Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

This, my dear Boswell, is advice which, perhaps, has been often given you, and given you without effect. But this advice, if you will not take from others, you must take from your own reflections, if you purpose to do the duties of the station to which the bounty of Providence has called you.

Let me have a long letter from you as soon as you can. I hope you continue your journal, and enrich it with many observations upon the country in which you reside. I am, dear sir,

Your most affectionate servant,

Samuel Johnson.

Dear sir,

LETTER IX.

To James Boswell, esq. at Paris.

Johnson's Court, Fleet Street, Jan. 14, 1766.

We will

Apologies are seldom of any use. delay till your arrival the reasons, good or bad, which have made me so sparing and ungrateful a correspondent. Be assured, for the present, that nothing has lessened either the esteem or the love with which I dismissed you at Harwich. Both have been increased by all that I have been told of you by yourself or others; and when you return, you will return to an unaltered, and, I hope, unalterable friend.

All that you have to fear from me, is the vexation of disappointing me. No man loves to frustrate expectations which have been formed in his favour; and the pleasure which I promise myself from your journals and remarks is so great, that perhaps no degree of attention or discernment will be sufficient to afford it. Come home, however, and take your chance. I long to see you, and to hear you; and I hope that we shall not be so long

separated again. Come home, and expect such a welcome as is due to him, whom a wise and noble curiosity has led, where perhaps no native of this country ever was before.

I have no news to tell you that can deserve your notice; nor would I willingly lessen the pleasure that any novelty may give you at your return. I am afraid we shall find it difficult to keep among us a mind which has been so long feasted with variety. But let us try what esteem and kindness can effect.

As your father's liberality has indulged you with so long a ramble, I doubt not but you will think his sickness, or even his desire to see you, a sufficient reason for hastening your return. The longer we live, and the more we think, the higher value we learn to put on the tenderness of parents and of friends. Parents we can have but once; and he promises himself too much, who enters life with the expectation of finding many friends. Upon some motive, I hope, that you will be here soon; and I am willing to think it will be an inducement to your return, that it is sincerely desired by, dear sir, Your affectionate, humble servant,

Samuel Johnson.

Dear sir,

LETTER X.

To Bennet Langton, esq.

Johnson's Court, Fleet Street, May 10, 1766.

In supposing that I should be more than commonly affected by the death of Peregrine Langton*, you were not mistaken; he was one of those whom I loved at once by instinct and by reason. I have seldom indulged more hope of any thing than of being able to

*Mr. Langton's uncle.

improve our acquaintance into friendship. Many a time have I placed myself again at Langton, and imagined the pleasure with which I should walk to Partney, in a summer morning: but this is no longer possible. We must now endeavour to preserve what is left us,—his example of piety and economy. I hope you make what inquiries you can, and write down what is told you. The little things which distinguish domestic characters are soon forgotten: if you delay to inquire, you will have no information; if you neglect to write, information will be vain.

His art of life certainly deserves to be known and studied. He lived in plenty and elegance upon an income, which, to many would appear indigent, and to most, scanty. How he lived, therefore, every man has an interest in knowing*. His death, I hope, was peaceful; it was surely happy.

I wish I had written sooner, lest, writing now, I

*He had laid down a plan of living proportioned to his income. He did not practise any extraordinary degree of parsimony; but endeavoured that in his family there should be plenty without waste. Not less than the tenth part of his income was set apart for charity. He was very considerate to his servants; he explained his injunctions to them distinctly; and, at their first coming into his service, steadily exacted a close and unremitting compliance with his rules: the servants finding this to be the case, soon grew habitually accustomed to their business; and then very little further attention was necessary. On extraordinary instances of good behaviour, or diligent service, he was not wanting in particular encouragements, and presents above their wages; and it is remarkable that he would permit their relations to visit them, and stay at his house two or three days at a time.-Every Monday morning he settled his family accounts, and so kept up a constant attention to the confining of his expenses within his income; and to do this more exactly, he compared those expenses with a computation he had made, how much that income would afford him every week

should renew your grief; but I could not forbear saying what I have said. Let me know how you all go on.-I continue to rise tolerably well, and I read more than I did.

Sir,

I am, sir,

Your most affectionate servant,

LETTER XI.

Samuel Johnson.

To Mr. William Drummond.

Johnson's Court, Fleet Street, Aug. 13, 1766.

I did not expect to hear that it could be, in an assembly convened for the propagation of Christian knowledge, a question whether any nation uninstructed in religion should receive instruction; or whether that instruction should be imparted to them by a translation of the Holy Books into their own language*. If obeand day of the year. One of his economical practices was, as soon as any repair was wanting in or about his house, to have it immediately performed. When he had money to spare, he chose to lay in a provision of linen or clothes, or any other necessaries; as then, he said, he could afford it, which he might not be so well able to do when the actual want came. But the main particular that seems to have enabled him to do so much with his income, was, that he paid for every thing as soon as he had it, except, alone, what were current accounts, such as rent for his house and servants' wages; and these he paid at the stated times with the utmost exactness. He gave notice to the tradesmen of the neighbouring towns that they should no longer have his custom, if they let any of his servants have any thing without their paying for it. Thus he put it out of his power to commit those imprudences to which people are liable who defer their payments.

* Some of the members of the society in Scotland for propagating Christian knowledge, had opposed the scheme of translating the Holy Scriptures into the Erse or Gaelic language, from political considerations of the disadvantage of keeping up the distinction between the Highlanders and the other inhabitants of North Britain.

dience to the will of God be necessary to happiness, and knowledge of his will be necessary to obedience, I know not how he who withholds this knowledge, or delays it, can be said to love his neighbour as himself. He, who voluntarily continues ignorance, is guilty of all the crimes which ignorance produces; as to him who should extinguish the tapers of a lighthouse, might justly be imputed the calamities of shipwrecks. Christianity is the perfection of humanity; and as no man is good but as he wishes the good of others, no man can be good in the highest degree, who wishes not to others the largest measure of the greatest good.

I am not very willing that any language should be totally extinguished. The similitude and derivation of languages afford the most indubitable proof of the traduction of nations, and the genealogy of mankind. They often add physical certainty to historical evidence; and often supply the only evidence of ancient migrations, and of the revolutions of ages which left no written monuments behind them.

Every man's opinions, at least his desires, are a little influenced by his favourite studies. My zeal for languages may seem, perhaps, rather over-heated, even to those by whom I desire to be well esteemed. To those who have nothing in their thoughts but trade or policy, present power, or present money, I should not think it necessary to defend my opinions: but with men of letters I would not unwillingly compound, by wishing the continuance of every language, however narrow in its extent, or however incommodious for common purposes, till it is reposited in some version of a known book, that it may be always hereafter examined and compared with other languages; and then permitting its disuse. For this purpose, the translation of the Bible is much to be

[ocr errors]
« ÎnapoiContinuă »