Boswell's Life of Johnson
thank you for hindering him from tumbling over a precipice; but, in the
other case, I should hurt his vanity, and do him no good. He would not
take my advice. His brother-in-law, Strahan, sent him a subscription
of fifty pounds, and said he would send him fifty more, if he would not
publish.' GARRICK. 'What! eh! is Strahan a good judge of an Epigram? Is
not he rather an OBTUSE man, eh?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, he may not be
a judge of an Epigram: but you see he is a judge of what is not an
Epigram.' BOSWELL. 'It is easy for you, Mr. Garrick, to talk to an
authour as you talked to Elphinston; you, who have been so long the
manager of a theatre, rejecting the plays of poor authours. You are
an old Judge, who have often pronounced sentence of death. You are a
practiced surgeon, who have often amputated limbs; and though this may
have been for the good of your patients, they cannot like you. Those
who have undergone a dreadful operation, are not very fond of seeing
the operator again.' GARRICK. 'Yes, I know enough of that. There was
a reverend gentleman, (Mr. Hawkins,) who wrote a tragedy, the SIEGE
of something, which I refused.' HARRIS. 'So, the siege was raised.'
JOHNSON. 'Ay, he came to me and complained; and told me, that Garrick
said his play was wrong in the CONCOCTION. Now, what is the concoction
of a play?' (Here Garrick started, and twisted himself, and seemed
sorely vexed; for Johnson told me, he believed the story was true.)
GARRICK. 'I--I--I--said FIRST concoction.' JOHNSON. (smiling,) 'Well,
he left out FIRST. And Rich, he said, refused him IN FALSE ENGLISH:
he could shew it under his hand.' GARRICK. 'He wrote to me in violent
wrath, for having refused his play: "Sir, this is growing a very serious
and terrible affair. I am resolved to publish my play. I will appeal
to the world; and how will your judgement appear?" I answered, "Sir,
notwithstanding all the seriousness, and all the terrours, I have no
objection to your publishing your play; and as you live at a great
distance, (Devonshire, I believe,) if you will send it to me, I will
convey it to the press." I never heard more of it, ha! ha! ha!'
On Friday, April 10, I found Johnson at home in the morning. We resumed
the conversation of yesterday. He put me in mind of some of it which
had escaped my memory, and enabled me to record it more perfectly than
I otherwise could have done. He was much pleased with my paying so
great attention to his recommendation in 1763, the period when our
acquaintance began, that I should keep a journal; and I could perceive
he was secretly pleased to find so much of the fruit of his mind
preserved; and as he had been used to imagine and say that he always
laboured when he said a good thing--it delighted him, on a review, to
find that his conversation teemed with point and imagery.
I said to him, 'You were yesterday, Sir, in remarkably good humour:
but there was nothing to offend you, nothing to produce irritation
or violence. There was no bold offender. There was not one capital
conviction. It was a maiden assize. You had on your white gloves.'
He found fault with our friend Langton for having been too silent. 'Sir,
(said I,) you will recollect, that he very properly took up Sir Joshua
for being glad that Charles Fox had praised Goldsmith's Traveller, and
you joined him.' JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir, I knocked Fox on the head, without
ceremony. Reynolds is too much under Fox and Burke at present. He is
under the Fox star and the Irish constellation. He is always under some
planet.' BOSWELL. 'There is no Fox star.' JOHNSON. 'But there is a dog
star.' BOSWELL. 'They say, indeed, a fox and a dog are the same animal.'
We dined together with Mr. Scott (now Sir William Scott his Majesty's
Advocate General,) at his chambers in the Temple, nobody else there. The
company being small, Johnson was not in such spirits as he had been the
preceding day, and for a considerable time little was said.
Talking of fame, for which there is so great a desire, I observed how
little there is of it in reality, compared with the other objects of
human attention. 'Let every man recollect, and he will be sensible
how small a part of his time is employed in talking or thinking of
Shakspeare, Voltaire, or any of the most celebrated men that have ever
lived, or are now supposed to occupy the attention and admiration of the
world. Let this be extracted and compressed; into what a narrow space
will it go!' I then slily introduced Mr. Garrick's fame, and his
assuming the airs of a great man. JOHNSON. 'Sir, it is wonderful how
LITTLE Garrick assumes. No, Sir, Garrick fortunam reverenter habet.
Consider, Sir: celebrated men, such as you have mentioned, have had
their applause at a distance; but Garrick had it dashed in his face,
sounded in his ears, and went home every night with the plaudits of a
thousand in his CRANIUM. Then, Sir, Garrick did not FIND, but MADE his
way to the tables, the levees, and almost the bed-chambers of the great.
Then, Sir, Garrick had under him a numerous body of people; who, from
fear of his power, and hopes of his favour, and admiration of his
talents, were constantly submissive to him. And here is a man who has
advanced the dignity of his profession. Garrick has made a player a
higher character.' SCOTT. 'And he is a very sprightly writer too.'
JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir; and all this supported by great wealth of his own
acquisition. If all this had happened to me, I should have had a couple
of fellows with long poles walking before me, to knock down every body
that stood in the way. Consider, if all this had happened to Cibber
or Quin, they'd have jumped over the moon--Yet Garrick speaks to US.'
(smiling.) BOSWELL. 'And Garrick is a very good man, a charitable man.'
