Baron Thomas Babington Macaulay Macaulay

Page 1. Line 4. Lichfield. Observe how near Lichfield comes to being in the exact center of England.

1 4–5. the midland counties. As you run your eye over the map, what counties should you naturally include under this head? In what county is Lichfield?

1 9. oracle. "Johnson, the Lichfield librarian, is now here; he propagates learning all over this diocese, and advanceth knowledge to its just height; all the clergy here are his pupils, and suck all they have from him."—From a letter written by Rev. George Plaxton, quoted by Boswell.

1 10–11. a strong religious and political sympathy. Macaulay's use of the article would lead us to think that the two kinds of sympathy were very closely connected. Michael Johnson was a member of the Established Church of England, and at heart a believer in the "divine right" kings. The student who is not familiar with the history of this period will do well to look up Jacobite in Brewer's Historic Note-book and then to read in some brief history an account of the sovereigns in possession who followed James II,—William and Mary (1689–1702) and Anne (1702–1714). Boswell says, "He no doubt had an early attachment to the House of Stuart; but his zeal had cooled as his reason strengthened."

1 16. In the child. Pause to take the glimpse ahead which this sentence gives. The construction helps one to remember the three kinds of peculiarities and the order in which they are mentioned.

2 26. Augustan delicacy of taste. You may read in Harper's Dictionary of Classical Literature and Antiquities, in the article on Augustus CÆsar, how "the court of Augustus thus became a school of culture, where men of genius acquired that delicacy of taste, elevation of sentiment, and purity of expression which characterize the writers of the age."

2 32. Petrarch. Does Macaulay imply that Petrarch is one of "the great restorers of learning"? See Renaissance in The Century Dictionary and Harper's Dictionary of Classical Literature and Antiquities. Note that Petrarch "may be said to have rediscovered Greek, which for some six centuries had been lost to the western world." Keep in mind, too, that his friend and disciple, Boccaccio, translated Homer into Latin.

3 11. Pembroke College. The University of Oxford consists of twenty-one colleges which together form a corporate body. The colleges are "endowed by their founders and others with estates and benefices; out of the revenue arising from the estates, as well as other resources, the Heads and Senior and Junior Members on the foundation receive an income, and the expenses of the colleges are defrayed. Members not on the foundation, called 'independent members,' reside entirely at their own expense." Among the members on the foundation are the Heads, Fellows, and Scholars.

3 17–18. Macrobius. A Roman grammarian who probably lived at the beginning of the fifth century.

3 20. about three years. Apparently Johnson remained at Oxford only fourteen months. See Dr. Hill's Dr. Johnson, His Friends and His Critics.

4 1–2. "It was bitterness which they mistook for frolic. I was miserably poor, and I thought to fight my way by my literature and my wit; so I disregarded all power and all authority."—Johnson, quoted by Boswell. Although aware of what he considered the defects of his college, Johnson loved Pembroke as long as he lived. He delighted in boasting of its eminent graduates and would have left to it his house at Lichfield had not wiser friends induced him to bequeath it to some poor relatives.

4 15–16. his father died. "I now therefore see that I must make my own fortune. Meanwhile let me take care that the powers of my mind be not debilitated by poverty, and that indigence do not force me into any criminal act."—Johnson, quoted by Boswell.

5 32. Walmesley. "I am not able to name a man of equal knowledge. His acquaintance with books was great, and what he did not immediately know, he could, at least, tell where to find."—Johnson, quoted by Boswell.

6 13. Politian. Another of "the great restorers of learning" (see 2 31). His beginning of a translation of the Iliad into Latin attracted the attention of Lorenzo de' Medici, under whose patronage he became one of the first scholars of Italy.

6 17. fell in love. Boswell says that Johnson's early attachments to the fair sex were "very transient," and considers it but natural that when the passion of love once seized him it should be exceedingly strong, concentrated as it was in one object. 6 22. Queensberrys and Lepels. Families of high rank in England.

