was employed in that painful drudgery. Ha was likewise to collect all such small tracts as were in any degrees worth preserving, in order to reprint and publish the whole in a collection, called "The Harleian Miscellany." The cata logue was completed: and the Miscellany, in 1749, was published in eight quarto volumes. In this business Johnson was a day-labourer for immediate subsistence, not unlike Gustavus Vasa working in the mines of Dalecarlia. What said to Johnson, on his first arrival in town, Wilcox, a bookseller of eminence in the Strand, was now almost confirmed. He lent our author five guineas, and then asked him, “How do you mean to earn your livelihood in this town?" Wilcox, staring at him, shook his head: "By "By my literary labours," was the answer. your literary labours!-You had better buy a porter's knot."

dote to Mr. Nichols; but he said, "Wilcox was
Johnson used to tell this anec-
one of my best friends, and he meant well.'
"In
fact, Johnson, while employed in Gray's-Inn,
paused occasionally to peruse the book that came
may be said to have carried a porter's knot. He
to his hand. Osborne thought that such curio-

by himself on the following occasion: Mr. Wedderburne (now Lord Loughborough,)* Dr. Johnson, Dr. Francis (the translator of Horace,) the present writer, and others, dined with the late Mr. Foote. An important debate towards the end of Sir Robert Walpole's administration being mentioned, Dr. Francis observed, "That Mr. Pitt's speech, on that occasion, was the best he had ever read." He added, "That he had employed eight years of his life in the study of Demosthenes, and finished a translation of that celebrated orator, with all the decorations of style and language within the reach of his capacity; but he had met with nothing equal to the speech above-mentioned." Many of the company remembered the debate; and some passages were cited, with the approbation and applause of all present. During the ardour of conversation Johnson remained silent. As soon as the warmth of praise subsided, he opened with these words: "That speech I wrote in a garret in Exeter-street. The company was struck with astonishment. After staring at each other in silent amaze, Dr. Francis asked, "How that speech could be written by him?" Sir," said Johnson, "Isity tended to nothing but delay, and objected wrote it in Exeter-street. I never had been in the gallery of the House of Commons but once. Cave had interest with the door-keepers. He, and the persons employed under him, gained admittance; they brought away the subject of discussion, the names of the speakers, the side they took, and the order in which they rose, together with notes of the arguments advanced in the course of the debate. The whole was afterwards communicated to me, and I composed the speeches in the form which they now have in the Parliamentary Debates." That the history of an author must be found To this dis- in his works, is, in general, a true observation; covery Dr. Francis made answer: "Then, Sir, and was never more apparent than in the preyou have exceeded Demosthenes himself; for to say that you have exceeded Francis's Demos- fixed by his writings. In 1744, he published sent narrative. Every era of Johnson's life is thenes, would be saying nothing." The rest of the life of Savage; and then projected a new the company bestowed lavish encomiums on edition of Shakspeare. Johnson; one, in particular, praised his im-design, he published, in 1745, "Miscellaneous As a prelude to that partiality; observing, that he dealt out reason and eloquence with an equal hand to both Remarks on Observations on the Tragedy of Macbeth, with parties. "That is not quite true," said John- tion;" to which were prefixed, “ Sir Thomas Hanmer's Edison; "I saved appearances tolerably well; but Proposals for I took care that the whig dogs should not have a new Edition of Shakspeare," with a specithe best of it." The sale of the Magazine was Of this pamphlet Warburton, in the greatly increased by the Parliamentary Debates, Preface to Shakspeare, has given his opinion: which were continued by Johnson till the month published under the title of Essays, Re"As to all those things, which have been of March 1742-3. From that time the Maga- marks, Observations, &c. on Shakspeare, if zine was conducted by Dr. Hawkesworth. given as a specimen of a projected edition, and you except some critical notes on Macbeth, written, as appears, by a man of parts and

In 1743-4, Osborne, the bookseller, who kept a shop in Gray's- Inn, purchased the Earl of Oxford's library, at the price of thirteen thousand pounds. He projected a catalogue in five octavo volumes, at five shillings each.

