Life of Johnson Volume II Part 78

169. Yet, in his _Life of Barretier_ (_Works_, vi. 380), he says:--'The first languages which he learnt were the French, German, and Latin, which he was taught, not in the common way, by a mult.i.tude of definitions, rules, and exceptions, which fatigue the attention and burden the memory, without any use proportionate to the time which they require and the disgust which they create. The method by which he was instructed was easy and expeditious, and therefore pleasing. He learnt them all in the same manner, and almost at the same time, by conversing in them indifferently with his father.'

[1227] Miss Aikin, better known as Mrs. Barbauld. Johnson uses _Presbyterian_ where we should use _Unitarian_. 'The Unitarians of the present day [1843] are the representatives of that branch of the early Nonconformists who received the denomination of Presbyterians; and they are still known by that name.' _Penny Cyclo_. xxvi. 6.

[1228] Oth.e.l.lo, act ii. sc. 1.

[1229] He quotes Barbauld's _Lessons for Children_ (p. 68, ed. of 1878).

Mrs. Piozzi (_Anec_. p. 16), speaking of books for children says:--'Mrs.

Barbauld had his best praise; no man was more struck than Mr. Johnson with voluntary descent from possible splendour to painful duty.' Mrs.

Piozzi alludes to Johnson's praise of Dr. Watts:--'Every man acquainted with the common principles of human action, will look with veneration on the writer, who is at one time combating Locke, and at another making a catechism for children in their fourth year. A voluntary descent from the dignity of science is perhaps the hardest lesson that humility can teach.' _Works_, viii. 384. He praised Milton also, who, when 'writing _Paradise Lost_, could condescend from his elevation to rescue children from the perplexity of grammatical confusion, and the trouble of lessons unnecessarily repeated.' _Ib_ vii. 99. Mrs. Barbauld did what Swift said Gay had shown could be done. 'One may write things to a child without being childish.' Swift's _Works_, xvii. 221. In her _Advertis.e.m.e.nt_, she says:--'The task is humble, but not mean; to plant the first idea in a human mind can be no dishonour to any hand.' 'Ethicks, or morality,'

wrote Johnson, 'is one of the studies which ought to begin with the first glimpse of reason, and only end with life itself.' _Works_, v.

243. This might have been the motto of her book. As the _Advertis.e.m.e.nt_ was not published till 1778 (Barbauld's _Works_, ii. 19) it is possible that Johnson's criticism had reached her, and that it was meant as an answer. Among her pupils were William Taylor of Norwich, Sir William Gell, and the first Lord Denman (_ib_. i. xxv-x.x.x). Mrs. Barbauld bore Johnson no ill-will. In her _Eighteen Hundred and Eleven_, she describes some future pilgrims 'from the Blue Mountains or Ontario's Lake,' coming to view 'London's faded glories.'

'With throbbing bosoms shall the wanderers tread The hallowed mansions of the silent dead, Shall enter the long aisle and vaulted dome Where genius and where valour find a home; Bend at each antique shrine, and frequent turn To clasp with fond delight some sculptured urn, The ponderous ma.s.s of Johnson's form to greet, Or breathe the prayer at Howard's sainted feet.'

_Ib_ i. 242.

[1230] According to Mme. D'Arblay he said:--'Sir, I shall be very glad to have a new sense _put into_ me.' He had been wont to speak slightingly of music and musicians. 'The first symptom that he showed of a tendency to conversion was upon hearing the following read aloud from the preface to Dr. Burney's _History of Music_ while it was yet in ma.n.u.script:--"The love of lengthened tones and modulated sounds seems a pa.s.sion implanted in human nature throughout the globe; as we hear of no people, however wild and savage in other particulars, who have not music of some kind or other, with which they seem greatly delighted." "Sir,"