JOHNSON. 'Sir, a liberal man. He has given away more money than any man
in England. There may be a little vanity mixed; but he has shewn, that
money is not his first object.' BOSWELL. 'Yet Foote used to say of
him, that he walked out with an intention to do a generous action; but,
turning the corner of a street, he met with the ghost of a half-penny,
which frightened him.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, that is very true, too; for
I never knew a man of whom it could be said with less certainty to-day,
what he will do to-morrow, than Garrick; it depends so much on his
humour at the time.' SCOTT. 'I am glad to hear of his liberality. He has
been represented as very saving.' JOHNSON. 'With his domestick saving we
have nothing to do. I remember drinking tea with him long ago, when Peg
Woffington made it, and he grumbled at her for making it too strong.*
He had then begun to feel money in his purse, and did not know when he
should have enough of it.'
* When Johnson told this little anecdote to Sir Joshua
Reynolds, he mentioned a circumstance which he omitted
to-day:--'Why, (said Garrick,) it is as red as blood.'
--BOSWELL
We talked of war. JOHNSON. 'Every man thinks meanly of himself for
not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.' BOSWELL. 'Lord
Mansfield does not.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, if Lord Mansfield were in a company
of General Officers and Admirals who have been in service, he would
shrink; he'd wish to creep under the table.' BOSWELL. 'No; he'd think he
could TRY them all.' JOHNSON. 'Yes, if he could catch them: but they'd
try him much sooner. No, Sir; were Socrates and Charles the Twelfth of
Sweden both present in any company, and Socrates to say, "Follow me,
and hear a lecture on philosophy;" and Charles, laying his hand on
his sword, to say, "Follow me, and dethrone the Czar;" a man would be
ashamed to follow Socrates. Sir, the impression is universal; yet it is
strange.'
He talked of Mr. Charles Fox, of whose abilities he thought highly, but
observed, that he did not talk much at our CLUB. I have heard Mr.
Gibbon remark, 'that Mr. Fox could not be afraid of Dr. Johnson; yet he
certainly was very shy of saying any thing in Dr. Johnson's presence.'
He expressed great indignation at the imposture of the Cock-lane Ghost,
and related, with much satisfaction, how he had assisted in detecting
the cheat, and had published an account of it in the news-papers. Upon
this subject I incautiously offended him, by pressing him with too many
questions, and he shewed his displeasure. I apologised, saying that 'I
asked questions in order to be instructed and entertained; I repaired
eagerly to the fountain; but that the moment he gave me a hint, the
moment he put a lock upon the well, I desisted.'--'But, Sir, (said he),
that is forcing one to do a disagreeable thing:' and he continued to
rate me. 'Nay, Sir, (said I,) when you have put a lock upon the well,
so that I can no longer drink, do not make the fountain of your wit play
upon me and wet me.'
He sometimes could not bear being teazed with questions. I was once
present when a gentleman asked so many as, 'What did you do, Sir?' 'What
did you say, Sir?' that he at last grew enraged, and said, 'I will not
be put to the QUESTION. Don't you consider, Sir, that these are not the
manners of a gentleman? I will not be baited with WHAT, and WHY; what
is this? what is that? why is a cow's tail long? why is a fox's tail
bushy?' The gentleman, who was a good deal out of countenance, said,
'Why, Sir, you are so good, that I venture to trouble you.' Johnson.
'Sir, my being so GOOD is no reason why you should be so ILL.'
He talked with an uncommon animation of travelling into distant
countries; that the mind was enlarged by it, and that an acquisition
of dignity of character was derived from it. He expressed a particular
enthusiasm with respect to visiting the wall of China. I catched it for
the moment, and said I really believed I should go and see the wall of
China had I not children, of whom it was my duty to take care. 'Sir,
(said he,) by doing so, you would do what would be of importance in
raising your children to eminence. There would be a lustre reflected
upon them from your spirit and curiosity. They would be at all times
regarded as the children of a man who had gone to view the wall of
China. I am serious, Sir.'
When we had left Mr. Scott's, he said 'Will you go home with me?' 'Sir,
(said I,) it is late; but I'll go with you for three minutes.' JOHNSON.
'Or four.' We went to Mrs. Williams's room, where we found Mr. Allen
the printer, who was the landlord of his house in Bolt-court, a worthy,
obliging man, and his very old acquaintance; and what was exceedingly
amusing, though he was of a very diminutive size, he used, even in
Johnson's presence, to imitate the stately periods and slow and solemn
utterance of the great man.--I this evening boasted, that although I
did not write what is called stenography, or short-hand, in appropriated
characters devised for the purpose, I had a method of my own of writing
half words, and leaving out some altogether so as yet to keep the
substance and language of any discourse which I had heard so much in
view, that I could give it very completely soon after I had taken it
down.
On Sunday, April 12, I found him at home before dinner. He and I, and
Mrs. Williams, went to dine with the Reverend Dr. Percy.
And here I shall record a scene of too much heat between Dr. Johnson
and Dr. Percy, which I should have suppressed, were it not that it gave
occasion to display the truely tender and benevolent heart of Johnson,
who, as soon as he found a friend was at all hurt by any thing which
he had 'said in his wrath,' was not only prompt and desirous to be
reconciled, but exerted himself to make ample reparation.
Books of Travels having been mentioned, Johnson praised Pennant very
highly, as he did at Dunvegan, in the Isle of Sky. Dr. Percy, knowing
himself to be the heir male of the ancient Percies, and having