Johnson

Afterwards Earl of Roslin. He died Jan. 8, 1805.

to it with all the pride and insolence of a man
dispute that of course ensued, Osborne, with that
who knew that he paid daily wages. In the
roughness which was natural to him, enforced
his argument by giving the lie. Johnson seized
a folio and knocked the bookseller down.
story has been related as an instance of John-
son's ferocity; but merit cannot always take
spirit.
the spurns of the unworthy with a patient

men.

This

Mr. Boswell says, "The simple truth I had from Johnson himself. Sir, he was impertinent to me, and 1 beat him; but it was not in his shop, it was in my own chamber.""

means to drink: and mangles what he means to
carve. Inattentive to all the regards of social
life, he mis-times and mis-places every thing.
He disputes with heat indiscriminately, mindless
of the rank, character, and situation of those
with whom he disputes. Absolutely ignorant
of the several gradations of familiarity and
respect, he is exactly the same to his superiors,
his equals, and his inferiors; and therefore, by
a necessary consequence, is absurd to two of the
three. Is it possible to love such a man? No.
The utmost I can do for him is, to consider him
a respectable Hottentot." Such was the idea
entertained by lord Chesterfield. After the
incident of Colley Cibber, Johnson never re-

In his high and decisive

tone, he has been often heard to say, "Lord
Chesterfield is a Wit among Lords, and a Lord
among Wits."

genius, the rest are absolutely below a serious | any where, but down his throat, whatever he
notice." But the attention of the public was
not excited; there was no friend to promote a
subscription; and the project died, to revive at
a future day. A new undertaking, however,
was soon after proposed; namely, an English
Dictionary upon an enlarged plan. Several of
the most opulent booksellers had meditated a
work of this kind; and the agreement was soon
adjusted between the parties. Emboldened by
this connection, Johnson thought of a better
habitation than he had hitherto known. He
had lodged with his wife in courts and alleys
about the Strand; but now, for the purpose of
carrying on his arduous undertaking, and to be
nearer his printer and friend, Mr. Strahan, he
ventured to take a house in Gough-square, Fleet-peated his visits.
street. He was told that the Earl of Chester-
field was a friend to his undertaking; and in
consequence of that intelligence, he published, in
1747, The Plan of a Dictionary of the English
Language, addressed to the Right Honourable
Philip Dormer, Earl of Chesterfield, one of his
Majesty's principal Secretaries of State. Mr.
Whitehead, afterwards Poet Laureat, undertook
to convey the manuscript to his Lordship: the
consequence was an invitation from Lord Ches-
terfield to the author. A stronger contrast of
characters could not be brought together; the
Nobleman celebrated for his wit, and all the
graces of polite behaviour; the Author, con-
scious of his own merit, towering in idea above
all competition, versed in scholastic logic, but a
stranger to the arts of polite conversation, un-
couth, vehement, and vociferous. The coali-
tion was too unnatural. Johnson expected a
Mæcenas, and was disappointed. No patron-
age, no assistance followed. Visits were re-
peated; but the reception was not cordial. John-
son one day was left a full hour, waiting in an
antichamber, till a gentleman should retire, and
leave his lordship at leisure. This was the fa-
mous Colley Cibber. Johnson saw him go, and
fired with indignation, rushed out of the house.*
What Lord Chesterfield thought of his visitor
may be seen in a passage in one of that Noble-
man's letters to his son.+ "There is a man,
whose moral character, deep learning, and su-
perior parts, I acknowledge, admire, and re-
spect; but whom it is so impossible for me to
love, that I am almost in a fever whenever I am
in his company. His figure (without being de-
formed) seems made to disgrace or ridicule the
common structure of the human body. His legs
and arms are never in the position which, ac-
cording to the situation of his body, they ought to
be in, but constantly employed in committing
acts of hostility upon the Graces. He throws

Dr. Johnson denies the whole of this story. See Boswell's Life. vol. i. p. 128. Oct. Edit. 1801. C. + Letter CCXII.

