Life of Johnson Volume II Part 29

That this pamphlet was written at the desire of those who were then in power, I have no doubt; and, indeed, he owned to me, that it had been revised and curtailed by some of them. He told me, that they had struck out one pa.s.sage, which was to this effect:--

'That the Colonists could with no solidity argue from their not having been taxed while in their infancy, that they should not now he taxed. We do not put a calf into the plow; we wait till he is an ox.'

He said, 'They struck it out either critically as too ludicrous, or politically as too exasperating. I care not which. It was their business. If an architect says, I will build five stories, and the man who employs him says, I will have only three, the employer is to decide.' 'Yes, Sir, (said I,) in ordinary cases. But should it be so when the architect gives his skill and labour _gratis_?'

Unfavourable as I am constrained to say my opinion of this pamphlet was, yet, since it was congenial with the sentiments of numbers at that time, and as everything relating to the writings of Dr. Johnson is of importance in literary history, I shall therefore insert some pa.s.sages which were struck out, it does not appear why, either by himself or those who revised it. They appear printed in a few proof leaves of it in my possession, marked with corrections in his own hand-writing. I shall distinguish them by _Italicks_.

In the paragraph where he says the Americans were incited to resistance by European intelligence from

'Men whom they thought their friends, but who were friends only to themselves[918],'

there followed,--

'_and made by their selfishness, the enemies of their country_'

And the next paragraph ran thus:--

'On the original contrivers of mischief, _rather than on those whom they have deluded_, let an insulted nation pour out its vengeance.'

The paragraph which came next was in these words:--

'_Unhappy is that country in which men can hope for advancement by favouring its enemies. The tranquillity of stable government is not always easily preserved against the machinations of single innovators; but what can be the hope of quiet, when factions hostile to the legislature can be openly formed and openly avowed?_'

After the paragraph which now concludes the pamphlet, there followed this, in which he certainly means the great Earl of Chatham[919], and glances at a certain popular Lord Chancellor[920].'

'_If, by the fortune of war, they drive us utterly away, what they will do next can only be conjectured. If a new monarchy is erected, they will want a KING. He who first takes into his hand the sceptre of America, should have a name of good omen. WILLIAM has been known both as conqueror and deliverer; and perhaps England, however contemned, might yet supply them with ANOTHER WILLIAM. Whigs, indeed, are not willing to be governed; and it is possible that KING WILLIAM may be strongly inclined to guide their measures: but Whigs have been cheated like other mortals, and suffered their leader to become their tyrant, under the name of their PROTECTOR. What more they will receive from England, no man can tell. In their rudiments of empire they may want a CHANCELLOR_.'

Then came this paragraph:--

'_Their numbers are, at present, not quite sufficient for the greatness which, in some form of government or other, is to rival the ancient monarchies; but by Dr. Franklin's rule of progression[921], they will, in a century and a quarter, be more than equal to the inhabitants of Europe. When the Whigs of America are thus multiplied, let the Princes of the earth tremble in their palaces. If they should continue to double and to double, their own hemisphere would not contain them. But let not our boldest oppugners of authority look forward with delight to this futurity of Whiggism_.'

How it ended I know not, as it is cut off abruptly at the foot of the last of these proof pages[922].

His pamphlets in support of the measures of administration were published on his own account, and he afterwards collected them into a volume, with the t.i.tle of _Political Tracts, by the Authour of the Rambler_, with this motto:--

'Fallitur egregio quisquis sub Principe credit Servitium; nunquam libertas gratior extat Quam sub Rege pio.' CLAUDIa.n.u.s[923].

These pamphlets drew upon him numerous attacks[924]. Against the common weapons of literary warfare he was hardened; but there were two instances of animadversion which I communicated to him, and from what I could judge, both from his silence and his looks, appeared to me to impress him much.

One was, _A Letter to Dr. Samuel Johnson, occasioned by his late political Publications_. It appeared previous to his _Taxation no Tyranny_, and was written by Dr. Joseph Towers[925]. In that performance, Dr. Johnson was treated with the respect due to so eminent a man, while his conduct as a political writer was boldly and pointedly arraigned, as inconsistent with the character of one, who, if he did employ his pen upon politics,

'It might reasonably be expected should distinguish himself, not by party violence and rancour, but by moderation and by wisdom.'

It concluded thus:--

'I would, however, wish you to remember, should you again address the publick under the character of a political writer, that luxuriance of imagination or energy of language will ill compensate for the want of candour, of justice, and of truth. And I shall only add, that should I hereafter be disposed to read, as I heretofore have done, the most excellent of all your performances, _The Rambler_, the pleasure which I have been accustomed to find in it will be much diminished by the reflection that the writer of so moral, so elegant, and so valuable a work, was capable of prost.i.tuting his talents in such productions as _The False Alarm_, the _Thoughts on the Transactions respecting Falkland's Islands_, and _The Patriot_'

I am willing to do justice to the merit of Dr. Towers, of whom I will say, that although I abhor his Whiggish democratical notions and propensities, (for I will not call them principles,) I esteem him as an ingenious, knowing, and very convivial man.

