physic can be of much use.
I wish you, dear Sir, a prosperous journey, and a happy re-
covery.
I am, dear Sir,
Your most affectionate humble servant,
July 28, 1782.
Sam. JOHNSON.
4.
## p. 8299 (#503) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8299
L
FROM A LETTER TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
IFE, as Cowley seems to say, ought to resemble a well-ordered
poem; of which one rule generally received is, that the ex-
ordium should be simple, and should promise little. Begin
your new course of life with the least show and the least expense
possible: you may at pleasure increase both, but you cannot easily
diminish them. Do not think your estate your own while any
man can call upon you for money which you cannot pay; there-
fore begin with timorous parsimony. Let it be your first care
not to be in any man's debt.
When the thoughts are extended to a future state, the present
life seems hardly worthy of all those principles of conduct and
maxims of prudence which one generation of men has transmit-
ted to another; but upon a closer view, when it is perceived how
much evil is produced and how much good is impeded by embar-
rassment and distress, and how little room the expedients of pov-
erty leave for the exercise of virtue, it grows manifest that the
boundless importance of the next life enforces some attention to
the interests of this.
Be kind to the old servants, and secure the kindness of the
agents and factors; do not disgust them by asperity, or unwel-
come gayety, or apparent suspicion. From them you must learn
the real state of your affairs, the characters of your tenants, and
the value of your lands.
Make my compliments to Mrs. Boswell: I think her expecta-
tions from air and exercise are the best that she can form. I
hope she will live long and happily.
TO MRS.
## p. 8282 (#486) ###########################################
. في
## p. 8283 (#487) ###########################################
8283
SAMUEL JOHNSON
(1709-1784)
BY GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL
AMUEL Johnson, the son of a bookseller, was born at Lich-
field, Staffordshire, England, September 18th, 1709. He was
educated mainly in the grammar school of that city; though
perhaps the best part of his education he gave himself, in the free
run which he had of the books in his father's shop. Lichfield was
the literary centre of a large district. Old Michael Johnson sup-
plied scholars with their folios, as well as less severe readers with
romances, poems, essays, and pamphlets. It was in climbing up to
search for some apples which young Samuel imagined his brother
had hidden behind a large folio, that he came across the works of
Petrarch, and fell to studying them. He was a mere child when,
reading Hamlet' in his father's kitchen, he was so greatly scared
by the ghost that he suddenly hurried up-stairs to the street door,
that he might see people about him. With the memory of this ter-
ror fresh in his mind, he wrote many years afterwards: “He that
peruses Shakespeare looks round him alarmed, and starts to find him-
self alone. ” He read with wonderful rapidity, ravenously as if he
devoured the book, and what he read his powerful memory retained.
“He knew more books,” said Adam Smith, «than any man alive. ”
At the age of nineteen he entered Pembroke College, Oxford,
“the best qualified for the university that his tutor had ever known
come there. »
Thence he was driven by poverty after a residence of
only fourteen months. During the next few years he lived partly by
teaching. At the age of twenty-six he married. Two years later he
went up to London with a half-finished tragedy in his pocket, and
David Garrick as his companion. There for five-and-twenty years he
lived the hard life of a poor scholar. His wife died after a long
illness. “ The melancholy of the day of her death hung long upon
me,” he recorded in his diary. His own body, though large and
powerful, was not sound, and his mind was often overcast by melan-
choly. My health,” he said in his old
«has been from my
twentieth year such as has seldom afforded me a single day of ease. ”
In this period of his life he did most of his work. He wrote the
Debates of Parliament, which were wholly in form and mainly in
age,
(
((
## p. 8284 (#488) ###########################################
8284
SAMUEL JOHNSON
substance his own invention; his great Dictionary; his two poems
(London' and 'The Vanity of Human Wishes'; the Rambler, the
Idler, and Rasselas,' and numerous minor pieces. He published
moreover Observations on Macbeth,' and he made a beginning of
his edition of Shakespeare.
In 1762, when he was in his fifty-third year, a pension of £300
from the King freed him from the pressure of poverty. The rest of
his life he passed in modest comfort. A friendship which he formed
a little later added greatly to his happiness. A wealthy London
brewer of the name of Thrale, a man of such strong sense that he
sought a comrade this rough genius, gave him a second home.
