NOTES ON BOSWELL'S LIFE OF SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D.

(Continued from Vol. IX. p. 354.)

VOL. VII. p. 80. "THAT he was driven from the stage by Churchill," i. e. T. Davies. The lines in the Rosciad which we presume sealed Davies's fate, were

"With him came mighty Davies-on my life,
That Davies hath a very pretty wife;
Statesman all over; in plots famous grown-
He mouths a sentence, as curs mouth a bone."

P. 82. "Entertained us with his observations on Horace's villa, which he (Ramsay) had examined with great care." See a very interesting and entertaining work called, “Découverte de la Maison de Campagne d'Horace, par l'Abbé C. de Chausey," 3 vols. 1767.

P. 83. The Bishop said, "It appeared from Horace's writings that he was a cheerful, contented man." Johnson :-" We have no reason to believe that," &c. On this subject, listen to one who had studied Horace both as a scholar and a statesman. "Horace was a great man after all. In his Sermons you will find the deep and intense grief he felt for the state of the times; though externally he contrived to smile at it, yet it is a bitter smile." See Niebuhr's Reminiscences, p. 183, 8νο.

P. 90. "Modern Characters from Shakspeare, afterwards collected into a pamphlet." The book alluded to, is "Modern Characters from Shakspeare for 1778," 12mo. The last is that of "The Chevalier D'Eon."

"Question, my Lords, no further of the case,
How, or which way; too sure they found some place
But weakly guarded where the breach was made, -

Pucelle hath bravely played her part."

Hen. VI. Part I. act ii. sc. i. and act iii. sc. iii.

Subsequently a similar work was printed from Vortigern and Rowena, collected from the pages of the Morning Herald, where the characters first appeared, 1795, 3 vols.

P. 100. "Lord Shelburne told me that a man of high rank who looks into his own affairs may have all he ought to have, -all that can be of any use, or appear with any advantage, - for five thousand pounds a-year." Since this time the value of money has altered, and the wants and habits of life have increased and changed: a nobleman of very high authority in such matters in the present day, the Marquis of H - d, we have heard, fixes the income of a man of the highest rank at 40,0001. a-year.

P. 103. "Mr. Gibbon remarked that Mr. Fox could not be afraid of Dr. Johnson, yet he certainly was very shy of saying anything in Dr. Johnson's presence." Mr. Fox was rather a silent companion at table, as all accounts written and oral agree; see on this subject, Trotter's Memoirs, and the Life of Wilberforce, &c. We have heard Sir James Mackintosh say, "It was difficult to rouse him to converse on public and political subjects."

P. 116. "I really believed I should go and see the wall of China." "Sir, by doing so, you would do what would be of importance in raising your children to eminence," &c. Neither Boswell nor Johnson seemed to entertain any suspicion, that to see the wall of China would require a GENT. MAG. VOL. X.

3 A

passport which could never be granted. An interesting account of it may be seen in Bell's Travels from Petersburgh, 2 vols.

P. 122. "You, Sir, have a friend who deserves to be hanged!" (G. Steevens). Some very curious anecdotes of Steevens may be found in Nichols's Literary Illustrations, v. 427; in Miss Hawkins's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 18, 258 to 275; Boaden's Life of Kemble, i. 245; Garrick Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 361. It appears that from Steevens's conduct at the Jubilee, and his abuse of Garrick in the St. James's Chronicle, Garrick dropped his acquaintance. See Epitaph on Steevens by Hayley, in Censura Lit. x. p. 3. See also Dibdin's Bibliomania, and D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature, ed. 10th, p. 482.