In the course of the year 1747, Garrick, in conjunction with Lacy, became patentee of Drury-Lane playhouse. For the opening of the theatre, at the usual time, Johnson wrote for his friend the well-known prologue, which, to say no more of it, may at least be placed on a level with Pope's to the tragedy of Cato. The playhouse being now under Garrick's direction, Johnson thought the opportunity fair to think of his tragedy of Irene, which was his whole stock on his first arrival in town, in the year 1737. That play was aecordingly put into rehearsal in January, 1749. As a precursor to prepare the way, and to awaken the public attention, The Vanity of Human Wishes, a poem in imitation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal, by the Author of London, was published in the same month. In the Gentleman's Magazine, for February, 1749, we find that the tragedy of Irene was acted at Drury-Lane, on Monday, February the 6th, and from that time, without interruption, to Monday, February the 20th being in all thirteen nights. Since that time it has not been exhibited on any stage. Irene may be added to some other plays in our language, which have lost their place in the theatre, but continue to please in the closet. During the representation of this piece, Johnson attended every night behind the scenes. Conceiving that his character as an author required some ornament for his person, he chose upon that occasion to decorate himself with a handsome waistcoat, and a gold-laced hat. The late Mr. Topham Beauclerc, who had a great deal of that humour, which pleases the more for seeming undesigned, used to give a pleasant description of this green-room finery, as related by the author himself; "But," said Johnson, with great gravity, "I soon laid aside my gold-laced hat, lest it should make me proud." The amount of the three benefit nights for the tragedy of Irene, it is to be feared, was not very considerable, as

See

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the profit, that stimulating motive, never invit- | down upon the memory of his friend the bittered the author to another dramatic attempt. Some years afterwards, when the present writer was intimate with Garrick, and knew Johnson to be in distress, he asked the manager why he did not produce another tragedy for his Litchfield friend? Garrick's answer was remarkable: "When Johnson writes tragedy, declamation roars, and passion sleeps: when Shakespeare wrote, he dipped his pen in his own heart."

There may, perhaps, be a degree of sameness in this regular way of tracing an author from one work to another, and the reader may feel the effect of a tedious monotony: but in the life of Johnson there are no other landmarks. He was now forty years old, and had mixed but little with the world. He followed no profession, transacted no business, and was a stranger to what is called a town life. We are now arrived at the brightest period he had hitherto known. His name broke out upon mankind with a degree of lustre that promised a triumph over all his difficulties. The Life of Savage was admired as a beautiful and instructive piece of biography. The two imitations of Juvenal were thought to rival even the excellence of Pope; and the tragedy of Irene, though uninteresting on the stage, was universally admired in the closet, for the propriety of the sentiments, the richness of the language, and the general harmony of the whole composition. His fame was widely diffused; and he had made his agreement with the booksellers for his English Dictionary at the sum of fifteen hundred guineas; a part of which was to be, from time to time, advanced in proportion to the progress of the work. This was a certain fund for his support, without being obliged to write fugitive pieces for the petty supplies of the day. Accordingly we find that, In 1749, he established a club, consisting of ten in number, at Horseman's, in Ivy-Lane, on every Tuesday evening. This is the first scene of social life to which Johnson can be traced out of his own house. The members of this little society were, Samuel Johnson; Dr. Salter (father of the late Master of the Charter-House); Dr. Hawkesworth; Mr. Ryland, a merchant; Mr. Payne, a bookseller, in Paternoster-row; Mr. Samuel Dyer, a learned young man; Dr. Wm. M'Ghie, a Scotch physician; Dr. Edmund Barker, a young physician; Dr. Bathurst, another young physician; and Sir John Hawkins. This list is given by Sir John, as it should seem, with no other view than to draw a spiteful and malevolent character of almost every one of them. Mr. Dyer, whom Sir John says he loved with the affection of a brother, meets with the harshest treatment, because it was his maxim, that to live in peace with mankind, and in a temper to do good offices, was the most essential part of o our duty. That notion of moral goodness gave umbrage to Sir John Hawkins, and drew

