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already repeated in so many books and pamphlets, that 'tis perhaps scarcely worth while to write down the conversation between him and a friend of that nation who always resides in London, and who at his return from the Hebrides asked him, with a firm tone of voice, What he thought of his country? 'That it is a very vile country to be sure, Sir',' (returned for answer Dr. Johnson.) Well, Sir! replies the other somewhat mortified, God made it. 'Certainly he did (answers Mr. Johnson again); but we must always remember that he made it for Scotchmen, and comparisons are odious, Mr. S-2; but God made hell.'

Dr. Johnson did not I think much delight in that kind of conversation which consists in telling stories: 'every body (said he) tells stories of me, and I tell stories of nobody 3. I do not recollect (added he), that I have ever told you, that have been always favourites, above three stories; but I hope I do not play the Old Fool, and force people to hear uninteresting narratives, only because I once was diverted with them myself.' He was [not] however an enemy to that sort of talk from the famous Mr. Foote, 'whose happiness of manner in relating was such (he said) as subdued arrogance and roused stupidity: His stories were truly like those of Biron in Love's Labour Lost 5, so very attractive,

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That aged ears play'd truant with [at] his tales,
And younger hearings were quite ravish'd;
So sweet and voluble was his discourse.

'Seeing Scotland,' said Johnson, 'is only seeing a worse England. It is seeing the flower gradually fade away to the naked stalk.' Life, iii. 248.

Perhaps Mr. Strahan.

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'Of all conversers however (added he), the late Hawkins Browne was the most delightful with whom I ever was in company his talk was at once so elegant, so apparently artless, so pure, and so pleasing, it seemed a perpetual stream of sentiment, enlivened by gaiety, and sparkling with images '.' When I asked Dr. Johnson, who was the best man he had ever known? 'Psalmanazar,' was the unexpected reply: he said, likewise, 'that though a native of France, as his friend imagined, he possessed more of the English language than any one of the other foreigners who had separately fallen in his way. Though there was much esteem however, there was I believe but little confidence between them; they conversed merely about general topics, religion and learning, of which both were undoubtedly stupendous examples; and, with regard to true Christian perfection, I have heard Johnson say, 'that George Psalmanazar's piety, penitence, and virtue exceeded almost what we read as wonderful even in the lives of saints ".'

I forget in what year it was that this extraordinary person lived and died at a house in Old-street 3, where Mr. Johnson was witness to his talents and virtues, and to his final preference of the church of England, after having studied, disgraced, and adorned so many forms of worship. The name he went by, was

I

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'Isaac Hawkins Browne,' said Johnson, one of the first wits of this country, got into Parliament and never opened his mouth.' Life, ii. 339. 'Dr. Johnson told us that Browne drank freely for thirty years, and that he wrote his poem De Animi Immortalitate in some of the last of these years.' Ib. v. 156. 'The pretty Mrs. Cholmondely said she was soon tired of him, because the first hour he was so dull there was no bearing him; the second he was so witty there was no bearing him; the third he was so drunk there was no bearing him.' Hayward's Piozzi, i. 294. See Letters, ii. 324, n. 1, for his gluttony, and Campbell's British Poets for specimens of his verses.

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not supposed by his friend to be that of his family, but all enquiries were vain; his reasons for concealing his original were penitentiary; he deserved no other name than that of the impostor, he said. That portion of the Universal History' which was written by him, does not seem to me to be composed with peculiar spirit, but all traces of the wit and the wanderer were probably worn out before he undertook the work.-His pious and patient endurance of a tedious illness, ending in an exemplary death, confirmed the strong impression his merit had made upon the mind of Mr. Johnson. It is so very difficult (said he, always) for a sick man not to be a scoundrel3. Oh! set the pillows soft, here is Mr. Grumbler o'coming: Ah! let no air in for the world, Mr. Grumbler will be here presently.'

This perpetual preference is so offensive where the privileges of sickness are besides supported by wealth, and nourished by dependence, that one cannot much wonder that a rough mind is revolted by them. It was however at once comical and touchant* (as the French call it), to observe Mr. Johnson so habitually watchful against this sort of behaviour, that he was often ready to suspect himself of it; and when one asked him gently, how he did? Ready to become a scoundrel, Madam (would commonly be the answer): with a little more spoiling you will, I think, make me a complete rascal 5.

