truth, this has been greatly exaggerated. I believe was true in a certain degree, He had, no doubt, a more than common share of that hurry of ideas which we often find in his countrymen, and which sometimes produces a laughable confusion in expressing them. He was very much what the French call un étourai, and from vanity and an eager desire of being conspicuous wherever he was, he frequently talked carelessly without knowledge of the subject, or even without thought. His person was short, his countenance coarse and vulgar, his deportment that of a scholar awkwardly affecting the easy gentleman. Those who were in any way distinguished, excited envy in him to so ridiculous an excess, that the instances of it are hardly credible. When accompanying two beautiful young ladies 1 with their mother on a tour in France, he was seriously angry that more attention was paid to them than to him; and once at the exhibition of the Fantoccini in London, when those who sat next him observed with what dexterity a puppet was made to toss a pike, he could not bear that it should have such praise, and exclaimed with some warmth, "Pshaw! I can do it better myself." 2 He, I am afraid, had no settled system of any sort, so that his conduct must not be strictly scrutinized; but his affections were social and generous, and when he had money he gave it away very liberally. His desire of imaginary consequence predominated over his attention to truth. When he began to rise into notice, he said he had a brother who was Dean of Durham, a fiction so easily detected, that it was wonderful how he should have been so inconsiderate as to hazard it. He boasted to me at this time of the power of his pen in commanding money, which 1 Miss Hornecks, one of whom is now married to Henry Bunbury, Esq. and the other to Colonel Gwyn. B. Mrs. Gwyn was the "Jessamy Bride. See Goldsmith's Works, Globe Ed. p. 691, and Forster's Life of Goldsmith. 3 2 He went home with Mr. Burke to supper; and broke his shin by attempting to exhibit to the company how much better he could jump over a stick than the puppets. B. 3 I am willing to hope that there may have been some mistake as to this anecdote, though I had it from a Dignitary of the church. Dr. Isaac Goldsmith, his near relation, was Dean of Cloyne, in 1747. B, though in the instance he gave he was by no means correct. He told me that he had sold a novel for four hundred pounds. This was his "Vicar of Wakefield." But Johnson informed me, that he had made the bargain for Goldsmith and the price was sixty pounds. "And, Sir," said he, "a sufficient price too, when it was sold; for then the fame of Goldsmith had not been elevated, as it afterwards was, by his 'Traveller'; and the bookseller had such faint hopes of profit by his bargain, that he kept the manuscript by him a long time, and did not publish it till after the Traveller' had appeared. Then, to be sure, it was accidentally worth more money. وو Mrs. Piozzi and Sir John Hawkins 5 have strangely mis-stated the history of Goldsmith's situation and Johnson's friendly interference, when this novel was sold. I shall give it authentically from Johnson's own exact narration : "I received one morning a message from poor Goldsmith that he was in great distress, and as it was not in his power to come to me, begging that I would come to him as soon as possible. I sent him a guinea, and promised to come to him directly. I accordingly went as soon as I was drest, and found that his landlady had arrested him for his rent, at which he was in a violent passion. I perceived that he had already changed my guinea, and had got a bottle of Madeira and a glass before him. I put the cork into the bottle, desired he would be calm, and began to talk to him of the means by which he might be extricated. He then told me that he had a novel ready for the press, which he produced to me. I looked into it, and saw its merit; told the landlady I should soon return, and having gone to a bookseller, sold it for sixty pounds. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he discharged his rent, not without rating his landlady in a high tone for having used him so ill." 5 4 Anecdotes of Johnson, p. 119. Life of Johnson, p. 420. B. 5 It may not be improper to annex here Mrs. Piozzi's account of this transaction, in her own words, as a specimen of the extreme_inaccuracy with which all her anecdotes of Dr. Johnson are related, or rather discoloured and distorted. "I 1 HIS ATTACHMENT TO JOHNSON My next meeting with Johnson was on Friday the 1st of July, when he and I and Dr. Goldsmith supped at the Mitre. I was before this time pretty well acquainted with Goldsmith, who was one of the brightest ornaments of the Johnsonian school. Goldsmith's respectful attachment to Johnson was then at its height; for his own literary reputation had not yet distinguished him so much as to excite a vain desire of competition with his great Master. He had increased my admiration of the goodness of Johnson's heart, by incidental remarks in the course of conversation; such as, when I mentioned Mr. Levett, whom he entertained under his roof, "He is poor and honest, which is recommendation enough to Johnand when I wondered that he was very kind to a man of whom I had heard a very bad character, "He is now become miserable, and that insures the protection of Johnson." son; دو Goldsmith attempting this evening to maintain, I suppose from an affectation of paradox, "that knowledge