drews.'" ERSKINE. "Surely, Sir, Richardson is very tedious." JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, if you were to read Richardson for the story, your impatience would be so much fretted that you would hang yourself. But you must read him for the sentiment, and consider the story as only giving occasion to the sentiment." I have already given my opinion of Fielding; but I cannot refrain from repeating here my wonder at Johnson's excessive and unaccountable depreciation of one of the best writers that England has produced. "Tom Jones" has stood the test of public opinion with such success, as to have established its great merit, both for the story, the sentiments, and the manners, and also the varieties of diction, so as to leave no doubt of its having an animated truth of execution throughout. A book of travels, lately published under the title of Coriat Junior, and written by Mr. Paterson,' was mentioned. Johnson said, this book was an imitation of Sterne," and not of Coriat, whose name Paterson had chosen as a whimsical one. "Tom Coriat," said he, "was a humourist about the court of James the First. He had a mixture of learning, of wit, and of buffoonery. He first travelled through Europe, and published his travels. He afterwards travelled on foot through Asia, and had made many remarks; but he died at Mandoa, and his remarks were lost." We talked of gaming, and animadverted on it with severity. JOHNSON. "Nay, gentlemen, let us not aggravate the matter. It is not roguery to play with a man who is ignorant of the 1 Mr. Samuel Paterson, eminent for his knowledge of books. He was the son of a woollen-draper: he kept a bookseller's shop, chiefly for old books, and was afterwards an auctioneer; but seems to have been unsuccessful in all his attempts at business. He made catalogues of several celebrated libraries. He died in 1802, ætat 77.—Croker. 2 Mr. Paterson, in a pamphlet, produced some evidence to show that his work was written before Sterne's Sentimental Journey appeared. 3 Under the title of Crudities, hastily gobbled up in France, Savoy, Italy, Rhetia, Helvetia, &c. Coriat was born in 1577, educated at Westminster school and Oxford, and died in 1617, at Surat, after he had left Mandoa.-Croker. game, while you are master of it, and so win his money; for he thinks he can play better than you, as you think you can play better than he; and the superior skill carries it." ERSKINE. "He is a fool, but you are not a rogue." JOHNSON. "That's much about the truth, Sir. It must be considered, that a man who only does what every one of the society to which he belongs would do, is not a dishonest man. In the republic of Sparta it was agreed, that stealing was not dishonourable if not discovered. I do not commend a society where there is an agreement that what would not otherwise be fair, shall be fair; but I maintain, that an individual of any society, who practises what is allowed, is not a dishonest man." BOSWELL. "So then, Sir, you do not think ill of a man who wins perhaps forty thousand pounds in a winter?" JOHNSON. "Sir, I do not call a gamester a dishonest man; but I call him an unsocial man, an unprofitable man. Gaming is a mode of transferring property without producing any intermediate good. Trade gives employment to numbers, and so produces intermediate good." Mr. Erskine told us that, when he was in the island of Minorca, he not only read prayers, but preached two sermons to the regiment.' He seemed to object to the passage in scripture, where we are told that the angel of the Lord smote in one night forty thousand Assyrians." "Sir," said Johnson, "you should recollect that there was a supernatural interposition; they were destroyed by pestilence. You are not to suppose that the angel of the Lord went about and stabbed each of them with a dagger, or knocked them on the head, man by man." 1 Lord Erskine was fond of this anecdote. He told it to me the first time that I had the honour of being in his company, and often repeated it, boasting that he had been a sailor, a soldier, a lawyer, and a parson. The latter he affected to think the greatest of his efforts, and to support that opinion would quote the prayer for the clergy in the liturgy, from the expression of which he would (in no commendable spirit of jocularity) infer, that the enlightening them was one of the "greatest marvels" which could be worked.-Croker. 2 One hundred and eighty-five thousand. See Isaiah, xxxvii. 36, and 2 Kings, xix. 35.