Both in his town house and in his beautiful country villa a room was
set apart for Johnson. Mrs. Thrale, «a lady of lively talents im-
proved by education,” flattered by the friendship of so great a man
and by the society which he drew round her table, tended him like
a daughter. Her kindness soothed twenty years of a life radically
wretched. ” To the Thrales he generally gave half the week, passing
the rest of his time in his own house. There he found constant
shelter for two humble friends; sometimes indeed for as many as
five.
His pen had long intervals of rest. He finished his Shakespeare,
wrote four political tracts which added nothing to his reputation, and
his Journey to the Western Islands. Happily he was roused from
his indolence by the request of the booksellers that he should under-
take that one of all his works by which he is best known,- the
(Lives of the English Poets. ' “I wrote it,” he says, “in my usual
way, dilatorily and hastily; unwilling to work, and working with
vigor and haste. ”
The indolence into which he seemed to have sunk was
apparent than real. That powerful mind was seldom long at rest.
“He was a kind of public oracle, whom everybody thought they had
a right to visit and consult. ) David Hume might complain that
«men of letters have in London no rendezvous, and are indeed sunk
and forgotten in the general torrent of the world. Those who knew
Johnson felt no such want. «His house became an academy. ” So
did the taverns which he frequented, whose chairs he looked upon as
so many thrones of human felicity. “There I have,” he said, “free
conversation, and an interchange of discourse with those whom I
most love; I dogmatize and am contradicted, and in this conflict of
opinions and opinions I find delight. ” In Thrale's house too «the
society of the learned, the witty, and the eminent in every way, called
forth his wonderful powers. Among his friends he numbered Rey-
nolds, Burke, Goldsmith, Garrick, and Boswell. They were all mem-
bers of that famous club of which he was the light and centre. In
more
»
## p. 8285 (#489) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8285
the grave.
>
the world of letters his opinion was eagerly awaited. (((What does
Johnson say of such a book? ' was the question of every day. ”
This, the happiest period of his life, was brought to an end by the
death of Mr. Thrale in 1781. “I looked,” he recorded in his diary,
«for the last time upon the face that for fifteen years had never been
turned upon me but with respect or benignity. ” The widow, who had
scarcely buried her husband before she fell in love with an Italian
singer, began to feel the old man's friendship a burden and reproach,
and deserted him as she deserted her daughter. While he was
thus losing his second home, «death visited his mournful habitation. ”
Blind Miss Williams and that strange old surgeon Robert Levett,
whom he had sheltered so many years and who repaid his kindness
by companionship whenever he needed it, quickly followed Thrale to
His own health began to break, and he was attacked by
a succession of painful disorders.
Though the ranks of his friends were thinning and his strength
was failing, he did not lose heart. He tried “to keep his friendships
in constanț repair,” and he struggled hard for life. “I will be con-
quered,” he said: "I will not capitulate. ” Death had always been
terrible to him. Had Mr. Thrale outlived him he would have faced
it in the house of friends, who by their attentions and their wealth
would have screened some of its terrors from his view.
He now
faced it month after month in the gloom of solitude. He died on
December 13th, 1784. «His death,” wrote one of his contemporaries,
kept the public mind in agitation beyond all former example. It
made a kind of era in literature,” said Hannah More. Harriet Mar-
tineau was told, by an old lady who well remembered the time, that
«the world of literature was perplexed and distressed as a swarm of
bees that have lost their queen. ” The sovereign man of letters was
indeed dead. “Sir,) Goldsmith had one day said to him, you are
for making a monarchy of what should be a republic. ” The republic
was at length founded; the last monarch of the English world of lit-
erature was gathered to his fathers. The sceptre which Dryden had
handed down to Pope, and Pope to Johnson, fell to the ground, never
to be raised again. The Declaration of Independence was read in the
funeral service over the newly opened grave in Westminster Abbey.
High as Johnson still stands as a writer, his great reputation rests
mainly on his talk and on his character as a man, full as it was of
strange variety, rugged strength, great tenderness, dogged honesty
and truthfulness, a willingness to believe what was incredible com-
bined with an obstinate rationality” which ever prevented him, and
Toryism with the spirit of a rebel glowing beneath. He had in the
highest degree that element of manhood” (to quote Lowell's words)
(which we call character. It is something distinct from genius —
(
((
## p. 8286 (#490) ###########################################
8286
SAMUEL JOHNSON
»
though all great geniuses are endowed with it. Hence we always
think of Dante Alighieri, of Michael Angelo, of William Shakespeare,
of John Milton; while of such men as Gibbon and Hume we merely
recall the works, and think of them as the author of this or that. ”
This holds more true of Samuel Johnson than even of the four
mighty geniuses whom Lowell instances. It is in the pages of his
friend and disciple that he lives for us as no other man has ever
lived. Of all men he is best known. In his early manhood he set
up an academy, and failed. The school which he founded in his later
years still numbers its pupils by thousands and tens of thousands.