was not desirable on its own account, for it often was a source of unhappiness:"-JOHNSON: "Why, Sir, that knowledge may in some cases produce unhappiness, allow. But, upon the whole, knowledge, per se, is certainly an object which every man would wish to attain, although, perhaps, he may not take the trouble necessary for attaining it." Dr. John Campbell, the celebrated political and biographical writer, being have forgotten the year, but it could scarcely, I think, be later than 1765 or 1766, that he was called abruptly from our house after dinner, and returning in about three hours, said he had been with an enraged author, whose landlady pressed him for payment within doors, while the bailiffs beset him without; that he was drinking himself drunk with Madeira, to drown care, and fretting over a novel, which, when finished, was to be his whole fortune, but he could not get it done for distraction, nor could he step out of doors to offer it for sale. Mr. Johnson, therefore, sent away the bottle, and went to the bookseller, recommending the performance, and desiring some immediate relief; which when he brought back to the writer, he called the woman of the house directly to partake of punch, and pass their time in merriment." Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson, p. 119. B. The novel was sold in 1762, though not published till 1766. Johnson's acquaintance with the Thrales began in 1764. 66 141 mentioned, Johnson said, Campbell is a man of much knowledge, and has a good share of imagination. His Hermippus Redivivus' is very entertaining, as an account of the Hermetic philosophy, and as furnishing a curious history of the extravagances of the human mind. If it were merely imaginary, it would be nothing at all. Campbell is not always rigidly careful of truth in his conversation; but I do not believe there is anything of this carelessness in his books. Campbell is a good man, a pious man. I am afraid he has not been in the inside of a church for many years; 2 but he never passes a church without pulling off his hat. This shews that he has good principles. I used to go pretty often to Campbell's on a Sunday evening till I began to consider that the shoals of Scotchmen who flocked about him might probably say, when any thing of mine was well done, ‘Ay, ay, he has learnt this of CAWMELL!' 1 A translation of a work published at Frankfort in 1742, by Cohausen, a German physician (1675-1750). 2 I am inclined to think that he was misin " formed as to this circumstance. I own I am jealous for my worthy friend Dr. John Campbell. For though Milton could without remorse absent himself from public worship, I cannot. On the contrary, I have the same habitual impressions upon my mind, with those of a truly venerable Judge, who said to Mr. Langton, "Friend Langton, if I have not been at church on Sunday, I do not feel myself easy.' Dr. Campbell was a sincerely religious man. Lord Macartney, who is eminent for his variety of knowledge, and attention to men of talents, and knew him well, told me, that when he called on him in a morning, he found him reading a chapter in a Greek New Testament, which he informed his Lordship was his constant practice. The quantity of Dr. Campbell's composition is almost incredible, and his labours brought him large profits. Dr. Joseph Warton told me that Johnson said of him, “He is the richest author that ever grazed the common of literature.' B. 3 In The Author, under the subject of pensioners, as well as in The Ghost. did not attack me violently till he found I did not like his poetry; and his attack on me shall not prevent me from continuing to say what I think of him, from an apprehension that it may be ascribed to resentment. No, Sir, I called the fellow a blockhead at first, and I will call him a blockhead still. However, I will acknowledge that I have a better opinion of him now, than I once had; for he has shewn more fertility than I expected. To be sure, he is a tree that cannot produce good fruit he only bears crabs. : But, Sir, a tree that produces a great many crabs is better than a tree which produces only a few." In this depreciation of Churchill's poetry I could not agree with him. It is very true that the greatest part of it is upon the topics of the day, on which account, as it brought him great fame and profit at the time, it must proportionably slide out of the public attention as other occasional objects succeed. But Churchill had extraordinary vigour both of thought and expression. His portraits of the players will ever be valuable to the true lovers of the drama, and his strong caricatures of several eminent men of his age, will not be forgotten by the curious. Let me add, that there is in his works many passages which are of a general nature; and his “Prophecy of Famine " is a poem of no ordinary merit. It is, indeed, falsely injurious to Scotland; but therefore may be allowed a greater share of invention. Bonnell Thornton had just published a burlesque "Ode on St. Cecilia's Day," adapted to the ancient British music, viz. the salt-box, the jews-harp, the marrowbones and cleaver, the hum-strum or hurdy-gurdy, &c. Johnson praised its humour, and seemed much diverted with it. He repeated the following passage : "In strains more exalted the salt-box shall join, And clattering and battering and clapping combine; With a rap and a tap while the hollow side sounds, Up and down leaps the flap, and with rattling rebounds."1 1 In 1769 I set for Smart and Newbery, Thornton's burlesque Ode on St. Cecilia's Day. It was performed at Ranelagh in masks, to a very crowded audience, as I was told; for I then I mentioned the periodical paper called "THE CONNOISSEUR. He said it wanted matter.