—Malone. After Mr. Erskine was gone, a discussion took place, whether the present Earl of Buchan, when Lord Cardross, did right to refuse to go secretary of the embassy to Spain, when Sir James Gray, a man of inferior rank, went ambassador. Dr. Johnson said, that perhaps in point of interest he did wrong; but in point of dignity he did well. Sir Alexander insisted that he was wrong; and said that Mr. Pitt intended it as an advantageous thing for him. "Why, Sir," said Johnson, "Mr. Pitt might think it an advantageous thing for him to make him a vintner, and get him all the Portugal trade: but he would have demeaned himself strangely, had he accepted of such a situation. Sir, had he gone secretary while his inferior was ambassador, he would have been a traitor to his rank and family." I talked of the little attachment which subsisted between near relations in London. "Sir," said Johnson, " in a country so commercial as ours, where every man can do for himself, there is not so much occasion for that attachment. No man is thought the worse of here, whose brother was hanged. In uncommercial countries, many of the branches of a family must depend on the stock; so, in order to make the head of the family take care of them, they are represented as connected with his reputation, that, self-love being interested, he may exert himself to promote their interest. You have, first, large circles, or clans; as commerce increases, the connection is confined to families; by degrees, that too goes off, as having become unnecessary, and there being few opportunities of intercourse. One brother is a merchant in the city, and another is an officer in the guards: how little intercourse can these two have!" I argued warmly for the old feudal system. Sir Alexander opposed it, and talked of the pleasure of seeing all men free and independent. JOHNSON. "I agree with Mr. Boswell, that there must be high satisfaction in being a feudal lord; but we are to consider, that we ought not to wish to have a number of men unhappy for the satisfaction of one." I maintained that numbers, namely, the vassals or followers, were not un happy; for that there was a reciprocal satisfaction between the lord and them, he being kind in his authority over them, they being respectful and faithful to him. On Thursday, April 9, I called on him to beg he would go and dine with me at the Mitre tavern. He had resolved not to dine at all this day. I know not for what reason; and I was so unwilling to be deprived of his company, that I was content to submit to suffer a want, which was at first somewhat painful; but he soon made me forget it: and a man is always pleased with himself when he finds his intellectual inclinations predominate. He observed, that to reason philosophically on the nature of prayer, was very unprofitable. Talking of ghosts, he said, he knew one friend, who was an honest man and a sensible man, who told him he had seen a ghost; old Mr. Edward Cave, the printer at St. John's Gate. He said, Mr. Cave did not like to talk of it, and seemed to be in great horror whenever it was mentioned. BOSWELL. "Pray, Sir, what did he say was the appearance?" JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, something of a shadowy being. I mentioned witches, and asked him what they properly meant. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, they properly mean those who make use of the aid of evil spirits." BoSWELL. “There is no doubt, Sir, a general report and belief of their having existed." JOHNSON. "You have not only the general report and belief, but you have many voluntary solemn confessions." He did not affirm anything positively upon a subject which it is the fashion of the times to laugh at as a matter of absurd credulity. He only seemed willing, as a candid inquirer after truth, however strange and inexplicable, to show that he understood what might be urged for it.' On Friday, April 10, I dined with him at General Oglethorpe's, where we found Dr. Goldsmith. 1 See this curious question treated by him with most acute ability, Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 3rd ed., p. 33. * James Edward Oglethorpe, the fourth son of Sir Theophilus Oglethorpe, of Godalming, Surrey, was born 1698, and after a life of varied Armorial bearings having been mentioned, Johnson said, they were as ancient as the siege of Thebes, which he proved by a passage in one of the tragedies of Euripides.1 I started the question, whether duelling was consistent with moral duty. The brave old general fired at this, and said, with a lofty air, "Undoubtedly a man has a right to defend his honour." GOLDSMITH (turning to me). "I ask you first, Sir, what would you do if you were affronted?" I answered, I should think it necessary to fight. "Why then," replied Goldsmith, "that solves the question." JOHNSON. “No, Sir, it does not solve the question. It does not follow, that what a man would do is therefore right." I said, I wished to have it settled, whether duelling was contrary to the laws of Christianity. Johnson immediately entered on the subject, and treated it in a masterly manner; and, so far as I have been able to recollect, his thoughts were these: "Sir, as men become in a high degree refined, various causes of offence arise; which are considered to be of such importance, that life must be staked to atone for them, though in reality they are not so. A body that has received a very fine polish may be easily hurt. Before men arrive at this artificial refinement, if one tells his neighbour-he lies, his neighbour tells him-he lies; if one gives his neighbour a blow, his neighbour gives him a blow; but in a state of highly polished society, an affront is held to be a serious injury. It must, therefore, be resented, or rather experience died, the oldest general officer in the British Army, June 30, Καὶ πρῶτα μὲν προσῆγε, κ. τ. λ. J. Boswell, jun. |