“We are,” said Sir Joshua Reynolds, of Dr. Johnson's school. He
may be said to have formed my mind, and to have brushed from it
a great deal of rubbish. He qualified it to think justly. ” He still
qualifies the mind to think; he still clears it of cant; he still brushes
from it all that rubbish which is heaped up by affectation, false sen-
timent, exaggeration, credulity, and indolence in thinking. "All who
were of his school,” Reynolds added, “are distinguished for a love
of truth and accuracy. ” “He taught me,” wrote Boswell, “to cross-
question in common life. ” The great master still finds many apt
scholars.
“He spoke as he wrote,” his hearers comme
monly asserted. This
was not altogether true. It might indeed be the case that every-
thing he said was as correct as a second edition”; nevertheless his
talk was never so labored as the more ornate parts of his writings.
Even in his lifetime his style was censured as “involved and turgid,
and abounding with antiquated and hard words. ” Macaulay went
so far as to pronounce it “systematically vicious. ” Johnson seems to
have been aware of some of his failings. "If Robertson's style be
faulty,” he said, “he owes it to me; that is, having too many words,
and those too big ones. ” As Goldsmith said of him, “If he were to
inake little fishes talk (in a fable), they would talk like whales. " In
the structure of his sentences he is as often at fault as in the use
of big words. He praised Temple for giving a cadence to English
prose, and he blamed Warburton for having his sentences unmeas-
ured. ” His own prose is too measured and has too much cadence.
It is in his Ramblers that he is seen at his worst, and in his Lives
of the Poets) at his best. In his Ramblers he was under the temp-
tation to expand his words beyond the thoughts they had to convey,
which besets every writer who has on stated days to fill up a certain
number of columns. In the Lives, out of the fullness of his mind
he gave far more than he had undertaken in his agreement with the
booksellers. With all its faults, his style has left a permanent and a
beneficial mark on the English language. It was not without reason
that speaking of what he had done, he said: “Something perhaps I
“
»
## p. 8287 (#491) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8287
>
»
have added to the elegance of its construction, and something to the
harmony of its cadence. ” If he was too fond of words of foreign
origin, he resisted the inroad of foreign idioms. No one could say
of him what he said of Hume: “The structure of his sentences is
French. ” He sturdily withstood “the license of translators who were
reducing to babble a dialect of France. ” Lord Monboddo complained
of his frequent use of metaphors. In this he was unlike Swift, in
whose writings, it was asserted, not a single one can be found. If
however he used them profusely, he used them as accurately as
Burke; of whom, as he was speaking one day in Parliament, a by-
stander said, “How closely that fellow reasons in metaphors! ” John-
son's writings are always clear. To him might be applied the words
he used of Swift: “He always understands himself, and his readers
always understand him. ” “He never hovers on the brink of mean-
ing. ” If he falls short of Swift in simplicity, he rises far above him
in eloquence. He cares for something more than “the easy and safe
conveyance of meaning. ” His task it was not only to instruct, but to
persuade; not only to impart truth, but to awaken “that inattention
by which known truths are suffered to be neglected. ” He was “the
great moralist. ” He was no unimpassioned teacher, as correct as he
is cold. His mind was ever swayed to the mood of what it liked
or loathed, and as it was swayed, so it gave harmonious utterance.
Who would look to find tenderness in the preface to a dictionary?
Nevertheless Horne Tooke, "the ablest and most malevolent of all
the enemies of his fame,” could never read Johnson's preface without
shedding a tear. He often rose to noble heights of eloquence; while
in the power of his honest scorn he has scarcely a rival. His letters
to Lord Chesterfield and James Macpherson are not surpassed by any
in our language. In his criticisms he is admirably clear. Whether
we agree with him or not, we know at once what he means; while
his meaning is so strongly supported by argument that we
neither neglect it nor despise it. Не may put his reader into a
rage, but he sets him thinking.