7 3–4. half ludicrous. Carlyle says it is no matter for ridicule that the man "whose look all men both laughed at and shuddered at, should find any brave female heart, to acknowledge, at first sight and hearing of him, 'This is the most sensible man I ever met with'; and then, with generous courage, to take him to itself, and say Be thou mine!... Johnson's deathless affection for his Tetty was always venerable and noble."

7 6–7. At Edial. Although this enterprise did not prosper, the man, as Carlyle says, "was to become a Teacher of grown gentlemen, in the most surprising way; a man of Letters, and Ruler of the British Nation for some time,—not of their bodies merely, but of their minds; not over them, but in them."

7 13. David Garrick. The mere fact that this celebrated actor and successful manager brought out twenty-four of Shakspere's plays is reason enough why we should look him up. A slight knowledge of his career enables one to enjoy all the more the frequent references to him in Boswell's Life of Johnson. After reading the sketch in the EncyclopÆdia Britannica it would be a good plan to read Boswell's references consecutively by means of the index.

8 9. Fielding. For an enjoyable short sketch of the first great English novelist, see Thackeray's English Humourists.

8 10. The Beggar's Opera, by John Gay, appeared in 1728.

8 19. knot. See The Century Dictionary.

8 34. Drury Lane. A street in the heart of the city, near the Strand,—one of the chief thoroughfares. It was beginning to lose its old-time respectability.

9 9. the sight of food. Once when Boswell was giving a dinner and one of the company was late, Boswell proposed to order dinner to be served, adding, "'Ought six people to be kept waiting for one?' 'Why, yes,' answered Johnson, with a delicate humanity, 'if the one will suffer more by your sitting down than the six will do by waiting.'" Is it probable that Macaulay exaggerates?

9 27. Harleian Library. The library collected by Robert Harley, First Earl of Oxford. Osborne afterwards bought it and Johnson did some of the cataloguing for him. As to Osborne's punishment, Boswell says: "The simple truth I had from Johnson himself. 'Sir, he was impertinent to me, and I beat him. But it was not in his shop: it was in my own chamber.'"

10 6. Blefuscu, Mildendo. If Blefuscu and Mildendo look unfamiliar, go to Lilliput for them. (See Gulliver's Travels.) 10 9. "Johnson told me, that as soon as he found that the speeches were thought genuine, he determined that he would write no more of them; for he 'would not be accessory to the propagation of falsehood.'"—Boswell.

10 15. Cf. The Traveller. Do you suppose that either Johnson or Goldsmith really believed that one form of government is as good as another?

10 17. Montagues. See Shakspere's Romeo and Juliet.

10 18. Greens. In Roman chariot races there was the bitterest rivalry between the different colors of the factions, and the betting often led to scenes of riot and bloodshed. Once in Justinian's reign, in the great circus at Constantinople, the tumult was not suppressed till about thirty thousand of the rioters had been killed. See Gibbon, Decline and Fall, Chapter XL.

10 22. Sacheverell. What do you gather from the context about this preacher? Was he high church? Did he preach resistance to the king?

10 31. Tom Tempest. See Johnson's Idler, No. 10.

10 32. Laud. Read in Gardiner's Student's History of England the account of this archbishop who tried to enforce uniformity of worship.

11 2–4. Hampden, Falkland, Clarendon. In the case of these three statesmen, as well as in the case of Laud, the context shows which of them were supporters of Charles I and which resisted him. Does Macaulay imply that Johnson would have been excusable if he had sympathized with Hampden's refusal to pay "ship money"?

11 5. Roundheads. If you do not know why they were so called, see The Century Dictionary.

11 20–21. Great Rebellion. If in doubt as to which rebellion Macaulay refers, see The Century Dictionary or Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable.

12 2, 8, 10. Juvenal. Dryden has translated five of the poems of this great Roman satirist. It is worth while to compare Johnson's London, a free imitation of the Third Satire, with Dryden's version. Johnson's poem may be found in Hales's Longer English Poems.

12 19. Boswell, too, asks us to remember Pope's candor and liberal conduct on this occasion. Let us not forget it.

