[F-6] Mr. John Desmoulins was the son of Mrs. Desmoulins (_ante_, iii.
222, 368), and the grandson of Johnson's god-father, Dr. Swinfen
(_ante_, i. 34). Johnson mentions him in a letter to Mrs. Thrale in
1778. 'Young Desmoulins is taken in an _under-something_ of Drury Lane;
he knows not, I believe, his own denomination.' _Piozzi Letters_,
ii. 25.
[F-7] The reference is to _The Rambler_, No. 41 (not 42 as Boswell
says), where Johnson mentions 'those vexations and anxieties with which
all human enjoyments are polluted.'
[F-8] Bishop Sanderson described his soul as 'infinitely polluted with
sin.' Walton's _Lives_, ed. 1838, p. 396.
[F-9] Hume, writing in 1742 about his _Essays Moral and Political_,
says:--
'Innys, the great bookseller in Paul's Church-yard, wonders there is not
a new edition, for that he cannot find copies for his customers.' J.H.
Burton's _Hume_, i. 143.
[F-10] Nichols (_Lit. Anec._ ii. 554) says that, on Dec. 7,
'Johnson asked him whether any of the family of Faden the printer were
living. Being told that the geographer near Charing Cross was Faden's
son, he said, after a short pause:--"I borrowed a guinea of his father
near thirty years ago; be so good as to take this, and pay it for me."'
[F-11] Nowhere does Hawkins more shew the malignancy of his character
than in his attacks on Johnson's black servant, and through him on
Johnson. With the passage in which this offensive _caveat_ is found he
brings his work to a close. At the first mention of Frank (_Life_, p.
328) he says:--
'His first master had _in great humanity_ made him a Christian, and his
last for no assignable reason, nay rather in despite of nature, and to
unfit him for being useful according to his capacity, determined to make
him a scholar.'
But Hawkins was a brutal fellow. See _ante_, i. 27, note 2, and 28, note
1.
[F-12] Johnson had written to Taylor on Oct. 23 of this year:--
'"Coming down from a very restless night I found your letter, which made
me a little angry. You tell me that recovery is in my power. This indeed
I should be glad to hear if I could once believe it. But you mean to
charge me with neglecting or opposing my own health. Tell me, therefore,
what I do that hurts me, and what I neglect that would help me." This
letter is endorsed by Taylor: "This is the last letter. My answer, which
were (_sic_) the words of advice he gave to Mr. Thrale the day he dyed,
he resented extremely from me."' Mr. Alfred Morrison's _Collection of
Autographs_, &c., ii. 343.
'The words of advice' which were given to Mr. Thrale _the day before_
the fatal fit seized him, were that he should abstain from full meals.
_Ante_, iv. 84, note 4. Johnson's resentment of Taylor's advice may
account for the absence of his name in his will.
[F-13] They were sold in 650 Lots, in a four days' sale. Besides the
books there were 146 portraits, of which 61 were framed and glazed.
These prints in their frames were sold in lots of 4, 8, and even 10
together, though certainly some of them--and perhaps many--were
engravings from Reynolds. The Catalogue of the sale is in the
Bodleian Library.
APPENDIX G.
(_Notes on Boswell's note on page 408_.)
[G-1] Mrs. Piozzi records (_Anecdotes_, p. 120) that Johnson told her,--
'When Boyse was almost perishing with hunger, and some money was
produced to purchase him a dinner, he got a bit of roast beef, but could
not eat it without ketch-up; and laid out the last half-guinea he
possessed in truffles and mushrooms, eating them in bed too, for want of
clothes, or even a shirt to sit up in.'
Hawkins (_Life_, p. 159) gives 1740 as the year of Boyse's destitution.
'He was,' he says, 'confined to a bed which had no sheets; here, to
procure food, he wrote; his posture sitting up in bed, his only covering
a blanket, in which a hole was made to admit of the employment of
his arm.'
Two years later Boyse wrote the following verses to Cave from a
spunging-house:--
'Hodie, teste coelo summo,
Sine pane, sine nummo,
Sorte positus infeste,
Scribo tibi dolens moeste.
Fame, bile tumet jecur:
Urbane, mitte opem, precor.
Tibi enim cor humanum
Non a malis alienum:
Mihi mens nee male grato,
Pro a te favore dato.
Ex gehenna debitoria,
Vulgo, domo spongiatoria.'
He adds that he hopes to have his _Ode on the British Nation_ done that
day. This _Ode_, which is given in the _Gent. Mag._ 1742, p. 383,
contains the following verse, which contrasts sadly with the poor
poet's case:--
'Thou, sacred isle, amidst thy ambient main,
_Enjoyst the sweets of freedom_ all thy own.'
