Life of Johnson Volume IV Part 54

[477] See _ante_, i. 441.

[478] Which I celebrated in the Church of England chapel at Edinburgh, founded by Lord Chief Baron Smith, of respectable and pious memory. BOSWELL.

[479] See _ante_, p. 80.

[480] The Reverend Mr. Temple, Vicar of St. Gluvias, Cornwall. BOSWELL.

See _ante_, i. 436, and ii. 316.

[481] 'He had settled on his eldest son,' says Dr. Rogers (_Boswelliana_, p. 129), 'the ancestral estate, with an unenc.u.mbered rental of l,600 a year.' That the rental, whatever it was, was not unenc.u.mbered is shewn by the pa.s.sage from Johnson's letter, _post_, p.

155, note 4. Boswell wrote to Malone in 1791 (Croker's _Boswell_, p.

828):--'The clear money on which I can reckon out of my estate is scarcely 900 a year.'

[482] Cowley's _Ode to Liberty_, Stanza vi.

[483] 'I do beseech all the succeeding heirs of entail,' wrote Boswell in his will, 'to be kind to the tenants, and not to turn out old possessors to get a little more rent.' Rogers's _Boswelliana, p. 186.

[484] Macleod, the Laird of Rasay. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. 8.

[485] A farm in the Isle of Skye, where Johnson wrote his Latin Ode to Mrs. Thrale. _Ib._ Sept. 6.

[486] Johnson wrote to Dr. Taylor on Oct. 4:--'Boswel's (sic) father is dead, and Boswel wrote me word that he would come to London for my advice. [The] advice which I sent him is to stay at home, and [busy]

himself with his own affairs. He has a good es[tate], considerably burthened by settlements, and he is himself in debt. But if his wife lives, I think he will be prudent.' _Notes and Queries_, 6th S.

v. 462.

[487] Miss Burney wrote in the first week in December:--'Dr. Johnson was in most excellent good humour and spirits.' She describes later on a brilliant party which he attended at Miss Monckton's on the 8th, where the people were 'superbly dressed,' and where he was 'environed with listeners.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 186, and 190. See _ante_, p.

108, note 4.

[488] See _ante,_, iii. 337, where Johnson got 'heated' when Boswell maintained this.

[489] See _ante_, in. 395.

[490] The greatest part of the copy, or ma.n.u.script of _The Lives of the Poets_ had been given by Johnson to Boswell (_ante_, iv. 36).

[491] Of her twelve children but these three were living. She was forty-one years old.

[492] 'The family,' writes Dr. Burney, 'lived in the library, which used to be the parlour. There they breakfasted. Over the bookcases were hung Sir Joshua's portraits of Mr. Thrale's friends--Baretti, Burke, Burney, Chambers, Garrick, Goldsmith, Johnson, Murphy, Reynolds, Lord Sandys, Lord Westcote, and in the same picture Mrs. Thrale and her eldest daughter.' Mr. Thrale's portrait was also there. Dr. Burney's _Memoirs_, ii. 80, and Prior's _Malone_, p. 259.

[493] _Pr. and Med._ p. 214. BOSWELL.

[494] Boswell omits a line that follows this prayer:--'O Lord, so far as, &c.,--Thrale.' This means, I think, 'so far as it might be lawful, I prayed for Thrale.' The following day Johnson entered:--'I was called early. I packed up my bundles, and used the foregoing prayer with my morning devotions, somewhat, I think, enlarged. Being earlier than the family, I read St. Paul's farewell in the _Acts_ [xx. 17-end], and then read fortuitously in the gospels, which was my parting use of the library.'

[495] Johnson, no doubt, was leaving Streatham because Mrs. Thrale was leaving it. 'Streatham,' wrote Miss Burney, on Aug. 12 of this year, 'my other home, and the place where I have long thought my residence dependent only on my own pleasure, is already let for three years to Lord Shelburne.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii.151. Johnson was not yet leaving the Thrale family, for he joined them at Brighton, and he was living with them the following spring in Argyll-street. Nevertheless, if, as all Mrs. Thrale's friends strongly held, her second marriage was blameworthy, Boswell's remark admits of defence. Miss Burney in her diary and letters keeps the secret which Mrs. Thrale had confided to her of her attachment to Mr. Piozzi; but in the _Memoirs of Dr. Burney_, which, as Mme. D'Arblay, she wrote long afterwards, she leaves little doubt that Streatham was given up as a step towards the second marriage.