cried Dr. Johnson after a little pause, "this a.s.sertion I believe may be right." And then, see-sawing a minute or two on his chair, he forcibly added:--"All animated nature loves music--except myself!"' _Dr. Burney's Memoirs_, ii. 77. Hawkins (_Life_, p. 319) says that Johnson said of music, '"it excites in my mind no ideas, and hinders me from contemplating my own." I have sometimes thought that music was positive pain to him. Upon his hearing a celebrated performer go through a hard composition, and hearing it remarked that it was very difficult, he said, "I would it had been impossible."' Yet he had once bought a flageolet, though he had never made out a tune. 'Had I learnt to fiddle,' he said, 'I should have done nothing else' (_post_, April 7, 1778, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 15, 1773). Not six months before his death he asked Dr. Burney to teach him the scale of music (_ante_, p. 263, note 4). That 'he appeared fond of the bagpipe, and used often to stand for some time with his ear close to the great drone' (Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 15), does not tell for much either way. In his _Hebrides_ (_Works_, ix. 55), he shews his pleasure in singing. 'After supper,' he writes, 'the ladies sung Erse songs, to which I listened, as an English audience to an Italian opera, delighted with the sound of words which I did not understand.' Boswell records (_Hebrides_, Sept.

28) that another day a lady 'pleased him much, by singing Erse songs, and playing on the guitar.' Johnson himself shews that if his ear was dull to music, it was by no means dead to sound. He thus describes a journey by night in the Highlands (_Works_, ix. l55):--'The wind was loud, the rain was heavy, and the whistling of the blast, the fall of the shower, the rush of the cataracts, and the roar of the torrent, made a n.o.bler chorus of the rough music of nature than it had ever been my chance to hear before.' In 1783, when he was in his seventy-fourth year, he said, on hearing the music of a funeral procession:--'This is the first time that I have ever been affected by musical sounds.' _Post_, 1780, in Mr. Langton's _Collection_.

[1231] Miss Burney, in 1778, records that he said:--'David, Madam, looks much older than he is; for his face has had double the business of any other man's; it is never at rest; when he speaks one minute, he has quite a different countenance to what he a.s.sumes the next; I don't believe he ever kept the same look for half-an-hour together in the whole course of his life; and such an eternal, restless, fatiguing play of the muscles must certainly wear out a man's face before its real time.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 64. Malone fathers this witticism on Foote. Prior's _Malone_, p. 369.

[1232] On Nov. 2 of this year, a proposal was made to Garrick by the proprietors of Covent-Garden Theatre, 'that now in the time of dearth and sickness' they should open their theatres only five nights in each week. _Garrick Corres_, ii. 108.

[1233] 'Mrs. Boswell no doubt had disliked his wish to pa.s.s over his daughters in entailing the Auchinleck estate, in favour of heirs-male however remote. _Post_, p. 414--Johnson, on Feb. 9, 1776, opposing this intention, wrote:--'I hope I shall get some ground now with Mrs. Boswell.'

[1234] Joseph Ritter, a Bohemian, who was in my service many years, and attended Dr. Johnson and me in our Tour to the Hebrides. After having left me for some time, he had now returned to me. BOSWELL. See _ante_, ii. 103.

[1235] See Boswell's _Hebrides_ near the end.

[1236] See _ante_, p. 383.

[1237] Mr. Croker says that he was informed by Boswell's grand-daughter, who died in 1836, that it had come to be p.r.o.nounced Auchinleck. The Rev.

James Chrystal, the minister of Auchinleck, in answer to my inquiry, politely informs me that 'the name "Affleck" is still quite common as applied to the parish, and even Auchinleck House is as often called Place Affleck as otherwise.'

[1238] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov. 4.

[1239] Acts of Parliament of Scotland, 1685, cap. 22. BOSWELL. c.o.c.kburn (_Life of Jeffrey_, i. 372) mentions 'the statute (11 and 12 Victoria, chap. 36) which dissolves the iron fetters by which, for about 160 years, nearly three-fourths of the whole land in Scotland was made permanently unsaleable, and unattachable for debt, and every acre in the kingdom might be bound up, throughout all ages, in favour of any heirs, or any conditions, that the caprice of each unfettered owner might be pleased to proscribe.'