est imputations. Mr. Dyer, however, was admired and loved through life. He was a man of literature. Johnson loved to enter with him into a discussion of metaphysical, moral, and critical subjects; in those conflicts, exercising his talents, and, according to his custom, always contending for victory. Dr. Bathurst was the person on whom Johnson fixed his affection. He hardly ever spoke of him without tears in his eyes. It was from him, who was a native of Jamaica, that Johnson received into his service Frank, the black servant, whom, on account of his master, he valued to the end of his life. At the time of instituting the club in Ivy-Lane, Johnson had projected the Rambler. The title was most probably suggested by the Wanderer ; a poem which he mentions with the warmest praise, in the Life of Savage. With the same spirit of independence with which he wished to live, it was now his pride to write. He communicated his plan to none of his friends; he desired no assistance, relying entirely on his own fund, and the protection of the Divine Being, which he implored in a solemn form of prayer, composed by himself for the occasion. Having formed a resolution to undertake a work that might be of use and honour to his country, he thought, with Milton, that this was not to be obtained "but by devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit that can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and send out his seraphim with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases.'

Having invoked the special protection of Heaven, and by that act of piety fortified his mind, he began the great work of the Rambler. The first number was published on Tuesday, March the 20th, 1750; and from that time was continued regularly every Tuesday and Saturday, for the space of two years, when it finally closed, on Saturday, March 14, 1752. As it began with motives of piety, so it appears that the same religious spirit glowed with unabating ardour to the last. His conclusion is: "The Essays professedly serious, if I have been able to execute my own intentions, will be found exactly conformable to the precepts of Christianity, without any accommodation to the licentiousness and levity of the present age. I therefore look back on this part of my work with pleasure, which no man shall diminish or augment. I shall never envy the honours which wit and learning obtain in any other cause, if I can be numbered among the writers who have given ardour to virtue, and confidence to truth." The whole number of Essays amounted to two hundred and eight. Addison's, in the Spectator, are

See Gent. Mag. vol. lxxi. p. 190.

pro

more in number, but not half in point of quan- | and advertised it under the title of "An Essay tity: Addison was not bound to publish on on Milton's Use and Imitation of the Moderns, stated days; he could watch the ebb and flow of in his Paradise Lost; dedicated to the Universihis genius, and send his paper to the press when ties of Oxford and Cambridge." While the his own taste was satisfied. Johnson's case was book was in the press, the proof-sheets were very different. He wrote singly and alone. In shown to Johnson at the Ivy-Lane club, by the whole progress of the work he did not receive Payne, the bookseller, who was one of the more than ten essays. This was a scanty con- members. No man in that society was in postribution. For the rest, the author has de- session of the authors from whom Lauder scribed his situation. "He that condemns him- fessed to make his extracts. The charge was self to compose on a stated day, will often believed, and the contriver of it found his way bring to his task an attention dissipated, a me- to Johnson; who is represented by Sir John mory embarrassed, an imagination overwhelmed, Hawkins, not indeed as an accomplice in the a mind distracted with anxieties, a body lan- fraud, but through motives of malignity to Milguishing with disease: he will labour on a bar- ton, delighting in the detection, and exulting ren topic, till it is too late to change it; or, in that the poet's reputation would suffer by the the ardour of invention, diffuse his thoughts into discovery. More malice to a deceased friend wild exuberance, which the pressing hour of cannot well be imagined. Hawkins adds, publication cannot suffer judgment to examine "that he wished well to the argument must be or reduce." Of this excellent production, the inferred from the preface, which indubitably number sold on each day did not amount to five was written by him." The preface, it is well hundred of course the bookseller, who paid the known, was written by Johnson, and for that author four guineas a week, did not carry on a reason is inserted in this edition. But if Johnsuccessful trade. His generosity and persever- son approved of the argument, it was no longer ance deserve to be commended; and happily, than while he believed it founded in truth. Let when the collection appeared in volumes, were us advert to his own words in that very preface. amply rewarded. Johnson lived to see his la- "Among the inquiries to which the ardour of bours flourish in a tenth edition. His posterity, criticism has naturally given occasion, none is as an ingenious French writer has said on a si- more obscure in itself, or more worthy of ramilar occasion, began in his lifetime. tional curiosity, than a retrospection of the progress of this mighty genius in the construction of his work; a view of the fabric gradually ris