The other instance was a paragraph of a letter to me, from my old and most intimate friend, the Reverend Mr. Temple, who wrote the character of Gray, which has had the honour to be adopted both by Mr. Mason and Dr. Johnson in their accounts of that poet[927]. The words were,--

'How can your great, I will not say your _pious_, but your _moral_ friend, support the barbarous measures of administration, which they have not the face to ask even their infidel pensioner Hume to defend[926].'

However confident of the rect.i.tude of his own mind, Johnson may have felt sincere uneasiness that his conduct should be erroneously imputed to unworthy motives, by good men; and that the influence of his valuable writings should on that account be in any degree obstructed or lessened[928].

He complained to a Right Honourable friend[929] of distinguished talents and very elegant manners, with whom he maintained a long intimacy, and whose generosity towards him will afterwards appear[930], that his pension having been given to him as a literary character, he had been applied to by administration to write political pamphlets; and he was even so much irritated, that he declared his resolution to resign his pension. His friend shewed him the impropriety of such a measure, and he afterwards expressed his grat.i.tude, and said he had received good advice. To that friend he once signified a wish to have his pension secured to him for his life; but he neither asked nor received from government any reward whatsoever for his political labours[931].

On Friday, March 24, I met him at the LITERARY CLUB, where were Mr.

Beauclerk, Mr. Langton, Mr. Colman, Dr. Percy, Mr. Vesey, Sir Charles Bunbury, Dr. George Fordyce, Mr. Steevens, and Mr. Charles Fox. Before he came in, we talked of his _Journey to the Western Islands_, and of his coming away 'willing to believe the second sight[932],' which seemed to excite some ridicule. I was then so impressed with the truth of many of the stories of it which I had been told, that I avowed my conviction, saying, 'He is only _willing_ to believe: I _do_ believe. The evidence is enough for me, though not for his great mind. What will not fill a quart bottle will fill a pint bottle. I am filled with belief[933].' 'Are you? (said Colman,) then cork it up.'

I found his _Journey_ the common topick of conversation in London at this time, wherever I happened to be. At one of Lord Mansfield's formal Sunday evening conversations, strangely called _Levees_, his Lordship addressed me, 'We have all been reading your travels, Mr. Boswell.' I answered, 'I was but the humble attendant of Dr. Johnson.' The Chief Justice replied, with that air and manner which none, who ever saw and heard him, can forget, 'He speaks ill of n.o.body but Ossian.'

Johnson was in high spirits this evening at the club, and talked with great animation and success. He attacked Swift, as he used to do upon all occasions. The _Tale of a Tub_ is so much superiour to his other writings, that one can hardly believe he was the authour of it[934]: 'there is in it such a vigour of mind, such a swarm of thoughts, so much of nature, and art, and life[935].' I wondered to hear him say of _Gulliver's Travels_, 'When once you have thought of big men and little men, it is very easy to do all the rest.' I endeavoured to make a stand for Swift, and tried to rouse those who were much more able to defend him; but in vain. Johnson at last, of his own accord, allowed very great merit to the inventory of articles found in the pocket of the Man Mountain, particularly the description of his watch, which it was conjectured was his G.o.d, as he consulted it upon all occasions. He observed, that 'Swift put his name to but two things, (after he had a name to put,) _The Plan for the Improvement of the English Language_, and the last _Drapier's Letter_[936].'

From Swift, there was an easy transition to Mr. Thomas Sheridan.--JOHNSON. 'Sheridan is a wonderful admirer of the tragedy of _Douglas_, and presented its authour with a gold medal. Some years ago, at a coffee-house in Oxford, I called to him, "Mr. Sheridan, Mr.

Sheridan, how came you to give a gold medal to Home, for writing that foolish play[937]?" This, you see, was wanton and insolent; but I _meant_ to be wanton and insolent. A medal has no value but as a stamp of merit.

And was Sheridan to a.s.sume to himself the right of giving that stamp? If Sheridan was magnificent enough to bestow a gold medal as an honorary reward of dramatick excellence, he should have requested one of the Universities to choose the person on whom it should be conferred.

Sheridan had no right to give a stamp of merit: it was counterfeiting Apollo's coin[938].'

On Monday, March 27, I breakfasted with him at Mr. Strahan's. He told us, that he was engaged to go that evening to Mrs. Abington's benefit.