[1240] As first, the opinion of some distinguished naturalists, that our species is transmitted through males only, the female being all along no more than a _nidus_, or nurse, as Mother Earth is to plants of every sort; which notion seems to be confirmed by that text of scripture, 'He was yet _in the loins of his_ FATHER when Melchisedeck met him' (Heb.

vii. 10); and consequently, that a man's grandson by a daughter, instead of being his _surest_ descendant as is vulgarly said, has in reality no connection whatever with his blood. And secondly, independent of this theory, (which, if true, should completely exclude heirs general,) that if the preference of a male to a female, without regard to primogeniture, (as a son, though much younger, nay, even a grandson by a son, to a daughter,) be once admitted, as it universally is, it must be equally reasonable and proper in the most remote degree of descent from an original proprietor of an estate, as in the nearest; because,--however distant from the representative at the time,--that remote heir male, upon the failure of those nearer to the _original proprietor_ than he is, becomes in fact the nearest male to _him_, and is, therefore, preferable as _his_ representative, to a female descendant.--A little extension of mind will enable us easily to perceive that a son's son, in continuation to whatever length of time, is preferable to a son's daughter, in the succession to an ancient inheritance; in which regard should be had to the representation of the original proprietor, and not to that of one of his descendants.

I am aware of Blackstone's admirable demonstration of the reasonableness of the legal succession, upon the principle of there being the greatest probability that the nearest heir of the person who last dies proprietor of an estate, is of the blood of the first purchaser. But supposing a pedigree to be carefully authenticated through all its branches, instead of mere _probability_ there will be a _certainty_ that _the nearest heir male, at whatever period_, has the same right of blood with the first heir male, namely, _the original purchaser's eldest son_. Boswell.

[1241] Boswell wrote to Temple on Sept. 2, 1775:--'What a discouraging reflection is it that my father has in his possession a renunciation of my birthright, which I _madly_ granted to him, and which he has not the generosity to restore now that I am doing beyond his utmost hopes, and that he may incommode and disgrace me by some strange settlements, while all this time not a shilling is secured to my wife and children in case of my death!' _Letters of Boswell_, p. 216.

[1242] The technical term in Roman law for a building in good repair.

[1243] Which term I applied to all the heirs male. Boswell.

[1244] A misprint for 1776.

[1245] I had reminded him of his observation mentioned, ii. 261.

BOSWELL.

[1246] The entail framed by my father with various judicious clauses, was settled by him and me, settling the estate upon the heirs male of his grandfather, which I found had been already done by my grandfather, imperfectly, but so as to be defeated only by selling the lands. I was freed by Dr. Johnson from scruples of conscientious obligation, and could, therefore, gratify my father. But my opinion and partiality of male succession, in its full extent, remained unshaken. Yet let me not be thought harsh or unkind to daughters; for my notion is, that they should be treated with great affection and tenderness, and always partic.i.p.ate of the prosperity of the family. BOSWELL.

[1247] Temple, in _Popular Discontents_ (_Works_, iii. 62-64), examines the general dissatisfaction with the judicature of the House of Lords.

Till the end of Elizabeth's reign, he states, the peers, who were few in number, were generally possessed of great estates which rendered them less subject to corruption. As one remedy for the evil existing in his time, he suggests that the Crown shall create no Baron, who shall not at the same time entail 4000 a year upon that honour, whilst it continues in his family; a Viscount, 5000; an Earl, 6000; a Marquis, 7000; and a Duke, 8000.

[1248] 'A cruel tyranny bathed in the blood of their Emperors upon every succession; a heap of va.s.sals and slaves; no n.o.bles, no gentlemen, no freeman, no inheritance of land, no strip of ancient families, [nullae stirpes antiquae].' Spedding _Bacon_, vii. 22.

[1249] 'Let me warn you very earnestly against scruples,' he wrote on March 5, of this year:--'I am no friend to scruples,' he had said at St.

Andrew's. Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 19. 'On his many, men miserable, but few men good.' Croker's _Boswell_, p. 844.

[1250] A letter to him on the interesting subject of the family settlement, which I had read. BOSWELL.

[1251] Paoli had given Boswell much the same advice. 'All this,' said Paoli, 'is melancholy. I have also studied metaphysics. I know the arguments for fate and free-will, for the materiality and immateriality of the soul, and even the subtle arguments for and against the existence of matter. _Ma lasciamo queste dispute ai oziosi_. But let us leave these disputes to the idle. _Io tengo sempre fermo un gran pensiero_. I hold always firm one great object. I never feel a moment of despondency.' Boswell's _Corsica_, ed. 1879, p. 193. See _post_, March 14, 1781.