Of his original works, Irene) was the first written, though not the
first published. It is a declamatory tragedy. He had little dramatic
power, and he followed a bad model, for he took Addison as his mas-
ter. The criticism which in his old age he passed on that writer's
(Cato' equally well fits his own Irene. “It is rather a poem in
dialogue than a drama, rather a succession of just sentiments in ele-
gant language than a representation of natural affections, or of any
state probable or possible in human life. It was in his two imita-
tions of Juvenal's Satires, London and the Vanity of Human
Wishes,' that he first showed his great powers. Pope quickly dis-
covered the genius of the unknown author. In their kind they are
can
(C
## p. 8288 (#492) ###########################################
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SAMUEL JOHNSON
masterpieces. Sir Walter Scott (had more pleasure in reading them
than any other poetical composition he could mention. ” The last
line of manuscript he sent to press was a quotation from the Van-
ity of Human Wishes. ' « 'Tis a grand poem,” said Byron, “and so
true! - true as the truth of Juvenal himself. ” Johnson had planned
further imitations of the Roman satirist, but he never executed them.
What he has done in these two longer poems and in many of his
minor pieces is so good that we may well grieve that he left so
little in verse. Like his three contemporaries Collins, Gray, and
Goldsmith, as a poet he died in debt to the world.
In the 'Rambler he teaches the same great lesson of life as in his
serious poems. He gave variety, however, by lighter papers modeled
on the Spectator, and by critical pieces. Admirable as was his humor
in his talk,-“in the talent of humor,” said Hawkins, there hardly
ever was his equal,” — yet in his writings he fell unmeasurably short
of Addison. His criticisms are acute; but it is when he reasons of
righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come that he is seen at
his strongest.
(Rasselas,' struck off at a heat when his mother lay dying, tells
in prose what the Vanity of Human Wishes, tells in verse. It is
little known to the modern reader, who is not easily reconciled to its
style. At no time could it have been a favorite with the young and
thoughtless. Nevertheless, as years steal over us, we own, as we lay
it down with a sigh, that it gives a view of life as profound and true
as it is sad.
His Dictionary, faulty as it is in its etymologies, is a very great
performance. Its definitions are admirable; while the quotations are
so happily selected that they would afford the most pleasant reading
were it possible to read a heavy folio with pleasure. That it should
be the work of one man is a marvel. He had hoped to finish it in
three years; it took him more than seven. To quote his own words,
“He that runs against time has an antagonist not subject to casual-
ties. ” He was hindered by ill health, by his wife's long and fatal
illness, and by the need that he was under of making provision for
the day that was passing over him. ” During two years of the seven
years he was writing three Ramblers a week.
Of his Shakespeare, Macaulay said: “It would be difficult to name
a more slovenly, a more worthless edition of any great classic. I
doubt whether when he passed this sweeping judgment, he had read
much more than those brief passages in which Johnson sums up the
merits of each play. The preface, Adam Smith, no friend of John-
son's fame, described as “the most manly piece of criticism that was
ever published in any country. ” In the notes the editor anticipated
modern critics in giving great weight to early readings. Warburton,
## p. 8289 (#493) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8289
in the audacity of his conjectural emendations, almost rivaled Bentley
in his dealings with Milton. He floundered, but this time he did
not flounder well. Johnson was unwilling to meddle with the text so
long as it gave a meaning. Many of his corrections are ingenious,
but in this respect he came far behind Theobald. His notes on
character are distinguished by that knowledge of mankind in which
he excelled. The best are those on Falstaff and Polonius. The
booksellers who had employed him did their part but ill. There
are numerous errors which the corrector of the press should have
detected, while the work is ill printed and on bad paper.
His four political tracts were written at the request of govern-
ment. In one of them, in a fine passage, he shows the misery and
suffering which are veiled from men's sight by the dazzle of the glory
of war.
In the struggle between England and her colonies he with
Gibbon stood by George III. , while Burke, Hume, and Adam Smith
were on the side of liberty.
In his Journey to the Western Islands) he describes the tour
which he made with Boswell in 1773. In this work he took the part
of the oppressed tenants against their chiefs, who were, he wrote,
«gradually degenerating from patriarchal rulers to rapacious land-
lords. » His narrative is interesting; while the facts which he gathered
about a rapidly changing society are curious. « Burke thought well
of the philosophy of the book. ”
His last work was the Lives of the English Poets. '
It was
undertaken at the request of the chief London booksellers,
had determined to publish a body of English poetry,” for which he
was to furnish brief prefaces. These prefaces swelled into Lives.