:

In the beginning of 1750, soon after the Rambler was set on foot, Johnson was induced by the arts of a vile impostor to lend his assist-ing, perhaps from small beginnings, till its ance, during a temporary delusion, to a fraud not to be paralleled in the annals of literature.* One Lauder, a native of Scotland, who had been a teacher in the University of Edinburgh, had conceived a mortal antipathy to the name and character of Milton. His reason was, because the prayer of Pamela, in Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, was, as he supposed, maliciously inserted by the great poet in an edition of the Eikon Basilike, in order to fix an imputation of impiety on the memory of the murdered king. Fired with resentment, and willing to reap the profits of a gross imposition, this man collected from several Latin poets, such as Masenius the Jesuit, Staphorstius a Dutch divine, Beza, and others, all such passages as bore any kind of resemblance to different places in the Paradise Lost; and these he published from time to time, in the Gentleman's Magazine, with occasional interpolations of lines, which he himself translated from Milton. The public credulity swallowed all with eagerness; and Milton was supposed to be guilty of plagiarism from inferior modern writers. The fraud succeeded so well, that Lauder collected the whole into a volume,

It has since been paralleled, in the case of the Shakspeare MSS. by a yet more vile impostor.

foundation rests in the centre, and its turrets sparkle in the skies; to trace back the structure, through all its varieties, to the simplicity of the first plan; to find what was projected, whence the scheme was taken, how it was improved, by what assistance it was executed, and from what stores the materials were collected; whether its founder dug them from the quarries of nature, or demolished other buildings to embellish his own." These were the motives that induced Johnson to assist Lauder with a preface: and are not these the motives of a critic and a scholar? What reader of taste, what man of real knowledge, would not think his time well employed in an inquiry so curious, so interesting, and instructive? If Lauder's facts were really true, who would not be glad, without the smallest tincture of malevolence, to receive real information? It is painful to be thus obliged to vindicate a man who, in his heart, towered above the petty arts of fraud and imposition, against an injudicious biographer, who undertook to be his editor, and the protector of his memory. Another writer, Dr. Towers, in an Essay on the Life and Character of Dr. Johnson, seems to countenance this calumny. He says, "It can hardly be doubted, but that Johnson's aversion to Milton's politics was the cause of that alacrity with

from the charge of Plagiarism brought against him by Mr. Lauder, and Lauder himself convicted of several Forgeries and gross Impositions on the Public, by John Douglas, M. A⚫ Rector of Eaton Constantine, Salop," was not published till the year 1751. In that work, p. 77, Dr. Douglas says, "It is to be hoped, nay, it is expected, that the elegant and nervous writer, whose judicious sentiments and inimitable style point out the author of Lauder's preface and postscript, will no longer allow A MAN to plume himself with his feathers, who appears so little to have deserved his assistance, an assistance which I am persuaded would never have been communicated, had there been the least suspicion of those facts, which I have been the instrument of conveying to the world." We have here a contemporary testimony to the integrity of Dr. Johnson throughout the whole of that vile transaction. What was the consequence of the requisition made by Dr. Douglas? Johnson, whose ruling passion may be said to be the love of truth, convinced Lauder, that it would be more for his interest to make a full confession of his guilt, than to stand forth the convicted champion of a lie; and for this purpose he drew up, in the strongest terms, a recantation, in a Letter to the Rev. Mr. Douglas, which Lauder signed, and published in the year 1751. That