His desire of doing good was not however lessened by his aversion to a sick chamber: he would have made an ill man well

Mrs. Piozzi means, I suppose, 'penitential.' To his concealment he thought himself obliged, he says, 'out of respect to his country and family.' The excuse seems unsatisfactory, for he tells enough to shew that he came from the South of France, while for his family there was no need of care. It was, he writes, 'ancient but decayed,' and he was the only surviving child. Of his father and mother he had heard nothing since he started on the career of a pious rogue. They must

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by any expence or fatigue of his own, sooner than any of the canters. Canter indeed was he none: he would forget to ask people after the health of their nearest relations, and say in excuse, That he knew they did not care: why should they? (says he :) every one in this world has as much as they can do in caring for themselves, and few have leisure really to think of their neighbours distresses, however they may delight their tongues with talking of them '.'

The natural depravity of mankind and remains of original sin were so fixed in Mr. Johnson's opinion, that he was indeed a most acute observer of their effects; and used to say sometimes, half in jest half in earnest, that they were the remains of his old tutor Mandeville's instructions 3. As a book however, he took care always loudly to condemn the Fable of the Bees, but not without adding, 'that it was the work of a thinking man.'

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I have in former days heard Dr. Collier of the Commons loudly condemned for uttering sentiments, which twenty years after I have heard as loudly applauded from the lips of Dr. Johnson, concerning the well-known writer of that celebrated work but if people will live long enough in this capricious world, such instances of partiality will shock them less and less, by frequent repetition. Mr. Johnson knew mankind, and wished to mend them: he therefore, to the piety and pure religion, the untainted integrity, and scrupulous morals of my earliest and most disinterested friend, judiciously contrived to join a cautious

1 On April 28, 1768, he wrote to Mrs. Thrale:-'Yet when any man finds himself disposed to complain with how little care he is regarded, let him reflect how little he contributes to the happiness of others, and how little, for the most part, he suffers from their pains... Nor can we wonder that, in a state in which all have so much to feel of their own evils, very few have leisure for those

of another.' Letters, i. 141.

2 'Lady Macleod asked if no man was naturally good. JOHNSON. "No, Madam, no more than a wolf." BOSWELL. "Nor no woman, Sir?” JOHNSON. "No, Sir." Lady Macleod started at this, saying in a low voice, "This is worse than Swift."' Life, v. 211.

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Ante, p. 207. • Ante, p. 246.

not

attention to the capacity of his hearers, and a prudent resolution not to lessen the influence of his learning and virtue, by casual freaks of humour, and irregular starts of ill-managed merriment. He did not wish to confound, but to inform his auditors'; and though he did not appear to solicit benevolence, he always wished to retain authority, and leave his company impressed with the idea, that it was his to teach in this world, and theirs to learn. What wonder then that all should receive with docility from Johnson those doctrines, which propagated by Collier they drove away from them with shouts! Dr. Johnson was not grave however because he knew not how to be merry. No man loved laughing better, and his vein of humour was rich, and apparently inexhaustible 2; Though Dr. Goldsmith said once to him, We should change companions oftener, we exhaust one another, and shall soon be both of us worn out 3. Poor Goldsmith was to him indeed like the earthen pot to the iron one in Fontaine's fables; it had been better for him perhaps, that they had changed companions oftener; yet no experience of his antagonist's strength hindered him from continuing the contest *. He used to remind me always of that verse in Berni,

Il pover uomo che non sen' èra accorto,
Andava combattendo-ed era morto.

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Mr. Johnson made him a comical answer one day, when seeming to repine at the success of Beattie's Essay on Truth - Here's such a stir (said he) about a fellow that has written one book,

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Johnson seemed a little angry, and

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said, Sir, you have not travelled over my mind, I promise you."' Life, iv. 183.

4 Boswell speaks of that 'vanity which often excited Goldsmith to occasional competition' with Johnson. Ib. i. 417; ii. 216, 257. He admits, however, that 'he was often very fortunate in his witty contests, even when he entered the lists with Johnson himself.' Ib. ii. 231.

5 Ib. ii. 201; Letters of Hume to Strahan, p. 269.

and

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