"I have,” he wrote, “been led beyond my intention, I hope by the
honest desire of giving useful pleasure. ” For payment he had re-
quired only two hundred guineas. “Had he asked one thousand, or
even fifteen hundred,” said Malone, the booksellers would doubtless
readily have given it. ” In this great work he traveled over the
whole field of English poetry, from Milton who was born in 1608
to Lyttleton who died in 1773. To such a task no man ever came
better equipped. He brought to it wide reading, a strong memory,
traditional knowledge gathered from the companions of his early
manhood, his own long acquaintance with the literary world of Lon-
don, and the fruits of years of reflection and discussion. He had
studied criticism deeply, and he dared to think for himself. No
man was ever more fearless in his judgments. He was overpowered
by no man's reputation.
His criticisms of Milton's Lycidas) and of
Gray show him at his worst. Nevertheless they are not wholly with-
out foundation. 'Lycidas,' great as it is, belongs to an unnatural
school of poetry. It is a lament that never moved a single reader to
XIV-519
(( who
## p. 8290 (#494) ###########################################
8290
SAMUEL JOHNSON
tears. No one mourns over young Lycidas. Blind as Johnson was
to the greatness of the poem, he has surpassed all other critics in
the splendor of the praise he bestowed on the poet. To the exquisite
beauties of Gray, unhappily, he was insensible. His faults he makes
us see only too clearly. We have to admit, however unwillingly,
that at times Gray is “tall by standing on tiptoe,” and does indulge in
commonplaces to which criticism disdains to chase him. ” Scarcely
less valuable than Johnson's critical remarks are the anecdotes which
he collected and the reflections which he made. In these Lives, and
in his own Life as told by Boswell, we have given us an admirable
view of literature and literary men, from the end of the age of
Elizabeth to close upon the dawn of the splendor which ushered in
the nineteenth century.
G Barkhurst Hill
FROM "THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES)
L
ET observation, with extensive view,
Survey mankind, from China to Peru;
Remark each anxious toil, each eager strife,
And watch the busy scenes of crowded life;
Then say how hope and fear, desire and hate,
O'erspread with snares the clouded maze of fate,
Where wavering man, betrayed by venturous pride
To tread the dreary paths without a guide,
As treacherous phantoms in the mist delude,
Shuns fancied ills, or chases airy good;
How rarely reason guides the stubborn choice,
Rules the bold hand, or prompts the suppliant voice;
How nations sink, by darling schemes oppressed,
When vengeance listens to the fool's request.
Fate wings with every wish the afflictive dart,
Each gift of nature, and each grace of art;
With fatal heat impetuous courage glows,
With fatal sweetness elocution flows,
Impeachment stops the speaker's powerful breath,
And restless fire precipitates on death.
Let history tell where rival kings command,
And dubious title shakes the maddened land.
## p. 8291 (#495) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8291
When statutes glean the refuse of the sword,
How much more safe the vassal than the lord !
Low skulks the hind beneath the rage of power,
And leaves the wealthy traitor in the tower;
Untouched his cottage, and his slumbers sound,
Though confiscation's vultures hover round.
On what foundation stands the warrior's pride,
How just his hopes, let Swedish Charles decide:
A frame of adamant, a soul of fire,
No dangers fright him, and no labors tire;
O'er love, o'er fear, extends his wide domain,
Unconquered lord of pleasure and of pain.
No joys to him pacific sceptres yield, -
War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field;
Behold surrounding kings their powers combine,
And one capitulate, and one resign;
Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in vain:
« Think nothing gained,” he cries, «till naught remain,
On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly,
And all be mine beneath the polar sky. ”
The march begins in military state,
And nations on his eye suspended wait ;
Stern famine guards the solitary coast,
And winter barricades the realms of frost.
He comes,
nor want nor cold his course delay:
Hide, blushing glory, hide Pultowa's day!
The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands,
And shows his miseries in distant lands;
Condemned a needy supplicant to wait,
While ladies interpose, and slaves debate.
But did not chance at length her error mend ?
Did no subverted empire mark his end ?
Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound,
Or hostile millions press him to the ground ?
His fall was destined to a barren strand,
A petty fortress, and a dubious hand;
He left the name at which the world grew pale
To point a moral, or adorn a tale.
Must helpless man, in ignorance sedate,
Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?
Must no dislike alarm, no wishes rise,
No cries invoke the mercies of the skies?
Inquirer, cease: petitions yet remain,
Which Heaven may hear; nor deem religion vain.
## p. 8292 (#496) ###########################################
8292
SAMUEL JOHNSON
Still raise for good the supplicating voice,
But leave to Heaven the measure and the choice.