13 8. Psalmanazar. Pretending to be a Japanese, this Frenchman wrote what he called a History of Formosa. Although fabulous, it deceived the learned world.

13 14–15. blue ribands. Worn by members of the Order of the Garter. 13 16. Newgate. The notorious London prison.

13 26. Piazza here has its first meaning,—"an open square in a town surrounded by buildings or colonnades, a plaza." This space was once the "convent" garden of the monks of Westminster. For a brief sketch of it down to the time its "coffee houses and taverns became the fashionable lounging-places for the authors, wits, and noted men of the kingdom," see The Century Dictionary.

14 11–12. Grub Street. "Originally the name of a street in Moorfields in London, much inhabited by writers of small histories, dictionaries, and temporary poems; whence any mean production is called grubstreet.

'I'd sooner ballads write, and grubstreet lays.' Gay."

—Johnson's Dictionary, edition of 1773.

14 23. Warburton. Bishop Warburton thus praised Johnson in the Preface to his own edition of Shakspere, and Johnson showed his appreciation by saying to Boswell, "He praised me at a time when praise was of value to me." On another occasion, when asked whether he considered Warburton a superior critic to Theobald, he replied, "He'd make two-and-fifty Theobalds, cut into slices!" Johnson's sketch of him, in the Life of Pope, Boswell calls "the tribute due to him when he was no longer in 'high place,' but numbered with the dead."

14 28–31. He employed six amanuenses, not a large number of assistants for a task of such magnitude. Nor was the sum of fifteen hundred guineas a generous one from which to pay these assistants.

14 33. Chesterfield. Every young man should read an abridged edition of Chesterfield's Letters to his Son; for example, the volume in the Knickerbocker Nugget Series. It contains much that is worth remembering, and the style is entertaining.

15 17. It is hard to realize what a stupendous task Johnson undertook when he began his Dictionary. Other dictionaries, notably Bailey's, were in existence, but they were mere beginnings of what he had in mind. As lists of words, with explanations of the meanings, they were useful, but none of them could reasonably be considered a standard. A standard Johnson's certainly was. Although no etymologist, in general he not only gave full and clear definitions, but he chose remarkably happy illustrations of the meanings of words. By taking care, also, to select passages which were interesting and profitable reading as well as elegant English, he succeeded in making probably the most readable dictionary that has ever appeared. 15 23. For the Vanity of Human Wishes, see Hales's Longer English Poems or Syle's From Milton to Tennyson. As in the case of London, the student will wish to compare Dryden's translation.

16 8–9. And this was eleven years after the London had appeared; as Boswell says, his fame was already established.

16 13. Goodman's Fields. Garrick made this theater successful.

16 15. Drury Lane Theatre. Near Drury Lane. (See note to 8 34.) Other prominent actors in this famous old theatre were Kean, the Kembles, and Mrs. Siddons.

17 13. See page 7. The story on which Irene is based is as follows:—

Mahomet the Great, first emperor of the Turks, in the year 1453 laid siege to the city of Constantinople, then possessed by the Greeks, and, after an obstinate resistance, took and sacked it. Among the many young women whom the commanders thought fit to lay hands on and present to him was one named Irene, a Greek, of incomparable beauty and such rare perfection of body and mind, that the emperor, becoming enamored of her, neglected the care of his government and empire for two whole years, and thereby so exasperated the Janizaries, that they mutinied and threatened to dethrone him. To prevent this mischief, Mustapha Bassa, a person of great credit with him, undertook to represent to him the great danger to which he lay exposed by the indulgence of his passion: he called to his remembrance the character, actions, and achievements of his predecessors, and the state of his government; and, in short, so roused him from his lethargy, that he took a horrible resolution to silence the clamors of his people by the sacrifice of this admirable creature. Accordingly, he commanded her to be dressed and adorned in the richest manner that she and her attendants could devise, and against a certain hour issued orders for the nobility and leaders of his army to attend him in the great hall of his palace. When they were all assembled, himself appeared with great pomp and magnificence, leading his captive by the hand, unconscious of guilt and ignorant of his design. With a furious and menacing look, he gave the beholders to understand that he meant to remove the cause of their discontent; but bade them first view that lady, whom he held with his left hand, and say whether any of them, possessed of a jewel so rare and precious, would for any cause forego her; to which they answered that he had great reason for his affection toward her. To this the emperor replied that he would convince them that he was yet master of himself. And having so said, presently, with one of his hands catching the fair Greek by the hair of the head, and drawing his falchion with the other, he, at one blow, struck off her head, to the great terror of them all; and having so done, he said unto them, "Now by this judge whether your emperor is able to bridle his affections or not."—Hawkins's Life of Johnson.

