Boswell's Life of Johnson
composed it the preceding year. Mrs. Johnson, for the sake of country
air, had lodgings at Hampstead, to which he resorted occasionally,
and there the greatest part, if not the whole, of this Imitation was
written. The fervid rapidity with which it was produced, is scarcely
credible. I have heard him say, that he composed seventy lines of it in
one day, without putting one of them upon paper till they were finished.
I remember when I once regretted to him that he had not given us more of
Juvenal's Satires, he said he probably should give more, for he had them
all in his head; by which I understood that he had the originals and
correspondent allusions floating in his mind, which he could, when he
pleased, embody and render permanent without much labour. Some of them,
however, he observed were too gross for imitation.
The profits of a single poem, however excellent, appear to have been
very small in the last reign, compared with what a publication of
the same size has since been known to yield. I have mentioned, upon
Johnson's own authority, that for his London he had only ten guineas;
and now, after his fame was established, he got for his Vanity of Human
Wishes but five guineas more, as is proved by an authentick document in
my possession.
His Vanity of Human Wishes has less of common life, but more of a
philosophick dignity than his London. More readers, therefore, will
be delighted with the pointed spirit of London, than with the profound
reflection of The Vanity of Human Wishes. Garrick, for instance,
observed in his sprightly manner, with more vivacity than regard to just
discrimination, as is usual with wits: 'When Johnson lived much with the
Herveys, and saw a good deal of what was passing in life, he wrote his
London, which is lively and easy. When he became more retired, he gave
us his Vanity of Human Wishes, which is as hard as Greek. Had he gone on
to imitate another satire, it would have been as hard as Hebrew.'
Garrick being now vested with theatrical power by being manager of
Drury-lane theatre, he kindly and generously made use of it to bring
out Johnson's tragedy, which had been long kept back for want of
encouragement. But in this benevolent purpose he met with no small
difficulty from the temper of Johnson, which could not brook that a
drama which he had formed with much study, and had been obliged to keep
more than the nine years of Horace, should be revised and altered at
the pleasure of an actor. Yet Garrick knew well, that without some
alterations it would not be fit for the stage. A violent dispute having
ensued between them, Garrick applied to the Reverend Dr. Taylor to
interpose. Johnson was at first very obstinate. 'Sir, (said he) the
fellow wants me to make Mahomet run mad, that he may have an opportunity
of tossing his hands and kicking his heels.' He was, however, at last,
with difficulty, prevailed on to comply with Garrick's wishes, so as to
allow of some changes; but still there were not enough.
Dr. Adams was present the first night of the representation of Irene,
and gave me the following account: 'Before the curtain drew up, there
were catcalls whistling, which alarmed Johnson's friends. The Prologue,
which was written by himself in a manly strain, soothed the audience,
and the play went off tolerably, till it came to the conclusion, when
Mrs. Pritchard, the heroine of the piece, was to be strangled upon the
stage, and was to speak two lines with the bowstring round her neck.
The audience cried out "Murder! Murder!" She several times attempted to
speak; but in vain. At last she was obliged to go off the stage alive.'
This passage was afterwards struck out, and she was carried off to be
put to death behind the scenes, as the play now has it. The Epilogue,
as Johnson informed me, was written by Sir William Yonge. I know not how
his play came to be thus graced by the pen of a person then so eminent
in the political world.
Notwithstanding all the support of such performers as Garrick,
Barry, Mrs. Cibber, Mrs. Pritchard, and every advantage of dress
and decoration, the tragedy of Irene did not please the publick. Mr.
Garrick's zeal carried it through for nine nights, so that the authour
had his three nights' profits; and from a receipt signed by him, now in
the hands of Mr. James Dodsley, it appears that his friend Mr. Robert
Dodsley gave him one hundred pounds for the copy, with his usual
reservation of the right of one edition.
When asked how he felt upon the ill success of his tragedy, he replied,
'Like the Monument;' meaning that he continued firm and unmoved as
that column. And let it be remembered, as an admonition to the genus
irritabile of dramatick writers, that this great man, instead of
peevishly complaining of the bad taste of the town, submitted to its
decision without a murmur. He had, indeed, upon all occasions, a great
deference for the general opinion: 'A man (said he) who writes a book,
thinks himself wiser or wittier than the rest of mankind; he supposes
that he can instruct or amuse them, and the publick to whom he appeals,
must, after all, be the judges of his pretensions.'