Safe in His power, whose eyes discern afar
The secret ambush of a specious prayer,
Implore his aid, in his decisions rest,
Secure, whate'er he gives, he gives the best.
Yet when the sense of sacred presence fires,
And strong devotion to the skies aspires,
Pour forth thy fervors for a healthful mind,
Obedient passions, and a will resigned:
For love, which scarce collective man can fill;
For patience, sovereign o'er transmuted ill;
For faith, that, panting for a happier seat,
Counts death kind nature's signal of retreat:
These goods for man the laws of Heaven ordain,
These goods He grants who grants the power to gain;
With these celestial wisdom calms the mind,
And makes the happiness she does not find.
LETTER TO LORD CHESTERFIELD AS TO THE DICTIONARY)
I
FEBRUARY 7th, 1755.
My Lord:
HAVE been lately informed by the proprietor of the World
that two papers, in which my Dictionary is recommended
to the public, were written by your Lordship. To be so
distinguished is an honor, which, being very little accustomed
to favors from the great, I know not well how to receive, or in
what terms to acknowledge.
When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your
Lordship, I was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the
enchantment of your address, and could not forbear to wish that
I might boast myself le vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre,
that I might obtain that regard for which I saw the world con-
tending; but I found my attendance so little encouraged, that
neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to continue it. When
I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I had exhausted
all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly scholar can
possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well pleased
to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.
Seven years, my lord, have now passed since I waited in your
outward rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which
## p. 8293 (#497) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8293
time I have been pushing on my work through difficulties of
which it is useless to complain, and have brought it at last to
the verge of publication, without one act of assistance, one word
of encouragement, or one smile of favor. Such treatment I did
not expect, for I never had a patron before.
The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and
found him a native of the rocks.
Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a
man struggling for life in the water, and when he has reached
ground, incumbers him with help? The notice which you have
been pleased to take of my labors, had it been early had been
kind: but it has been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot
enjoy it; till I am solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am
known, and do not want it. I hope it is no very cynical asper-
ity not to confess obligations where no benefit has been received,
or to be unwilling that the public should consider me as owing
that to a patron which Providence has enabled me to do for
myself.
Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation
to any favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I
should conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been
long wakened from that dream of hope in which I once boasted
myself with so much exultation, my lord,
Your Lordship's most humble, most obedient servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
DR. JOHNSON'S LAST LETTER TO HIS AGED MOTHER
NET
Dear Honored Mother:
EITHER your condition nor your character make it fit for me
to say much. You have been the best mother, and I be-
lieve the best woman, in the world. I thank
you
for
your
indulgence to me, and beg forgiveness of all that I have done
ill, and all that I have omitted to do well. God grant you his
Holy Spirit, and receive you to everlasting happiness, for Jesus
Christ's sake. Amen. . Lord Jesus receive your spirit. Amen.
I am, dear, dear Mother,
Your dutiful Son,
JAN. 20, 1759.
SAM. JOHNSON.
## p. 8294 (#498) ###########################################
8294
SAMUEL JOHNSON
FROM A LETTER TO HIS FRIEND MR. JOSEPH BARETTI, AT
MILAN
I
sons.
Know my Baretti will not be satisfied with a letter in which I
give him no account of myself; yet what account shall I give
him? I have not, since the day of our separation, suffered or
done anything considerable. The only change in my way of life
is, that I have frequented the theatre more than in former sea-
But I have gone thither only to escape from myself. We
have had many new farces, and the comedy called “The Jealous
Wife,' — which, though not written with much genius, was yet
so well adapted to the stage, and so well exhibited by the actors,
that it was crowded for near twenty nights. I am digressing
from myself to the play-house; but a barren plan must be filled
with episodes. Of myself I have nothing to say, but that I have
hitherto lived without the concurrence of my own judgment; yet
I continue to flatter myself that when you return, you will find
me mended. I do not wonder that where the monastic life is per-
mitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabit-
ants. Men will submit to any rule by which they may be exempt
from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to
supply by external authority their own want of constancy and
resolution, and court the government of others when long experi-
ence has convinced them of their own inability to govern them-
selves. If I were to visit Italy, my curiosity would be more
attracted by convents than by palaces; though I am afraid I
should find expectation in both places equally disappointed, and
life in both places supported with impatience and quitted with
reluctance. That it must be so soon quitted is a powerful rem-
edy against impatience; but what shall free us from reluctance ?