'She was visiting some ladies whom I was visiting, and begged that I would come to her benefit. I told her I could not hear: but she insisted so much on my coming, that it would have been brutal to have refused her.' This was a speech quite characteristical. He loved to bring forward his having been in the gay circles of life; and he was, perhaps, a little vain of the solicitations of this elegant and fashionable actress. He told us, the play was to be _The Hypocrite_, altered from Cibber's _Nonjuror_[939], so as to satirize the Methodists. 'I do not think (said he,) the character of _The Hypocrite_ justly applicable to the Methodists, but it was very applicable to the Nonjurors[940]. I once said to Dr. Madan[941], a clergyman of Ireland, who was a great Whig, that perhaps a Nonjuror would have been less criminal in taking the oaths imposed by the ruling power, than refusing them; because refusing them, necessarily laid him under almost an irresistible temptation to be more criminal; for, a man _must_ live, and if he precludes himself from the support furnished by the establishment, will probably be reduced to very wicked shifts to maintain himself[942].' BOSWELL. 'I should think, Sir, that a man who took the oaths contrary to his principles, was a determined wicked man, because he was sure he was committing perjury; whereas a Nonjuror might be insensibly led to do what was wrong, without being so directly conscious of it.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, a man who goes to bed to his patron's wife is pretty sure that he is committing wickedness.' BOSWELL. 'Did the nonjuring clergymen do so, Sir?' JOHNSON.

'I am afraid many of them did.'

I was startled at his argument, and could by no means think it convincing. Had not his own father complied with the requisition of government[943], (as to which he once observed to me, when I pressed him upon it, '_That_, Sir, he was to settle with himself,') he would probably have thought more unfavourably of a Jacobite who took the oaths:

'--had he not resembled My father as he _swore_--[944].'

Mr. Strahan talked of launching into the great ocean of London, in order to have a chance for rising into eminence; and, observing that many men were kept back from trying their fortunes there, because they were born to a competency, said, 'Small certainties are the bane of men of talents[945];' which Johnson confirmed. Mr. Strahan put Johnson in mind of a remark which he had made to him; 'There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money.' 'The more one thinks of this, (said Strahan,) the juster it will appear.'

Mr. Strahan had taken a poor boy from the country as an apprentice, upon Johnson's recommendation. Johnson having enquired after him, said, 'Mr.

Strahan, let me have five guineas on account, and I'll give this boy one. Nay, if a man recommends a boy, and does nothing for him, it is sad work. Call him down.'

I followed him into the court-yard[946], behind Mr. Strahan's house; and there I had a proof of what I had heard him profess, that he talked alike to all. 'Some people tell you that they let themselves down to the capacity of their hearers. I never do that. I speak uniformly, in as intelligible a manner as I can[947].'

'Well, my boy, how do you go on?' 'Pretty well, Sir; but they are afraid I an't strong enough for some parts of the business.' JOHNSON. 'Why I shall be sorry for it; for when you consider with how little mental power and corporeal labour a printer can get a guinea a week, it is a very desirable occupation for you. Do you hear,--take all the pains you can; and if this does not do, we must think of some other way of life for you. There's a guinea.'

Here was one of the many, many instances of his active benevolence. At the same time, the slow and sonorous solemnity with which, while he bent himself down, he addressed a little thick short-legged boy, contrasted with the boy's aukwardness and awe, could not but excite some ludicrous emotions[948].

I met him at Drury-lane play-house in the evening. Sir Joshua Reynolds, at Mrs. Abington's request, had promised to bring a body of wits to her benefit; and having secured forty places in the front boxes, had done me the honour to put me in the group. Johnson sat on the seat directly behind me[949]; and as he could neither see nor hear at such a distance from the stage, he was wrapped up in grave abstraction, and seemed quite a cloud, amidst all the sunshine of glitter and gaiety[950].

I wondered at his patience in sitting out a play of five acts, and a farce of two. He said very little; but after the prologue to Bon Ton[951]

had been spoken, which he could hear pretty well from the more slow and distinct utterance, he talked of prologue-writing, and observed, 'Dryden has written prologues superiour to any that David Garrick has written; but David Garrick has written more good prologues than Dryden has done.

It is wonderful that he has been able to write such variety of them[952].'

At Mr. Beauclerk's, where I supped, was Mr. Garrick, whom I made happy with Johnson's praise of his prologues; and I suppose, in grat.i.tude to him, he took up one of his favourite topicks, the nationality of the Scotch, which he maintained in a pleasant manner, with the aid of a little poetical fiction. 'Come, come, don't deny it: they are really national. Why, now, the Adams[953] are as liberal-minded men as any in the world: but, I don't know how it is, all their workmen are Scotch. You are, to be sure, wonderfully free from that nationality: but so it happens, that you employ the only Scotch shoe-black in London.' He imitated the manner of his old master with ludicrous exaggeration; repeating, with pauses and half-whistlings interjected,

'_Os homini sublime dedit,--calumque tueri Jussit,--et erectos ad sidera--tollere vultus_[954]';