—No doubt it had not the deep thinking of Johnson's writings. But surely it has just views of the surface of life, and in a very sprightly manner. His opinion of "THE WORLD" was not much higher than of "The Connoisseur." Let me here apologize for the imperfect manner in which I am obliged to exhibit Johnson's conversation at this period. In the early part of my acquaintance with him, I was so rapt in admiration of his extraordinary colloquial talents, and so little accustomed to his peculiar mode of expression, that I found it extremely difficult to recollect and record his conversation with its genuine vigour and vivacity. In progress of time, when my mind was, as it were, strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian æther, I could with much facility and exactness, carry in my memory and commit to paper the exuberant variety of his wisdom and wit. At this time Miss Williams, as she was then called, though she did not reside with him in the Temple under his roof, but had lodgings in Bolt Court, Fleet Street, had so much of his attention, that he every night drank tea with her before he went home, however late it might be, and she always sat up for him. This, it may be fairly conjectured, was not alone a proof of his regard for her, but of his own unwillingness to go into solitude, before that unseasonable hour at which he had habituated himself to expect the oblivion of repose. Dr. Goldsmith, being a privileged man, went with him this night, strutting away, and calling to me with an air of superiority, like that of an esoteric over an exoteric disciple of a sage of antiquity, "I go to Miss Williams." I confess, I then envied him this mighty privilege, of which he seemed resided in Norfolk. Beard sung the salt-box song, which was admirably accompanied on that instrument by Brent, the fencing-master, and father of Miss Brent, the celebrated singer; Skeggs on the broom-stick, as bassoon: and a remarkable performer on the jews-harp.- -"Buzzing twangs the iron lyre." Cleavers were cast in bell-metal for this entertainment. All the performers of the old woman's Oratory, employed by Foote were, I believe, employed at Ranelagh on this occasion. Burney. JOHNSON'S FONDNESS FOR LONDON so proud; but it was not long before I obtained the same mark of distinction. 143 He the awkward appearánce I supposed I should make to Johnson and the other gentlemen whom I had invited, not being able to receive them at home, and being obliged to order supper at the Mitre. went to Johnson in the morning, and talked of it as of a serious distress. laughed, and said, Consider, Sir, how insignificant this will appear a twelvemonth hence."- Were this consideration to be applied to most of the little vexatious incidents of life, by which our quiet is too often disturbed, it would prevent many painful sensations. I have On Tuesday the 5th of July, I again visited Johnson. He told me he had looked into the poems of a pretty voluminous writer, Mr. (now Dr.) John Ogilvie, one of the Presbyterian ministers of Scotland, which had lately come out, but could find no thinking in them. BOSWELL: "Is there not imagination in them, Sir?" JOHNSON : "Why, Sir, there is in them what was imagination, but it is no more imagination in him, than sound is sound in the echo. And his diction too is not his own. We have long | tried it frequently with good effect. ago seen white-robed innocence, and flower-bespangled meads." "There is nothing," continued he, “in this mighty misfortune; nay, we shall Talking of London, he observed, "Sir, be better at the Mitre." I told him that if you wish to have a just notion of the I had been at Sir John Fielding's office,1 magnitude of this city, you must not be complaining of my landlord, and had satisfied with seeing its great streets and been informed, that though I had taken squares, but must survey the innumerable my lodgings for a year, I might, upon little lanes and courts. It is not in the proof of his bad behaviour, quit them showy evolutions of buildings, but in the when I pleased, without being under an multiplicity of human habitations which obligation to pay rent for any longer time are crowded together, that the wonderful than while I possessed them. The fertility immensity of London consists.". I have of Johnson's mind could shew itself even often amused myself with thinking how upon so small a matter as this. "Why, different a place London is to different Sir," said he, “I suppose this must be the people. They, whose narrow minds are law, since you have been told so in Bow contracted to the consideration of some Street. But, if your landlord could hold one particular pursuit, view it only you to your bargain, and the lodgings through that medium. A politician should be yours for a year, you may thinks of it merely as the seat of govern- certainly use them as you think fit. So, ment in its different departments; a Sir, you may quarter two life-guardsmen grazier, as a vast market for cattle; a upon him; or you may send the greatest mercantile man, as a place where a pro-scoundrel you can find into your apartdigious deal of business is done upon 'Change; a dramatic enthusiast, as the grand scene of theatrical