Those who have endeavored to teach us to die well, have taught
few to die willingly; yet I cannot but hope that a good life might
end at last in a contented death,
DR. JOHNSON'S FAREWELL TO HIS MOTHER'S AGED SERVANT
UNDAY, Oct. 18, 1767. -Yesterday, Oct. 17, at about ten in the
morning, I took my leave forever of my dear old friend
Catherine Chambers, who came to live with my mother
about 1724, and has been but little parted from us since. She
## p. 8295 (#499) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8295
buried my father, my brother, and my mother. She is now
fifty-eight years old.
I desired all to withdraw, then told her that we were to part
forever; that as Christians, we should part with prayer, and that
I would, if she was willing, say a short prayer beside her. She
expressed great desire to hear me; and held up her poor hands,
as she lay in bed, with great fervor while I prayed, kneeling by
her, nearly in the following words:
"Almighty and most merciful Father, whose loving kindness
is over all thy works, behold, visit, and relieve this thy serv-
ant, who is grieved with sickness. Grant that the sense of her
weakness may add strength to her faith, and seriousness to her
repentance. And grant that by the help of thy Holy Spirit, after
the pains and labors of this short life, we may all obtain ever-
lasting happiness through Jesus Christ our Lord; for whose sake
hear our prayers.
Amen. Our Father,” etc.
.
"
I then kissed her. She told me that to part was the greatest
pain that she had ever felt, and that she hoped we should meet
again in a better place. I expressed, with swelled eyes and great
emotion of tenderness, the same hopes. We kissed and parted,
I humbly hope to meet again and to part no more.
West
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
Dear Sir:
HAT can possibly have happened that keeps us two such
strangers to each other? I expected to have heard from
you when you came home; I expected afterwards. I
went into the country and returned; and yet there is no letter
from Mr. Boswell. No ill I hope has happened; and if ill should
happen, why should it be concealed from him who loves you? Is
it a fit of humor, that has disposed you to try who can hold out
longest without writing ? If it be, you have the victory. But
I am afraid of something bad; set me free from my suspicions.
My thoughts are at present employed in guessing the reason
of your silence: you must not expect that I should tell you any-
thing, if I had anything to tell. Write, pray write to me, and
let me know what is, or what has been, the cause of this long
interruption. I am, dear Sir,
Your most affectionate humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
JULY 13, 1779.
## p. 8296 (#500) ###########################################
8296
SAMUEL JOHNSON
A
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
My Dear Sir
RE you playing the same trick again, and trying who can
keep silence longest ? Remember that all tricks are either
knavish or childish; and that it is as foolish to make ex-
periments upon the constancy of a friend as upon the chastity of
a wife.
What can be the cause of this second fit of silence I cannot
conjecture; but after one trick, I will not be cheated by another,
nor will I harass my thoughts with conjectures about the motives
of a man who probably acts only by caprice. I therefore suppose
you are well, and that Mrs. Boswell is well too; and that the fine
summer has restored Lord Auchinleck. I am much better, better
than you left me; I think I am better than when I was in Scot-
land.
I forgot whether I informed you that poor Thrale has been
in great danger. Mrs. Thrale likewise has
been much
indisposed. Everybody else is well; Langton is in camp.
intend to put Lord Hailes's description of Dryden into another
edition; and as I know his accuracy, wish he would consider the
dates, which I could not always settle to my own mind.
Mr. Thrale goes to Brighthelmstone about Michaelmas, to
be jolly and ride a-hunting. I shall go to town, or perhaps to
Oxford. Exercise and gayety, or rather carelessness, will I hope
dissipate all remains of his malady; and I likewise hope, by the
change of place, to find some opportunities of growing yet better
myself. I am, dear Sir, your humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON.
STREATHAM, Sept. 9, 1779.
WY
TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
Dear Sir:
Hy should you importune me so earnestly to write? Of
what importance can it be to hear of distant friends to a
man who finds himself welcome wherever he goes, and
makes new friends faster than he can want them? If to the
delight of such universal kindness of reception, anything can be
added by knowing that you retain my good-will, you may indulge
yourself in the full enjoyment of that small addition.
I am glad that you made the round of Lichfield with so much
success: the oftener
ou are seen, the inore you will be liked.
## p. 8297 (#501) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8297
It was pleasing to me to read that Mrs. Aston was so well, and
that Lucy Porter was so glad to see you.
In the place where you now are, there is much to be ob-
served; and you will easily procure yourself skillful directors.
But what will you do to keep away the black dog that worries
you at home ?
