When Johnson saw some young ladies in Lincolnshire who were remarkably well behaved, owing to their mother's strict discipline and severe correction, he exclaimed, in one of Shakspeare's lines, a little varied 1, "Rod, I will honour thee for this thy duty."

Piozzi,

p. 21.

he maintained with so much dignity in his march through life, was not assumed from vanity and ostentation, but was the natural and constant effect of those extraordinary powers of mind, of which he could not but be conscious by comparison; the intellectual difference, which in other cases of [Yet when talking of a young fel- comparison of characters, is often a matter low, who used to come often to Mr. of undecided contest, being as clear in his Thrale's house, who was about case as the superiority of stature in some fifteen years old or less, and had a manner men above others. Johnson did not strut at once sullen and sheepish-"That lad or stand on tip-toe; he only did not stoop. (said Johnson) looks like the son of a From his earliest years, his superiority was schoolmaster; which (added he) is one of perceived and acknowledged. the very worst conditions of childhood; from the beginning Avaz avdgar, a king of. His schoolfellow, Mr. Hector, has such a boy has no father, or worse than men. none; he never can reflect on his parent obligingly furnished me 2 with many parbut the reflection brings to his mind some ticulars of his boyish days; and assured me idea of pain inflicted, or of sorrow suffered." that he never knew him corrected3 at He was, indeed, himself exceed-school, but for talking and diverting other Piozzi, ingly disposed to the general. boys from their business. He seemed to indulgence of children, and was learn by intuition; for though indolence X even scrupulously and ceremoniously atten- and procrastination were inherent in his tive not to offend them: he had strongly constitution, whenever he made an exertion persuaded himself of the difficulty people he did more than any one else. In short, always find to erase early impressions, either he is a memorable instance of what has. of kindness or resentment, and said, "he been often observed, that the boy is the should never have so loved his mother man in miniature; and that the distinguishwhen a man, had she not given him coffee ing characteristicks of each individual are she could ill afford, to gratify his appetite the same, through the whole course of life. when a boy." "If you had had children, His favourites used to receive very liberal sir," said Mrs. Piozzi, "would you have assistance from him; and such was the taught them any thing?" "I hope (replied submission and deference with which he ne) that I should have willingly lived on was treated, such the desire to obtain his bread and water to obtain instruction for regard, that three of the boys, of whom them; but I would not have set their future Mr. Hector was sometimes one, used to friendship to hazard for the sake of thrust-come in the morning as his humble attending into their heads knowledge of things for which they might not perhaps have either taste or necessity. You teach your daughters the diameters of the planets, and wonder when you have done that they do not delight in your company. No science can be communicated by mortal creatures without attention from the scholar; no attention can be obtained from children without the infliction of pain, and pain is never remembered without resentment." That something should be learned was, however, so certainly his opinion, that Mrs. Piozzi heard him say, that education had been often compared to agriculture, yet that it resembled it chiefly in this: "that if nothing is sown, no crop can be obtained."]

[It is to be hoped that Mr. Boswell was mistaken as to the sex and age of the children: the idea of disciplining young ladies by the rod is absurd and disgusting.-ED.]

VOL. I.

3

of his intellectual powers alone; but they who remember what boys are, and who consider that Johnson's corporeal prowess was by no means despicable, will be apt to suspect that the homage was enforced, at least as much by awe of the one as by admiration of the other."-Anderson's Life of Johnson.-ED.]

a scholar as Johnson; and this was said | (adds his lordship) spending part of a sum

but of one-but of Lowe1; and I do not think he was as good a scholar."

mer at my parsonage-house in the country, he chose for his regular reading the old Spanish romance of FELIXMARTE OF HIR CANIA, in folio, which he read quite througn Yet I have heard him attribute to these ex travagant fictions that unsettled turn of mind which prevented his ever fixing in any profession."

Hawk.

p. 8.