In 1782, on a visit there, she found that her father 'and all others--Dr. Johnson not excepted--were cast into the same gulf of general neglect. As Mrs. Thrale became more and more dissatisfied with her own situation, and impatient for its relief, she slighted Johnson's counsel, and avoided his society.' Mme. D'Arblay describes a striking scene in which her father, utterly puzzled by 'sad and altered Streatham,' left it one day with tears in his eyes. Another day, Johnson accompanied her to London. 'His look was stern, though dejected, but when his eye, which, however shortsighted, was quick to mental perception, saw how ill at ease she appeared, all sternness subsided into an undisguised expression of the strongest emotion, while, with a shaking hand and pointing finger, he directed her looks to the mansion from which they were driving; and when they faced it from the coach-window, as they turned into Streatham Common, tremulously exclaimed, "That house ...is lost to _me_... for ever."' Johnson's letter to Langton of March 20, 1782 (_ante_, p. 145), in which he says that he was 'musing in his chamber at Mrs. Thrale's,' shews that so early as that date he foresaw that a change was coming. Boswell's statement that 'Mrs. Thrale became less a.s.siduous to please Johnson,'

might have been far more strongly worded. See Dr. Burney's _Memoirs_, ii. 243-253. Lord Shelburne, who as Prime Minister was negotiating peace with the United States, France, and Spain, hired Mrs. Thrale's house 'in order to be constantly near London.' Fitzmaurice's _Shelburne_, iii. 242.

[496] Mr. Croker quotes the following from the _Rose MSS_.:--'Oct. 6, Die Dominica, 1782. Pransus sum Streathamiae agninum crus coctum c.u.m herbis (spinach) comminutis, farcimen farinaceum c.u.m uvis pa.s.sis, lumbos bovillos, et pullum gallinae: Turcicae; et post carnes missas, ficus, uvas, non admodum maturas, ita voluit anni intemperies, c.u.m malis Persicis, iis tamen duris. Non laetus accubui, cib.u.m modice sumpsi, ne intemperantia ad extremum peccaretur. Si recte memini, in mentem venerunt epulae in exequiis Hadoni celebratae. Streathamiam quando revisam?'

[497] 'Mr. Metcalfe is much with Dr. Johnson, but seems to have taken an unaccountable dislike to Mrs. Thrale, to whom he never speaks.... He is a shrewd, sensible, keen, and very clever man.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 172, 174. He, Burke, and Malone were Sir Joshua's executors.

Northcote's _Reynolds_, ii. 293.

[498] Boswell should have shown, for he must have known it, that Johnson was Mrs. Thrale's guest at Brighton. Miss Burney was also of the party.

Her account of him is a melancholy one:--'Oct. 28. Dr. Johnson accompanied us to a ball, to the universal amazement of all who saw him there; but he said he had found it so dull being quite alone the preceding evening, that he determined upon going with us; "for," said he, "it cannot be worse than being alone."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii.

161. 'Oct. 29. Mr. Pepys joined Dr. Johnson, with whom he entered into an argument, in which he was so roughly confuted, and so severely ridiculed, that he was hurt and piqued beyond all power of disguise, and, in the midst of the discourse, suddenly turned from him, and, wishing Mrs. Thrale goodnight, very abruptly withdrew. Dr. Johnson was certainly right with respect to the argument and to reason; but his opposition was so warm, and his wit so satirical and exulting, that I was really quite grieved to see how unamiable he appeared, and how greatly he made himself dreaded by all, and by many abhorred.' _Ib_. p.

163. 'Oct. 30. In the evening we all went to Mrs. Hatsel's. Dr. Johnson was not invited.' _Ib_. p. 165. 'Oct. 31. A note came to invite us all, except Dr. Johnson, to Lady Rothes's.' _Ib_. p. 168. 'Nov. 2. We went to Lady Sh.e.l.ley's. Dr. Johnson again excepted in the invitation. He is almost constantly omitted, either from too much respect or too much fear. I am sorry for it, as he hates being alone.' _Ib_. p. 160. 'Nov.

7. Mr. Metcalfe called upon Dr. Johnson, and took him out an airing. Mr.

Hamilton is gone, and Mr. Metcalfe is now the only person out of this house that voluntarily communicates with the Doctor. He has been in a terrible severe humour of late, and has really frightened all the people, till they almost ran from him. To me only I think he is now kind, for Mrs. Thrale fares worse than anybody.' _Ib_. p. 177.

[499] '"Dr. Johnson has asked me," said Mr. Metcalfe, "to go with him to Chichester, to see the cathedral, and I told him I would certainly go if he pleased; but why I cannot imagine, for how shall a blind man see a cathedral?" "I believe," quoth I [i.e. Miss Burney] "his blindness is as much the effect of absence as of infirmity, for he sees wonderfully at times."' _Ib_. p. 174. For Johnson's eyesight, see _ante_, i. 41.