P. 131. "Dr. Mayo asked Johnson's opinion of Soame Jenyns's View of the Internal Evidence of the Christian Religion. 'I think it a pretty book; not very theological, indeed," &c. On this pretty book, see Porteus's Exhort, to Good Friday, p. 15. "If Mr. S. Jenyns would reconsider and retouch a few passages of his book, in which, for want of a little close attention, the true spirit of the Gospel, and the true meaning of the sacred writers, seem to have escaped his usual penetration, it would add greatly to the value of his work, and establish on the firmest grounds that high reputation which, on account of its general good tendency, it has already so justly acquired." See also Benson's Hulsean Lectures, vol. i. p. 220. "Take up the small but valuable treatise of S. Jenyns, and you will find him casting the power and credibility of miracles into the shade, in order to build up in its stead his own favourite system of internal evidence." Henry Taylor (author of the "Apology of Benj. Ben Mordecai") published, "Full Answer to S. Jenyns's Internal Evidence of the Christian Religion," 1777. See also Quarterly Review, No. LXXVI. Art. i. p. 310, for an account of the Internal Evidence; see H. More's Character of St. Paul, vol. ii. p. 30, and H. More's Life, i. p. 309; ii. p. 94; iv. p. 206.

P. 134. "God may have this probability increased to certainty." The argument of Mr. Croker, in the note adjoined to this passage-" that to the eternal Creator there can be no futurity; and that God has already seen what man will choose to do"-is one that has been sanctioned by almost all the eminent writers on the subject of Prescience and Free Will. I will, however, confine myself to two of the earliest as well as ablest writers on this subject, in the language. "It may be conceived," (says Henry More, D. Dialogues, p. 60.) "that the evolution of ages from everlasting to everlasting is so collectedly and presentifically represented to God at once, as if all things which ever were, are, or shall be, were at this very instant, and so always, really present and existent before Him; which is no wonderthe animadversion and intellectual comprehension of God being absolutely infinite, according to the truth of his idea." "Secondly," (I quote Archbishop Bramhall, Works, p. 709.) "concerning the prescience of contingent things, in my poor judgment, the readiest way to reconcile contingencies and liberty with the decree and prescience of God, and most remote from the altercations of these times, is to subject future contingents to the aspect of God, according to that presentiality which they have in eternity." See also S. Jenyns's Free Enquiry, p. 227. "As all things are equally present to the Divine intention, it is impossible that he can foreknow or predestinate anything.'

"

Consult also Whately's Essays on the Writings of St. Paul on this subject, p. 110.

P. 136. "The fallacy of that book is, that Mandeville defines neither vices nor benefits." See on this work of Mandeville, Diary of a Lover of Literature, p. 97; Whately's Lectures on Political Economy, p. 45; Search's Light of Nature, vol. ii. p. 359; vol. vi. p. 127; Edinburgh Review, Sept. 1828, p. 173, (No. XCV.); Warburton on Miracles, p. 31; Piozzi's Anecdotes of Johnson, p. 87, 177. Dugald Stewart has also some remarks on Mandeville's fallacy, on which I cannot lay my hand at present.

P. 162. "It distressed me to think of going into a state of being in which Shakspeare's poetry did not exist." Boswell might have been relieved from this distress, if he had consulted Dr. Watts, who believed that we should not only read, but write books in another world, and attend lectures, &c. carrying on the system of human instruction in Heaven. See his Life by Southey.

P. 170. "Demosthenes Taylor." Mr. Nichols deserved the thanks of every scholar for his excellent collection of Dr. J. Taylor's Tracts, Sermons, &c. in 1 vol. 8vo. 1819, with notes by Dr. Parr. See also Nichols's Select Poems, vol. viii. p. 154-172; Brydges's Restituta, iv. p. 404-7; Bell's Fugitive Poetry, vol. 18, p. 87.

P. 189. "The more one reads it (Cowper's Homer) the better it seems." Croker. Yet Mr. Croker probably has always read Cowper's Homer in the amended edition, so inferior to the first, which Mr. Southey has judiciously substituted in his beautiful edition of the Poet's works.

P. 206. "How little does travelling supply to the conversation of any man who has travelled." Dugald Stewart has remarked the use of traveling in awakening attention to things casually and carelessly observed before.