On occasion of his play being brought upon the stage, Johnson had a
fancy that as a dramatick authour his dress should be more gay than what
he ordinarily wore; he therefore appeared behind the scenes, and even in
one of the side boxes, in a scarlet waistcoat, with rich gold lace, and
a gold-laced hat. He humourously observed to Mr. Langton, 'that when in
that dress he could not treat people with the same ease as when in his
usual plain clothes.' Dress indeed, we must allow, has more effect
even upon strong minds than one should suppose, without having had
the experience of it. His necessary attendance while his play was in
rehearsal, and during its performance, brought him acquainted with
many of the performers of both sexes, which produced a more favourable
opinion of their profession than he had harshly expressed in his Life of
Savage. With some of them he kept up an acquaintance as long as he and
they lived, and was ever ready to shew them acts of kindness. He for a
considerable time used to frequent the Green Room, and seemed to take
delight in dissipating his gloom, by mixing in the sprightly chit-chat
of the motley circle then to be found there. Mr. David Hume related to
me from Mr. Garrick, that Johnson at last denied himself this amusement,
from considerations of rigid virtue; saying, 'I'll come no more behind
your scenes, David; for the silk stockings and white bosoms of your
actresses excite my amorous propensities.'
1750: AETAT. 41.]--In 1750 he came forth in the character for which
he was eminently qualified, a majestick teacher of moral and religious
wisdom. The vehicle which he chose was that of a periodical paper, which
he knew had been, upon former occasions, employed with great success.
The Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian, were the last of the kind published
in England, which had stood the test of a long trial; and such an
interval had now elapsed since their publication, as made him justly
think that, to many of his readers, this form of instruction would, in
some degree, have the advantage of novelty. A few days before the first
of his Essays came out, there started another competitor for fame in the
same form, under the title of The Tatler Revived, which I believe was
'born but to die.' Johnson was, I think, not very happy in the choice
of his title, The Rambler, which certainly is not suited to a series
of grave and moral discourses; which the Italians have literally,
but ludicrously translated by Il Vagabondo; and which has been lately
assumed as the denomination of a vehicle of licentious tales, The
Rambler's Magazine. He gave Sir Joshua Reynolds the following account of
its getting this name: 'What MUST be done, Sir, WILL be done. When I was
to begin publishing that paper, I was at a loss how to name it. I sat
down at night upon my bedside, and resolved that I would not go to sleep
till I had fixed its title. The Rambler seemed the best that occurred,
and I took it.'
With what devout and conscientious sentiments this paper was undertaken,
is evidenced by the following prayer, which he composed and offered up
on the occasion: 'Almighty GOD, the giver of all good things, without
whose help all labour is ineffectual, and without whose grace all wisdom
is folly; grant, I beseech Thee, that in this undertaking thy Holy
Spirit may not be with-held from me, but that I may promote thy glory,
and the salvation of myself and others: grant this, O LORD, for the sake
of thy son JESUS CHRIST. Amen.'
The first paper of The Rambler was published on Tuesday the 20th
of March, 1750; and its authour was enabled to continue it, without
interruption, every Tuesday and Friday, till Saturday the 17th of March,
1752, on which day it closed. This is a strong confirmation of the truth
of a remark of his, which I have had occasion to quote elsewhere, that
'a man may write at any time, if he will set himself doggedly to it;'
for, notwithstanding his constitutional indolence, his depression of
spirits, and his labour in carrying on his Dictionary, he answered the
stated calls of the press twice a week from the stores of his mind,
during all that time.
Posterity will be astonished when they are told, upon the authority of
Johnson himself, that many of these discourses, which we should suppose
had been laboured with all the slow attention of literary leisure, were
written in haste as the moment pressed, without even being read over by
him before they were printed. It can be accounted for only in this way;
that by reading and meditation, and a very close inspection of life,
he had accumulated a great fund of miscellaneous knowledge, which, by a
peculiar promptitude of mind, was ever ready at his call, and which
he had constantly accustomed himself to clothe in the most apt and
energetick expression. Sir Joshua Reynolds once asked him by what means
he had attained his extraordinary accuracy and flow of language. He told
him, that he had early laid it down as a fixed rule to do his best on
every occasion, and in every company; to impart whatever he knew in
the most forcible language he could put it in; and that by constant
practice, and never suffering any careless expressions to escape him,
or attempting to deliver his thoughts without arranging them in the
clearest manner, it became habitual to him.
As The Rambler was entirely the work of one man, there was, of course,
such a uniformity in its texture, as very much to exclude the charm
of variety; and the grave and often solemn cast of thinking, which
distinguished it from other periodical papers, made it, for some time,
not generally liked. So slowly did this excellent work, of which twelve
editions have now issued from the press, gain upon the world at large,
that even in the closing number the authour says, 'I have never been
much a favourite of the publick.'
Johnson told me, with an amiable fondness, a little pleasing
circumstance relative to this work. Mrs. Johnson, in whose judgement and
taste he had great confidence, said to him, after a few numbers of The
Rambler had come out, 'I thought very well of you before; but I did not
imagine you could have written any thing equal to this.' Distant praise,
from whatever quarter, is not so delightful as that of a wife whom a
man loves and esteems. Her approbation may be said to 'come home to his
bosom;' and being so near, its effect is most sensible and permanent.
Mr. James Elphinston, who has since published various works, and who
was ever esteemed by Johnson as a worthy man, happened to be in Scotland
while The Rambler was coming out in single papers at London. With a
laudable zeal at once for the improvement of his countrymen, and the