If you would, in compliance with your father's
advice, inquire into the old tenures and old charters of Scotland,
you would certainly open to yourself many striking scenes of the
manners of the Middle Ages. The feudal system, in a country
half barbarous, is naturally productive of great anomalies in civil
life. The knowledge of past times is naturally growing less in
all cases not of public record; and the past time of Scotland is
so unlike the present, that it is already difficult for a Scotchman
to image the economy of his grandfather. Do not be tardy nor
negligent; but gather up eagerly what can yet be found.
We have, I think, once talked of another project,-a history
of the late insurrection in Scotland, with all its incidents. Many
falsehoods are passing into uncontradicted history. Voltaire, who
loved a striking story, has told what he could not find to be
true.
You may make collections for either of these projects, or for
both, as opportunities occur, and digest your materials at leisure.
The great direction which Burton has left to men disordered like
you, is this: Be not solitary; be not idle - which I would thus
modify: If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be
not idle.
There is a letter for you, from
Your humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON
LONDON, October 27, 1779.
TO MRS. LUCY PORTER IN LICHFIELD
L'
Dear Madam :
IFE is full of troubles. I have just lost my dear friend Thrale.
I hope he is happy; but I have had a great loss. I am
otherwise pretty well. I require some care of myself, but
that care is not ineffectual; and when I am out of order I think
it often my own fault.
The spring is now making quick advances. As it is the sea-
son in which the whole world is enlivened and invigorated, I
## p. 8298 (#502) ###########################################
8298
SAMUEL JOHNSON
hope that both you and I shall partake of its benefits. My de-
sire is to Lichfield; but being left executor to my friend, I
know not whether I can be spared; but I will try, for it is now
long since we saw one another; and how little we can promise
ourselves many more interviews, we are taught by hourly exam-
ples of mortality. Let us try to live so as that mortality may
not be an evil. Write to me soon, my dearest; your letters will
give me great pleasure.
I am sorry that Mr. Porter has not had his box; but by
sending it to Mr. Mathias, who very readily undertook its convey-
ance, I did the best I could, and perhaps before now he has it.
Be so kind as to make my compliments to my friends: I have
a great value for their kindness, and hope to enjoy it before
summer is past. Do write to me.
I am, dearest love,
Your most humble servant,
LONDON, April 12, 1781.
SAM. JOHNSON.
I
I.
2.
TO MR. PERKINS
Dear Sir:
AM much pleased that you are going a very long journey,
which may, by proper conduct, restore your health and pro-
long your life.
Observe these rules:-
Turn all care out of your head as soon as you mount the
chaise.
Do not think about frugality: your health is worth more
than it can cost.
3.
Do not continue any day's journey to fatigue.
Take now and then a day's rest.
5.
Get a smart sea-sickness if you can.
6. Cast away all anxiety, and keep your mind easy.
This last direction is the principal; with an unquiet mind
neither exercise, nor diet, nor physic can be of much use.
I wish you, dear Sir, a prosperous journey, and a happy re-
covery.
I am, dear Sir,
Your most affectionate humble servant,
July 28, 1782.
Sam. JOHNSON.
4.
## p. 8299 (#503) ###########################################
SAMUEL JOHNSON
8299
L
FROM A LETTER TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.
IFE, as Cowley seems to say, ought to resemble a well-ordered
poem; of which one rule generally received is, that the ex-
ordium should be simple, and should promise little. Begin
your new course of life with the least show and the least expense
possible: you may at pleasure increase both, but you cannot easily
diminish them. Do not think your estate your own while any
man can call upon you for money which you cannot pay; there-
fore begin with timorous parsimony. Let it be your first care
not to be in any man's debt.
When the thoughts are extended to a future state, the present
life seems hardly worthy of all those principles of conduct and
maxims of prudence which one generation of men has transmit-
ted to another; but upon a closer view, when it is perceived how
much evil is produced and how much good is impeded by embar-
rassment and distress, and how little room the expedients of pov-
erty leave for the exercise of virtue, it grows manifest that the
boundless importance of the next life enforces some attention to
the interests of this.
Be kind to the old servants, and secure the kindness of the
agents and factors; do not disgust them by asperity, or unwel-
come gayety, or apparent suspicion. From them you must learn
the real state of your affairs, the characters of your tenants, and
the value of your lands.
Make my compliments to Mrs. Boswell: I think her expecta-
tions from air and exercise are the best that she can form. I
hope she will live long and happily.
TO MRS.