He discovered a great ambition to excel, which roused him to counteract his indolence. He was uncommonly inquisitive; and his memory was so tenacious, that he never forgot any thing that he either heard or read. Mr. Hector remembers having recited to him eighteen verses, which, after a little [In the autumn of the year 1725, pause, he repeated verbatim, varying only he received an invitation from his one epithet, by which he improved the line. uncle 4, Cornelius Ford, to spend a He never joined with the other boys in few days with him at his house, which I their ordinary diversions: his only amuse- conjecture to have been on a living of his ment was in winter, when he took a plea- in one of the counties bordering upon Stafsure in being drawn upon the ice by a boy fordshire; but it seems that the uncle, disbarefooted, who pulled him along by a gar- covering that the boy was possessed of unter fixed round him; no very easy operation, common parts, was unwilling to let him reas his size was remarkably large. His de- turn, and to make up for the loss he might fective sight, indeed, prevented him from sustain by his absence from school, became enjoying the common sports; and he once his instructor in the classics, and farther aspleasantly remarked to me, "how wonder-sisted him in his studies; so that it was not fully well he had contrived to be idle without them." Lord Chesterfield, however, has justly observed in one of his letters, when earnestly cautioning a friend against the pernicious effects of idleness, that active sports are not to be reckoned idleness in young people; and that the listless torpor of doing nothing alone deserves that name. Of this dismal inertness of disposition, Johnson had all his life too great a share. Mr. Hector relates, that "he could not oblige him more than by sauntering away the hours of vacation in the fields, during which he was more engaged in talking to himself than to his companion." [Mr. Hector concludes by saying, "After a long absence from Lichfield, when he returned I was apprehensive of something wrong in his constitution, which might either impair his intellect or endanger his life, but, thanks to Almighty God, my fears have proved false."].

Hawk. p. 8.

Dr. Percy, the Bishop of Dromore, who was long intimately acquainted with him, and has preserved a few anecdotes concerning him, regretting that he was not a more diligent collector, informs me, that "when a boy he was immoderately fond of reading romances of chivalry, and he retained his fondness for them through life 3; so that

till the Whitsuntide following, that Johnson went back to Lichfield. Whether Mr. Hunter was displeased to find a visit of a few days protracted into a vacation of many months, or that he resented the interference of another person in the tuition of one of his scholars, and he one of the most promising of any under his care, cannot now be known; but, it seems, that at Johnson's return to Lichfield, he was not received into the school of that city;] and he was, at the age of fifteen, removed to the school of Stourbridge, in Worcestershire, of which Mr. Wentworth was then master.

This step was taken by the advice of his cousin, the Rev. Mr. Ford, a man in whom both talents and good dispositions were disgraced by licentiousness-(he is said to be the original of the parson in Hogarth's Modern Midnight Conversation 5)-but who

was for exercise in the language, and he took no pleasure in the work itself.-ED.]

kins, was his cousin-german, being the son of Dr. * Cornelius Ford, according to Sir John HawJoseph [Q. Nathanael?] Ford, an eminent phy sician, who was brother to Johnson's mother.— MALONE. [Sir John Hawkins, in this passage of his first edition, distinctly calls Cornelius Ford his uncle, as Boswell also does, but it was probably an error, as Hawkins corrected it in the second edition to cousin.-ED.]

5 [This fact has been doubted; but the blameable levity of his character, Johnson himself admits. In his Life of Fenton, he mentions" Ford, a clergyman at that time too well known, whose abilities, instead of furnishing convivial merriment to the voluptuous and dissolute, might have enabled him to excel among the virtuous and the wise." In the Historical Register for 1731, we find, "Died Aug. 22, the Rev. Mr. Ford, well known to the world for his great wit and abilities." And the Gentleman's Magazine of the same date states that he was "esteemed for his polite and agreeable conversation." Mr. Murphy asserts

p. 10.

Hawk.

p. 9.

was a very able judge of what was right. | two years, in a state very unworthy his [Johnson always spoke of his cousin uncommon abilities. [His father Piozzi, to Mrs. Piozzi with tenderness, prais- was for some time at a loss how to ing his acquaintance with life and dispose of him: he probably had a manners, and recollecting one piece of ad- view to bring him up to his own trade; for vice that no man surely ever followed more Sir J. Hawkins heard Johnson say, that he exactly: "Obtain (says Ford) some general himself was able to bind a book.] He had principles of every science; he who can talk already given several proofs of his poetical only on one subject, or act only in one depart- genius, both in his school-exercises and in ment, is seldom wanted and perhaps never other occasional compositions. Of these I wished for; while the man of general know- have obtained a considerable collection, by ledge can often benefit and always please." the favour of Mr. Wentworth, son of one He used to relate, however, another story of his masters, and of Mr. Hector, his less to the credit of his cousin's penetration, schoolfellow and friend; from which I select how Ford on some occasion said to him, some specimens [which will be found in the "You will make your way more easily in Appendix]. the world, I see, as you are contented to dispute no man's claim to conversation excellence; they will, therefore, more willingly allow your pretensions as a writer."