P. 217. "Tradeswomen (tradesmen's wives) are the worst creatures upon earth, grossly ignorant, and thinking viciousness fashionable." This severe portrait of the bourgeoisie, though now totally incorrect, was so true in the days of James and Charles as to form the plots of innumerable comedies on their gallantry and infidelity. See also the court correspondence in Nichols's Progresses, &c. of King James I.

P. 224. "Thomson had one brother." Mr. Cunningham, the editor of Drummond, has collected many curious materials for a life of Thomson, and much information, we believe, that has been hitherto unknown; which we hope he will soon give to the public.

P. 236. "Johnson expressed great satisfaction at the publication of Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses," &c. On this subject, the reader may find Mengs' (the painter's) opinion of these discourses in his Works, vol. i. p. 53. On the contradictions and inconsistencies in Sir J. Reynolds's Discourses, see Hazlitt's Table Talk, p. 289 to 345. In an original edition of Sir J. Reynolds's Discourses, 4to. 1788, Mr. Orde has written as follows:-" I purchased it as a literary curiosity, being perhaps the only genuine uncorrected production of Sir Joshua's pen. The inaccuracies are not a little remarkable, considering the author has been esteemed a model of good writing. But, alas! his friend Dr. Johnson was now dead!" In several places Mr. Orde has noted the violations of grammatical propriety, and concludes by saying, "Surely this discourse is very ill written. It is now past a doubt how much he was indebted to his friend Johnson." Mr. Smith, the late keeper of Prints in the British Museum, told the writer of these notes, "that Sir Joshua used to write his lectures late at night, and Northcote (then his pupil) used to write them out fair for him; that Sir Joshua tore up and threw away the night copy, which Northcote, however, saved, who has many of them now."

P. 253.

Croker.

"At the altar I commended my Ө Ф,” i. c. ' θνητοι φιλοι.' "Thrale friends." J. М.

P. 263. "I believe H. Walpole was meant." Croker. Does it appear that Johnson was "several times" in company with H. Walpole? I think

not.

P. 277. "Prior." Some letters of Prior, hitherto unpublished, have lately appeared in Sir H. Bunbury's edition of Hanmer's Correspondence. P. 285. This authority of Lord Bathurst is in itself sufficient to prove that Pope understood and could relish Greek. Pope used frequently to repeat with great rapture the Greek lines which he had been translating. See hereafter, in our present Number, p. 382.

P. 321. "The Doctor then went on to speak of his (Beauclerk's) endowments," &c. In Mr. Wilkes's copy of Boswell's Johnson, in which a few MS. notes existed, he has written, "Lady - used to call Beauclerk Shy, sly, and dry.'"

P. 353. Mr. Langton asked him how he liked that paper? (one of his Ramblers). He shook his head and answered, "too wordy." Sce Coleridge's Table Talk, vol. ii. p. 274-" Johnson seems to have been really more powerful in discoursing viva voce than with his pen in his hand. It seemed as if the excitement of company called something like reality and consecutiveness into his reasonings, which in his writings I cannot see. His antitheses are almost always verbal only, and sentence after sentence in the Rambler may be pointed out, to which you cannot attach any definite meaning whatever.'

We will now give, by way of conclusion to this article, a specimen of the kind of attacks to which Johnson was exposed, from some of the scribblers of the day, and the nature of their accusations. The following is from a pamphlet called "A Defence of Mr. Kenrick's Review of Dr. Johnson's Shakspeare, &c. by a Friend. 1766." p. 12.

The following queries take in a further retrospect of Dr. Johnson's literary con

duct:

1. Who encouraged Lauder in his infamous attempt to charge the author of Paradise Lost with plagiarism from Masenius and others, clapping him on the back while he hopped about the town, exclaiming against that axacrable vellain John Milton?