[G-2] It is not likely that Johnson called a sixpence 'a serious
consideration.' He who in his youth would not let his comrades say
_prodigious_ (_ante/_, in. 303) was not likely in his old age so to
misuse a word.
[G-3] Hugh Kelly is mentioned _ante_, ii. 48, note 2, and iii. 113.
[G-4] It was not on the return from Sky, but on the voyage from Sky to
Rasay, that the spurs were lost. _Post_, v. 163.
[G-5] Dr. White's _Bampton Lectures_ of 1784 'became part of the
triumphant literature of the University of Oxford,' and got the preacher
a Christ Church Canonry. Of these _Lectures_ Dr. Parr had written about
one-fifth part. White, writing to Parr about a passage in the manuscript
of the last Lecture, said:--'I fear I did not clearly explain myself; I
humbly beg the favour of you to make my meaning more intelligible.' On
the death of Mr. Badcock in 1788, a note for L500 from White was found
in his pocket-book. White pretended that this was remuneration for some
other work; but it was believed on good grounds that Badcock had begun
what Parr had completed, and that these famous _Lectures_ were mainly
their work. Badcock was one of the writers in the _Monthly Review_.
Johnstone's _Life of Dr. Parr_, i. 218-278. For Badcock's correspondence
with the editor of the _Monthly Review_, see _Bodleian_ MS. _Add._
C. 90.
[G-6] 'Virgilium vidi tantum.' Ovid, _Tristia_, iv. 10. 51.
[G-7] Mackintosh says of Priestley:--'Frankness and disinterestedness in
the avowal of his opinion were his point of honour.' He goes on to point
out that there was 'great mental power in him wasted and scattered.'
_Life of Mackintosh_, i. 349. See _ante_, ii. 124, and iv. 238 for
Johnson's opinion of Priestley.
[G-8] Badcock, in using the term 'index-scholar,' was referring no doubt
to Pope's lines:--
'How Index-learning turns no student pale,
Yet holds the eel of science by the tail.'
_Dunciad_, i. 279.
APPENDIX H.
(_Notes on Boswell's note on pages 421-422_.)
[H-1] The last lines of the inscription on this urn are borrowed, with a
slight change, from the last paragraph of the last _Rambler/_.
(Johnson's _Works_, iii. 465, and _ante_, i. 226.) Johnson visited
Colonel Myddelton on August 29, 1774, in his Tour to Wales. See
_post_, v. 453.
[H-2] Johnson, writing to Dr. Taylor on Sept. 3, 1783, said:--'I sat to
Opey (sic) as long as he desired, and I think the head is finished, but
it is not much admired.' _Notes and Queries_, 6th S. v. 481. Hawkins
(_Life of Johnson_, p. 569) says that in 1784 'Johnson resumed sitting
to Opie, but,' he adds, 'I believe the picture was never finished.'
[H-3] Of this picture, which was the one painted for Beauclerk (_ante_,
p. 180), it is stated in Johnson's _Work_, ed. 1787, xi. 204, that
'there is in it that appearance of a labouring working mind, of an
indolent reposing body, which he had to a very great degree.'
[H-4] It seems almost certain that the portrait of Johnson in the Common
Room of University College, Oxford, is this very mezzotinto. It was
given to the College by Sir William Scott, and it is a mezzotinto from
Opie's portrait. It has been reproduced for this work, and will be found
facing page 244 of volume iii. Scott's inscription on the back of the
frame is given on page 245, note 3, of the same volume.
APPENDIX I.
(_Page_ 424.)
Boswell most likely never knew that in the year 1790 Mr. Seward, in the
name of Cadell the publisher, had asked Parr to write a _Life of
Johnson_. (Johnstone's _Life of Parr_, iv. 678.) Parr, in his amusing
vanity, was as proud of this _Life_ as if he had written it. '"It would
have been," he said, "the third most learned work that has ever yet
appeared. The most learned work ever published I consider Bentley _On
the Epistles of Phalaris_; the next Salmasius _On the Hellenistic
Language_." Alluding to Boswell's Life he continued, "Mine should have
been, not the droppings of his lips, but the history of his mind."'
Field's _Life of Parr_, i. 164.
In the epitaph that he first sent in were found the words 'Probabili
Poetae.'
'In arms,' wrote Parr, 'were all the Johnsonians: Malone, Steevens, Sir
W. Scott, Windham, and even Fox, all in arms. The epithet was cold. They
do not understand it, and I am a Scholar, not a Belles-Lettres man.'
Parr had wished to pass over all notice of Johnson's poetical character.