[1252] Johnson, in his letters to the Thrales during the year 1775, mentions this riding-school eight or nine times. The person recommended was named Carter. Gibbon (_Misc. Works_, i. 72) says 'the profit of the _History_ has been applied to the establishment of a riding-school, that the polite exercises might be taught, I know not with what success, in the University.'

[1253] I suppose the complaint was, that the trustees of the Oxford Press did not allow the London booksellers a sufficient profit upon vending their publications. BOSWELL.

[1254] Cadell published _The False Alarm and The Journey to the Hebrides_. Gibbon described him as 'That honest and liberal bookseller.'

Stewart's _Life of Robertson,_ p. 366.

[1255] I am happy in giving this full and clear statement to the publick, to vindicate, by the authority of the greatest authour of his age, that respectable body of men, the Booksellers of London, from vulgar reflections, as if their profits were exorbitant, when, in truth, Dr. Johnson has here allowed them more than they usually demand.

[1256] 'Behind the house was a garden which he took delight in watering; a room on the ground-floor was a.s.signed to Mrs. Williams, and the whole of the two pair of stairs floor was made a repository for his books; one of the rooms thereon being his study. Here, in the intervals of his residence at Streatham, he received the visits of his friends, and to the most intimate of them sometimes gave not inelegant dinners.'

Hawkins's _Johnson_, p. 531. He wrote to Mrs. Thrale on Aug. 14, 1780:--'This is all that I have to tell you, except that I have three bunches of grapes on a vine in my garden: at least this is all that I will now tell of my garden.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 178. This house was burnt down in 1819. _Notes and Queries_, 1st S., v. 233.

[1257] He said, when in Scotland, that he was _Johnson of that Ilk_.

ROSWELL. See _post_, April 28, 1778, note.

[1258] See _ante_, ii. 229.

[1259] See vol. i. p. 375. BOSWELL. Boswell refers to the work of Dr.

Cohausen of Coblentz, _Hermippus Redivivus_. Dr. Campbell translated it (_ante_, i. 417), under the t.i.tle of _Hermippus Redivivus, or the Sage's Triumph over Old Age and the Grave_. Cohausen maintained that life might be prolonged to 115 years by breathing the breath of healthy young women. He founded his theory 'on a Roman inscription--_AEsculapio et Sanitati L. Colodius Hermippus qui vixit annos CXV. dies V. puellarum anhelitu_.' He maintained that one of the most eligible conditions of life was that of a Confessor of youthful nuns. _Lowndes's Bibl. Man_. p.

488, and _Gent. Mag_. xiii. 279. I. D'Israeli (_Curiosities of Literature_, ed. 1834, ii. 102) describes Campbell's book as a 'curious banter on the hermetic philosophy and the universal medicine; the grave irony is so closely kept up, that it deceived for a length of time the most learned. Campbell a.s.sured a friend it was a mere _jeu-d'-esprit_.'

Lord E. Fitzmaurice (_Life of Shelburne_, iii. 447) says that Ingenhousz, a Dutch physician who lived with Shelburne, combated in one of his works the notion held by certain schoolmasters, that 'it was wholesome to inhale the air which has pa.s.sed through the lungs of their pupils, closing the windows in order purposely to facilitate that operation.'

[1260] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 24.

[1261] The privilege of perpetuating in a family an estate and arms _indefeasibly_ from generation to generation, is enjoyed by none of his Majesty's subjects except in Scotland, where the legal fiction of _fine_ and _recovery_ is unknown. It is a privilege so proud, that I should think it would be proper to have the exercise of it dependent on the royal prerogative. It seems absurd to permit the power of perpetuating their representation, to men, who having had no eminent merit, have truly no name. The King, as the impartial father of his people, would never refuse to grant the privilege to those who deserved it. BOSWELL.

[1262] Boswell wrote to Temple about six weeks later:--'Murphy says he has read thirty pages of Smith's _Wealth_, but says he shall read no more; Smith, too, is now of our Club. It has lost its select merit.'

_Letters of Boswell_, p. 233. Johnson can scarcely have read Smith; if he did, it made no impression on him. His ignorance on many points as to what const.i.tutes the wealth of a nation remained as deep as ever.

[1263] Mr. Wedderburne. CROKER.