2. Who was the manager and editor of the Gent. Mag. at that time, and kept out the papers written against Lauder for several months together; for which he afterwards apologized, when the imposition became flagrant, and the accuser himself, with unparalleled effrontery, confessed the forgery?

3. Who recommended such a modest gentleman to the Lords Chesterfield and Granville? who honoured him with their protection, and rewarded him with an annuity, till even Dr. Johnson's interest could not prevent his being ignominiously turned out of doors?

4. Who actually wrote Lauder's pamphlet against Milton ?

5. What motive could induce Dr. Johnson to endeavour in his Rambler to lessen the poetical reputation of the late Mr. Pope, by laboured criticisms on a few of the most admired passages in his writings, and in those only?

6. Who wrote the severe and carping criticisms on the Epitaphs of the same author ? -first published in the Visiter, and afterwards retailed in the magazines?

7. Who advised and assisted Mrs. Lennox to an attack on the greatest poet the world ever produced, and that in the most essential parts of his poetical character, in her Shakspeare illustrated?

8. Who wrote Dr. Johnson's New Dictionary of the English Language? 9. Whether Dr. Johnson ever read the Dictionary he is supposed to have written ? 10. Whether the capital improvement intended by that Dictionary was not the collection of the authorities for the illustration of the use of English Words ?

11. Whether these authorities and illustrations do not in many hundred places contradict the meaning of the words as given by the Lexicographer?

12. Whether the writer hath not almost always mistaken the very meaning of the words, when he has departed from former dictionaries?

13. Whether he has not, in a considerable number of instances, given the words without any meaning at all?

14. Who wrote the Proposals for publishing the last edition of Shakspeare, and who executed the work, and how?

15. Whether indolence be an excuse for not doing what a man hath publicly undertaken, and is well paid for?

16. Whether, if the above questions cannot be answered to the honour of Dr. Johnson, what right either he or his friends have to complain of the severity of the chastisement bestowed on him?

To these fulminations of spleen we add some queries extending to the conduct of Johnson's friends, as

1. Whether the Doctors Johnson and Hawkesworth have not long been in a secret and partial combination to applaud the writings and enhance the literary reputation of each other?

2. Whether the Gent. Mag. hath not, for many years past, been notoriously prostituted to this purpose?

3. Whether the Rambler and Adventurer, in their journey to the temple of Fame, were not obliged, like travellers that had but one horse between them, to ride and tie from month to month occasionally?

4. How many lines Dr. Johnson wrote in the Traveller for the awkward compliment paid him by its author in the Universal Museum, where he styled him "the glory of the English Nation?"

5. How many more he is to write in Goldsmith's next poem, for his scribbling nonsense on the cover of Mr. Kenrick's Review at the coffee-house; for his verses in the St. James's Chronicle of December 14; and for the favour he does the Reviewer in running about the town to abuse him?

This specimen of dulness and malice is sufficient. For this and other misdemeanors of the sort, Dr. Kenrick became immortalized in the poem of "Retaliation:" "Ye Kenricks, ye Kellys," &c.

A HISTORICAL DISQUISITION ON ALMANACS.

The learned appear by no means agreed respecting the etymology of the word Almanac; it has been, perhaps, the subject of more dispute than that of any term admitted into our language. Mr. Brady, in his "Clavis Calendaria," thinks Verstegan the most to be relied on:-"They," he says, alluding to our ancient Saxon ancestors, "used to engrave upon certaine squared sticks about a foot in length, or shorter or longer as they pleased, the courses of the moones of the whole yeere, whereby they could alwaies certainely tell when the new moones, full moones, and changes should happen, as also their festavall daies; and such a carved stick they called an al-monaght, that is to say, al-mon-heed, to wit, the regard or observation of all the moones, and here hence is derived the name of Almanack."

An instrument of this kind is pre

* We may refer, however, to the extracts from a Pocket-book of 1752, given in our number for February last, p. 150.-Edit.