which he joined with Lauder in his infamous attack on our great epic poet, and which induced him to assist in that transaction." These words would seem to describe an accomplice, were they not immediately followed by an express declaration, that Johnson was unacquainted with the imposture. Dr. Towers adds, "It seems to have been by way of making some compensation to the memory of Milton, for the share he had in the attack of Lauder, that Johnson wrote the Prologue, spoken by Garrick, at Drury-Lane Theatre, 1750, on the performance of the Masque of Comus, for the benefit of Milton's granddaughter." Dr. Towers is not free from prejudice; but, as Shakspeare has it, "he begets a temperance, to give it smoothness." He is, therefore, entitled to a dispassionate answer. When Johnson wrote the prologue, it does not appear that he was aware of the malignant artifices practised by Lauder. In the postscript to Johnson's preface, a subscription is proposed, for relieving the grand-daughter of the author of Paradise Lost. Dr. Towers will agree that this shows Johnson's alacrity in doing good. That alacrity showed itself again in the letter printed in the European Magazine, January, 1785, and there said to have appeared originally in the General Advertiser, 4th April, 1750, by which the public were invited to embrace the opportunity of paying a just regard to the illus-piece will remain a lasting memorial of the ab trious dead, united with the pleasure of doing good to the living. The letter adds, "to assist industrious indigence, struggling with distress, and debilitated by age, is a display of virtue, and an acquisition of happiness and honour. Whoever, therefore, would be thought capable of pleasure in reading the works of our incomparable Milton, and not so destitute of gratitude as to refuse to lay out a trifle, in a rational and elegant entertainment, for the benefit of his living remains, for the exercise of their own virtue, the increase of their reputation, and the consciousness of doing good, should appear at Drury-Lane Theatre, to-morrow, April 5, when COMUS will be performed for the benefit of Mrs. Elizabeth Foster, grand-daughter to the author, and the only surviving branch of his family. Nota bene, there will be a new prologue on the occasion, written by the author of Irene, and spoken by Mr. Garrick." The man who had thus exerted himself to serve the grand-daughter, cannot be supposed to have entertained personal malice to the grand-father. It is true, that the malevolence of Lauder, as well as the impostures of Archibald Bower, were fully detected by the labours, in the cause of truth, of the Rev. Dr. Douglas, the late Lord Bishop of Salisbury.

"Diram qui contudit Hydram, Notaque fatali portenta labore subegit." But the pamphlet, entitled, "Milton vindicated

horrence with which Johnson beheld a violation
of truth. Mr. Nichols, whose attachment to
his illustrious friend was unwearied, showed
him, in 1780, a book called " Remarks on John -
son's Life of Milton," in which the affair of
Lauder was renewed with virulence, and a po-
etical scale in the Literary Magazine, 1758,
(when Johnson had ceased to write in that col-
lection) was urged as an additional proof of de-
liberate malice. He read the libellous passage
with attention, and instantly wrote on the mar-
gin:
"In the business of Lauder I was de-
ceived, partly by thinking the man too frantic
to be fraudulent. Of the poetical scale quoted
from the Magazine I am not the author. I
fancy it was put in after I had quitted that
work; for I not only did not write it, but I do
not remember it." As a critic and a scholar,
Johnson was willing to receive what numbers,
at the time, believed to be true information :
when he found that the whole was a forgery, he
renounced all connection with the author.

In March 1752, he felt a severe stroke of affiction in the death of his wife. The last number of the Rambler, as already mentioned, was on the 14th of that month. The loss of Mrs. Johnson was then approaching, and probably was the cause that put an end to those admirable periodical essays. It appears that she died on the 28th of March: in a memorandum, at the foot of the Prayers and Meditations, that is called her Dying Day. She was buried at