At the school of Stourbridge he did not receive so much benefit as was expected. It has been said, that he acted in the capacity of an assistant to Mr. Wentworth in teaching the younger boys. "Mr. Went worth (he told me) was a very able man, but an idle man, and to me very severe; but I cannot blame him much. I was then a big boy; he saw I did not reverence him; and that he should get no honour by me. I had brought enough with me, to carry me through; and all I should get at his school would be ascribed to my own labour, or to my former master. Yet he taught me a great deal.”

He thus discriminated, to Dr. Percy, Bishop of Dromore, his progress at his two grammar-schools. "At one [Lichfield], I learned much in the school, but little from the master; in the other [Stourbridge], I learnt much from the master, but little in the school."

The two years which he spent at home, after his return from Stourbridge, he passed in what he thought idleness, and was scolded by his father for his want of steady application. He had no settled plan of life, nor looked forward at all, but merely lived from day to day. Yet he read a great deal in a desultory manner, without any scheme of study, as chance threw books in his way, and inclination directed him through them. He used to mention one curious instance of his casual reading, when but a boy. Having imagined that his brother had hid some apples behind a large folio upon an upper shelf in his father's shop, he climbed up to search for them. There were no apples; but the large folio proved to be Petrarch2, whom he had seen mentioned, in some preface, as one of the restorers of learning. His curiosity having been thus excited, he sat down with avidity, and read a great part of the book. What he read during these two years, he told me, was not works of mere amusement, "not voyages and travels, but all literature, sir, all ancient writers, all manly: though but little Greek, only some of Anacreon and Hesiod: but in this irregular manner (added he) I had looked into a great many books, which were not commonly known at the Universities, where they seldom read any books but what are put into their hands by their tutors; so that when I came to Oxford, Dr. Adams, now master of Pembroke College, told me, I was the best qualified for the University that he had ever known come there."

The bishop also informs me that "Dr. Johnson's father, before he was received at Stourbridge, applied to have him admitted as a scholar and assistant to the Rev. Samuel Lea, M. A., head-master of Newport school, in Shropshire (a very diligent good teacher, at that time in high reputation, under whom Mr. Hollis is said, in the Memoirs of his Life, to have been also educated). This application to Mr. Lea was not successful; but Johnson had afterwards the gratification to hear that the old gentle- In estimating the progress of his mind man, who lived to a very advanced age, during these two years, as well as in future mentioned it as one of the most memorable periods of his life, we must not regard his events of his life, that he was very near hav-own hasty confession of idleness; for we ing that great man for his scholar."

He remained at Stourbridge little more than a year, and then he returned home, where he may be said to have loitered, for

that he was chaplain to Lord Chesterfield, but gives no authority.-ED.]

As was likewise the Bishop of Dromore many years afterwards.-BOSWELL.

see, when he explains himself, that he was acquiring various stores; and, indeed, he himself concluded the account, with saying,

2 [This was probably the folio edition of Petrarch's Opera Omnia quæ extant, Bas. 1554 It could have been only the Latin works that Johnson read, as there is no reason to suppose that he was, at this period, able to read Italian.-ED.]

"I would not have you think I was doing nothing then." He might, perhaps, have studied more assiduously; but it may be doubted, whether such a mind as his was not more enriched by roaming at large in the fields of literature, than if it had been confined to any single spot. The analogy between body and mind is very general, and the parallel will hold as to their food, as well as any other particular. The flesh of animals who feed excursively is allowed to have a higher flavour than that of those who are cooped up. May there not be the same difference between men who read as their taste prompts, and men who are confined in cells and colleges to stated tasks 1?