[500] The second letter is dated the 28th. Johnson says:--'I have looked _often_,' &c.; but he does not say 'he has been _much_ informed,' but only 'informed.' Both letters are in the _Gent. Mag._ 1784, p. 893.

[501] The reference is to Rawlinson's MS. collections for a continuation of Wood's _Athenae_ (Macray's _Annals of the Bodleian_, p. 181).

[502] Jortin's sermons are described by Johnson as 'very elegant.'

_Ante_, in. 248. He and Thirlby are mentioned by him in the _Life of Pope. Works_, viii. 254.

[503] Markland was born 1693, died 1776. His notes on some of Euripides'

_Plays_ were published at the expense of Dr. Heberden. Markland had previously destroyed a great many other notes; writing in 1764 he said:--'Probably it will be a long time (if ever) before this sort of learning will revive in England; in which it is easy to foresee that there must be a disturbance in a few years, and all public disorders are enemies to this sort of literature.' _Gent. Mag._ 1778, P. 3l0. 'I remember,' writes Mrs. Piozzi (_Anec_. p. 252), 'when lamentation was made of the neglect shown to Jeremiah Markland, a great philologist, as some one ventured to call him: "He is a scholar undoubtedly, Sir,"

replied Dr. Johnson, "but remember that he would run from the world, and that it is not the world's business to run after him. I hate a fellow whom pride, or cowardice, or laziness drives into a corner, and [who]

does nothing when he is there but sit and _growl_; let him come out as I do, and _bark_"' A brief account of him is given in the _Ann. Reg._ xix. 45.

[504] Nichols published in 1784 a brief account of Thirlby, nearly half of it being written by Johnson. Thirlby was born in 1692 and died in 1753. 'His versatility led him to try the round of what are called the learned professions.' His life was marred by drink and insolence.' His mind seems to have been tumultuous and desultory, and he was glad to catch any employment that might produce attention without anxiety; such employment, as Dr. Battie has observed, is necessary for madmen.' _Gent.

Mag._ 1784, pp. 260, 893.

[505] He was attacked, says Northcote (_Life of Reynolds_, ii. 131), 'by a slight paralytic affection, after an almost uninterrupted course of good health for many years.' Miss Burney wrote on Dec. 28 to one of her sisters:--'How can you wish any wishes [matrimonial wishes] about Sir Joshua and me? A man who has had two shakes of the palsy!' Mme.

D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 218.

[506] Dr. Patten in Sept. 1781 (Croker's _Boswell_, p. 699) informed Johnson of Wilson's intended dedication. Johnson, in his reply, said:--'What will the world do but look on and laugh when one scholar dedicates to another?'

[507] On the same day he wrote to Dr. Taylor:-'This, my dear Sir, is the last day of a very sickly and melancholy year. Join your prayers with mine, that the next may be more happy to us both. I hope the happiness which I have not found in this world will by infinite mercy be granted in another.' _Notes and Queries_, 6th S. v. 462.

[508] 'Jan. 4, 1783. Dr. Johnson came so very late that we had all given him up; he was very ill, and only from an extreme of kindness did he come at all. When I went up to him to tell how sorry I was to find him so unwell, "Ah," he cried, taking my hand and kissing it, "who shall ail anything when Cecilia is so near? Yet you do not think how poorly I am."

All dinner time he hardly opened his mouth but to repeat to me:--"Ah!

you little know how ill I am." He was excessively kind to me in spite of all his pain.' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii. 228. _Cecilia_ was the name of her second novel (_post_, May 26, 1783). On Jan. 10 he thus ended a letter to Mr. Nichols:--'Now I will put you in a way of shewing me more kindness. I have been confined by ilness (sic) a long time, and sickness and solitude make tedious evenings. Come sometimes and see, Sir,

'Your humble servant,

'SAM. JOHNSON.'

_MS_. in the British Museum.

[509] 'Dr. Johnson found here [at Auchinleck] Baxter's Anacreon, which he told me he had long inquired for in vain, and began to suspect there was no such book.' Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov.2. See _post_, under Sept. 29, 1783.

[510] 'The delight which men have in popularity, fame, honour, submission, and subjection of other men's minds, wills, or affections, although these things may be desired for other ends, seemeth to be a thing in itself, without contemplation of consequence, grateful and agreeable to the nature of man.' Bacon's _Nat. Hist._ Exper. No. 1000.

See _ante_, ii. 178.

[511] In a letter to Dr. Taylor on Jan. 21 of this year, he attacked the scheme of equal representation.' Pitt, on May 7, 1782, made his first reform motion. Johnson thus ended his letter:--'If the scheme were more reasonable, this is not a time for innovation. I am afraid of a civil war. The business of every wise man seems to be now to keep his ground.'