To this, Malone said, none of his friends of the Literary Club would
agree. He pointed out also that Parr had not noticed 'that part of
Johnson's genius, which placed him on higher ground than perhaps any
other quality that can be named--the universality of his knowledge, the
promptness of his mind in producing it on all occasions in conversation,
and the vivid eloquence with which he clothed his thoughts, however
suddenly called upon.' Parr, regardless of Johnson's rule that 'in
lapidary inscriptions a man is not upon oath' (_ante_, ii. 407),
replied, that if he mentioned his conversation he should have to mention
also his roughness in contradiction, &c. As for the epithet _probabili_,
he 'never reflected upon it without almost a triumphant feeling in its
felicity.' Nevertheless he would change it into 'poetae sententiarum et
verborum ponderibus admirabili.' Yet these words, 'energetic and
sonorous' though they were, 'fill one with a secret and invincible
loathing, because they tend to introduce into the epitaph a character of
magnificence.' With every fresh objection he rose in importance. He
wrote for the approbation of real scholars of generations yet unborn.
'That the epitaph was written by such or such a man will, from the
publicity of the situation, and the popularity of the subject, be long
remembered.' Johnstone's _Life of Parr_, iv. 694-712. No objection seems
to have been raised to the five pompous lines of perplexing dates and
numerals in which no room is found even for Johnson's birth and
birth-place.
'After I had written the epitaph,' wrote Parr to a friend, 'Sir Joshua
Reynolds told me there was a scroll. I was in a rage. A scroll! Why,
Ned, this is vile modern contrivance. I wanted one train of ideas. What
could I do with the scroll? Johnson held it, and Johnson must speak in
it. I thought of this, his favourite maxim, in the Life of Milton,
[Johnson's _Works_, vii. 77],
"[Greek: Otti toi en megaroisi kakon t agathon te tetuktai.]."
In Homer [_Odyssey_, iv. 392] you know--and shewing the excellence of
Moral Philosophy. There Johnson and Socrates agree. Mr. Seward, hearing
of my difficulty, and no scholar, suggested the closing line in the
_Rambler_ [_ante_, i. 226, note 1]; had I looked there I should have
anticipated the suggestion. It is the closing line in Dionysius's
_Periegesis_,
"[Greek: Anton ek makaron antaxios eiae amoibae.]."
I adopted it, and gave Seward the praise. "Oh," quoth Sir William Scott,
"_[Greek: makaron]_ is Heathenish, and the Dean and Chapter will
hesitate." "The more fools they," said I. But to prevent disputes I have
altered it.
"[Greek: En makaressi ponon antaxios ein amoibae]."
Johnstone's _Life of Parr_, iv. 713.
Though the inscription on the scroll is not strictly speaking part of
the epitaph, yet this mixture of Greek and Latin is open to the censure
Johnson passed on Pope's Epitaph on Craggs.
'It may be proper to remark,' he said, 'the absurdity of joining in the
same inscription Latin and English, or verse and prose. If either
language be preferable to the other, let that only be used; for no
reason can be given why part of the information should be given in one
tongue and part in another on a tomb more than in any other place, or on
any other occasion.' Johnson's _Works_, viii. 353.
Bacon the sculptor was anxious, wrote Malone, 'that posterity should
know that he was entitled to annex R.A. to his name.' Parr was ready to
give his name, lest if it were omitted 'Bacon should slily put the
figure of a hog on Johnson's monument'; just as 'Saurus and Batrachus,
when Octavia would not give them leave to set their names on the Temples
they had built in Rome, scattered one of them [Greek: saurai] [lizards],
and the other [Greek: batrachoi] [frogs] on the bases and capitals of
the columns.' But as for the R.A., the sculptor 'very reluctantly had to
agree to its omission.' Johnstone's _Parr_, iv. 705 and 710.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Nothing can compensate for this want this year of all years.
Johnson's health was better than it had been for long, and his mind
happier perhaps than it had ever been. The knowledge that in his _Lives
of the Poets_, he had done, and was doing good work, no doubt was very
cheering to him. At no time had he gone more into society, and at no
time does he seem to have enjoyed it with greater relish. 'How do you
think I live?' he wrote on April 25. 'On Thursday, I dined with
Hamilton, and went thence to Mrs. Ord. On Friday, with much company at
Reynolds's. On Saturday, at Dr. Bell's. On Sunday, at Dr. Burney's; at
night, came Mrs. Ord, Mr. Greville, &c. On Monday with Reynolds, at
night with Lady Lucan; to-day with Mr. Langton; to-morrow with the
Bishop of St. Asaph; on Thursday with Mr. Bowles; Friday ----; Saturday,
at the Academy; Sunday with Mr. Ramsay.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 107. On
May 1, he wrote:--'At Mrs. Ord's, I met one Mrs. B---- [Buller], a
travelled lady, of great spirit, and some consciousness of her own
abilities. We had a contest of gallantry an hour long, so much to the
diversion of the company that at Ramsay's last night, in a crowded room,
they would have pitted us again. There were Smelt, [one of the King's
favourites] and the Bishop of St. Asaph, who comes to every place; and
Lord Monboddo, and Sir Joshua, and ladies out of tale.' _Ib_. p. 111.