entertainments; a man of pleasure, as an assemblage of taverns, and the great emporium for ladies of easy virtue. But the intellectual man is struck with it, as comprehending the whole of human life in all its variety, the contemplation of which is inexhaustible. On Wednesday, July 6th, he was engaged to sup with me at my lodgings But in Downing Street, Westminster. on the preceding night my landlord having behaved very rudely to me and some company who were with me, I had resolved not to remain another night in his house. I was exceedingly uneasy at ments; or you may say that you want to make some experiments in natural philosophy, and may burn a large quantity of assafoetida in his house." I had as my guests this evening at the Mitre tavern, Dr. Johnson, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. Thomas Davies, Mr. Eccles, an Irish gentleman, for whose agreeable company I was obliged to Mr. Davies, and the Reverend Mr. John Ogilvie, who was 2 1 Half-brother to Henry Fielding, and his successor in the office of Justice for Westminster. 2 The Northern bard mentioned above. When I asked Dr. Johnson's permission to introduce him, he obligingly agreed; adding, however, with a sly pleasantry, but he must give us none of his poetry." It is remarkable that Johnson and Churchill, however much they differed in desirous of being in company with my illustrious friend, while I, in my turn, was proud to have the honour of shewing one of my countrymen upon what easy terms Johnson permitted me to live with him.. Goldsmith, as usual, endeavoured, with too much eagerness, to shine, and disputed very warmly with Johnson against the well-known maxim of the British constitution, "the King can do no wrong;" affirming, that "What was morally false could not be politically true; and as the King might, in the exercise of his regal power, command and cause the doing of what was wrong, it certainly might be said, in sense and in reason, that he could do wrong.' JOHNSON: "Sir, you are to consider, that in our constitution, according to its true principles, the King the head, he is supreme; he is above every thing, and there is no power by which he can be tried. Therefore, it is, Sir, that we hold the King can do no wrong; that whatever may happen to be wrong in government may not be above our reach, by being ascribed to Majesty. Redress is always to be had against oppression, by punishing the immediate agents. The King, though he should command, cannot force a judge to condemn a man justly; therefore it is the judge whom we prosecute and punish. Political institutions are formed upon the consideration of what will most frequently tend to the good of the whole, although now and then exceptions may occur. Thus it is better in general that a nation should have a supreme legislative power, although it may at times be abused. And then, Sir, there is this consideration, that if the abuse be enormous, Nature will rise up, and claiming her original rights, overturn a corrupt political system. I mark this animated sentence with peculiar pleasure, as a noble instance of that truly dignified spirit of freedom which ever glowed in his heart, though he was charged with slavish tenets by superficial un. other points, agreed on this subject. See Churchill's Journey. It is, however, but justice to Dr. Ogilvie to observe, that his Day of Judg ment has no inconsiderable share of merit. B. observers; because he was at all times indignant against that false patriotism, that pretended love of freedom, that unruly restlessness, which is inconsistent with the stable authority of any good government. This generous sentiment, which he uttered with great fervour, struck me exceedingly, and stirred my blood to that pitch of fancied resistance, the possibility of which I am glad to keep in mind, but to which I trust I never shall be forced. "Great abilities," said he, 66 are not requisite for an historian; for in historical composition, all the greatest powers of the human mind are quiescent. He has facts ready to his hand; so there is no exercise of invention. Imagination is not required in any high degree; only about as much as is used in the lower kinds of poetry. Some penetration, accuracy, and colouring, will fit a man for the task, if he can give the application which is necessary." "Bayle's Dictionary is a very useful work for those to consult who love the biographical part of literature, which is what I love most. و, Talking of the eminent writers in Queen Anne's reign, he observed, "I think Dr. Arbuthnot the first man among them. He was the most universal genius, being an excellent physician, a man of deep learning, and a man of much humour. Mr. Addison was, to be sure, a great man ; his learning was not profound; but his morality, his humour, and his elegance of writing, set him very high." He Mr. Ogilvie was unlucky enough to choose for the topic of his conversation the praises of his native country. began with saying, that there was very rich land around Edinburgh. Goldsmith, who had studied physic there, contradicted this, very untruly, with a sneering laugh. Disconcerted a little by this, Mr. Ogilvie then took new ground, where, I suppose, he thought himself perfectly safe; for he observed, that Scotland had a great many noble wild prospects. JOHNSON: believe, Sir, you have a great many. Norway, too, has noble wild prospects; and Lapland is remarkable for prodigious noble wild prospects. But, Sir, let me "I |