That a man in Mr. Michael Johnson's circumstances should think of sending his son to the expensive university of Oxford, at his own charge, seems very improbable. The subject was too delicate to question Johnson upon; but I have been assured by Dr. Taylor, that the scheme never would have taken place, had not a gentleman of Shropshire, one of his schoolfellows, spontaneously undertaken to support him at Oxford, in the character of his companion: though, in fact, he never received any sistance whatever from that gentleman.

Hawk. p. 9, 10.

an agreement, during his continuance at college, to pay for his commons 2.]

He, however, went to Oxford, and was entered a commoner of Pembroke College, on the 31st of October, 1728, being then in his nineteenth year.

The Reverend Dr. Adams, who afterwards presided over Pembroke College with universal esteem, told me he was present, and gave me some account of what passed on the night of Johnson's arrival at Oxford. On that evening, his father, who had anxiously accompanied him, found means to have him introduced to Mr. Jorden, who was to be his tutor. His being put under any tutor, reminds us of what Wood says of Robert Burton, authour of the "Anatomy of Melancholy," when elected student of Christ-church; "for form's sake, though he wanted not a tutor, he was put under the tuition of Dr. John Bancroft, afterwards Bishop of Oxon 3."

His father seemed very full of the merits of his son, and told the company he was a good scholar, and a poet, and wrote Latin verses. His figure and manner appeared strange to them; but he behaved modestly, and sat silent, till upon something which as-occurred in the course of conversation, he suddenly struck in and quoted Macrobius; and thus he gave the first impression of that more extensive reading in which he had indulged himself.

[Sir John Hawkins, thus states this circumstance: A neighbouring gentleman, Mr. Andrew Corbett, having a son, who had been educated in the same school with Johnson, whom he was about to send to Pembroke College in Oxford, a proposal was made and accepted, that Johnson should attend this son thither, in quality of assistant in his studies; and accordingly, on the 31st day of October, 1728, they were both entered, Corbett as a gentleman commoner, and Johnson as a commoner. Whether it was discouragement in the outset of their studies, or any other ground of disinclination that moved him to it, is not known, but this is certain, that young Corbett could not brook submission to a man who seemed to be little more learned than himself, and that having a father living, who was able to dispose of him in various other ways, he, after about two years' stay, left the college, and went home. But the case of Johnson was far different; his fortunes were at sea; his title to a stipend was gone, and all that he could obtain from the father of Mr. Corbett was

1 1 [Dr. Johnson's prodigious memory and talents enabled him to collect from desultory reading a vast mass of general information; but he was in no science, and indeed we might almost say in no branch of literature, what is usually called a profound scholar-that character is only to be earned by laborious study; and Mr. Boswell's fanciful allusion to the flavour of the flesh of animals seems fallacious, not to say foolish.-ED.]

His tutor 4, Mr. Jorden, fellow of Pembroke,

Andrew

2 [Mr. Murphy, in his Life of Johnson, follows Hawkins; but the date of Mr. Corbett's entry into and retirement from college does not tally with either Boswell's or Hawkins's account. Corbett appears, from the books of Pembroke admitted 24th February, 1727, and his name was College (as Dr. Hall informs me), to have been removed from the books February 21, 1732: so that, as Johnson entered in Oct. 1728, and does not appear to have returned after Christmas, 1729, Corbett was of the University twenty months before, and twelve or thirteen months after Johnson. And, on reference to the college books, it appears that Corbett's residence was so irregular, and so little coincident with Johnson's, that there is no reason to suppose that Johnson was employed either as the private tutor of Corbett, as Hawkins states, or his companion, as Boswell suggests.—ED.]

Athen. Oxon. edit. 1721, i. 627.—Boswell. 4 [There are, as Dr. Hall observes to me, many small errors in Mr. Boswell's account of Johnson's college life, and particularly as to the relation between him and Mr. Jorden. It is not the custom at Pembroke to assign particular tutors to in dividual students. There are two college tutors appointed for the whole. Mr. Jorden was therefore no more the tutor of Johnson than of any other student, and Johnson was equally the pupil of the other college tutor; though, as the latter was probably the tutor in mathematics, it seems likely that Johnson did not pay him much atten