The account that Langton gives of the famous evening at Mrs. Vesey's,
'when the company began to collect round Johnson till they became not
less than four, if not five deep (_ante_, May 2, 1780), is lively
enough; but 'the particulars of the conversation' which he neglects,
Boswell would have given us in full.
[2] In 1792, Miss Burney, after recording that Boswell told some of his
Johnsonian stories, continues:--'Mr. Langton told some stories in
imitation of Dr. Johnson; but they became him less than Mr. Boswell, and
only reminded me of what Dr. Johnson himself once said to me--"Every man
has some time in his life an ambition to be a wag."' Mme. D'Arblay's
_Diary_, v. 307.
[3] _Stephanorum Historia, vitas ipsorum ac libros complectens_. London,
1709.
[4] _Senilia_ was published in 1742. The line to which Johnson refers
is, 'Mel, nervos, fulgur, Carteret, unus, habes,' p. 101. In another
line, the poet celebrates Colley Cibber's Muse--the _Musa Cibberi_:
'Multa Cibberum levat aura.' p. 50. See Macaulay's Essays, ed. 1843,
i. 367.
[5] _Graecae Linguae Dialecti in Scholae Westmonast. usum_, 1738.
[6] Giannone, an Italian historian, born 1676, died 1748. When he
published his _History of the Kingdom of Naples_, a friend
congratulating him on its success, said:--'Mon ami, vous vous etes mis
une couronne sur la tete, mais une couronne d'epines.' His attacks on
the Church led to persecution, in the end he made a retractation, but
nevertheless he died in prison. _Nouv. Biog. Gen._ xx. 422.
[7] See _ante_, ii. 119.
[8] 'There is no kind of impertinence more justly censurable than his
who is always labouring to level thoughts to intellects higher than his
own; who apologises for every word which his own narrowness of converse
inclines him to think unusual; keeps the exuberance of his faculties
under visible restraint; is solicitous to anticipate inquiries by
needless explanations; and endeavours to shade his own abilities lest
weak eyes should be dazzled with their lustre.' _The Rambler_, No. 173.
[9] Johnson, in his _Dictionary_, defines _Anfractuousness_ as _Fulness
of windings and turnings_. _Anfractuosity_ is not given. Lord Macaulay,
in the last sentence in his _Biography of Johnson_, alludes to
this passage.
[10] See _ante_, iii. 149, note 2.
[11] 'My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I
might not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries
might have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution,
but when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration,
when my memory supplied me from late books with an example that was
wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited
admission for a favourite name.' Johnson's _Works_, v. 39. He cites
himself under _important_, Mrs. Lennox under _talent_, Garrick under
_giggler_; from Richardson's _Clarissa_, he makes frequent quotations.
In the fourth edition, published in 1773 (_ante_, ii. 203), he often
quotes Reynolds; for instance, under _vulgarism_, which word is not in
the previous editions. Beattie he quotes under _weak_, and Gray under
_bosom_. He introduces also many quotations from Law, and Young. In the
earlier editions, in his quotations from _Clarissa_, he very rarely
gives the author's name; in the fourth edition I have found it
rarely omitted.
[12] In one of his _Hypochondriacks_ (_London Mag._ 1782, p. 233)
Boswell writes:--'I have heard it remarked by one, of whom more remarks
deserve to be remembered than of any person I ever knew, that a man is
often as narrow as he is prodigal for want of counting.'
[13] 'Sept. 1778. We began talking of _Irene_, and Mrs. Thrale made Dr.
Johnson read some passages which I had been remarking as uncommonly
applicable to the present time. He read several speeches, and told us he
had not ever read so much of it before since it was first printed.' Mme.
D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 96. 'I was told,' wrote Sir Walter Scott, 'that a
gentleman called Pot, or some such name, was introduced to him as a
particular admirer of his. The Doctor growled and took no further
notice. "He admires in especial your _Irene_ as the finest tragedy
modern times;" to which the Doctor replied, "If Pot says so, Pot lies!"
and relapsed into his reverie.' _Croker Corres._ ii. 32.
[14] _Scrupulosity_ was a word that Boswell had caught up from Johnson.
Sir W. Jones (_Life_, i. 177) wrote in 1776:--'You will be able to
examine with the minutest _scrupulosity_, as Johnson would call it.'
Johnson describes Addison's prose as 'pure without scrupulosity.'
_Works_, vii. 472. 'Swift,' he says, 'washed himself with oriental
scrupulosity.' _Ib._ viii. 222. Boswell (_Hebrides_, Aug. 15) writes of
'scrupulosity of conscience.'
[15]
'When thou didst not, savage,
Know thine own meaning, but wouldst gabble like