17 20–21. Tatler, Spectator. It is to be hoped that the reader needs no introduction to these papers or to the account of them in Macaulay's essay on Addison. 17 30. Rambler. A suitable title for a series of moral discourses? At the time of the undertaking he composed a prayer to the effect that he might in this way promote the glory of Almighty God and the salvation both of himself and others.—Prayers and Meditations, p. 9, quoted by Boswell.

17 31–32. Boswell considers it a strong confirmation of the truth of Johnson's remark that "a man may write at any time if he will set himself doggedly to it," that "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."

17 34. Richardson. Samuel Richardson. When he was a boy, the girls employed him to write love letters for them; and his novels, written in after life, also took the form of letters. He wrote Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded; Clarissa Harlowe, or the History of a Young Lady; and The History of Sir Charles Grandison (about 1750). Johnson called him "an author who has enlarged the knowledge of human nature and taught the passions to move at the command of virtue."

18 2. Young. Johnson held a high opinion of Edward Young's most famous work, Night Thoughts, and Boswell writes, "No book whatever can be recommended to young persons, with better hopes of seasoning their minds with vital religion, than Young's Night Thoughts."—Hartley. David Hartley, prominent as a psychologist, and as a physician benevolent and studious. For intimate friends he chose such men as Warburton and Young.

18 3. Dodington. A member of Parliament who patronized men of letters and was complimented by Young and Fielding.

18 7. Frederic. When Frederick, Prince of Wales, became the center of the opposition to Walpole, in 1737, among the leaders of his political friends, called "the Leicester House Party,"—at that time Leicester House was the residence of the Prince of Wales,—were Chesterfield, William Pitt, and Bubb Dodington.

18 25. In regard to the use of antiquated and hard words, for which Johnson was censured, he says in Idler No. 90, "He that thinks with more extent than another, will want words of larger meaning."

18 30–32. brilliancy ... eloquence ... humour. Johnson wrote many of these discourses so hastily, says Boswell, that he did not even read them over before they were printed. Boswell continues: "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." One man who knew Johnson intimately observed "that he always talked as if he was talking upon oath."

18 32–19 10. Cf. Johnson's comment: "Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison."—Boswell, 1750.

19 1–2. Sir Roger, etc. These two sets of allusions offer a good excuse for handling complete editions of the Spectator and the Rambler.

19 21. the Gunnings. "The beautiful Misses Gunning," two sisters, were born in Ireland. They went to London in 1751, were continually followed by crowds, and were called "the handsomest women alive."—Lady Mary. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Let one of the encyclopÆdias introduce you to this relative of Fielding who laughed at Pope when he made love to her, and whose wit had full play in the brilliant letters from Constantinople which added greatly to her reputation as an independent thinker.

19 23–24. the Monthly Review. This Whig periodical would not appeal to Johnson as did its rival, the Critical Review. It was the Monthly that Goldsmith did hack work for. Smollett wrote for the other. See Irving's Life of Goldsmith, Chapter VII.

19 31. It was published in 1755, price £4 10s., bound.

20 17. The letter, which needs no comment, is as follows:

February 7, 1755.

To the Right Honourable the Earl of Chesterfield.

My Lord,

I have been lately informed, by the proprietor of the World, that two papers, in which my Dictionary is recommended to the publick, were written by your Lordship. To be so distinguished, is an honour, which, being very little accustomed to favours from the great, I know not well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge.

When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your Lordship, I was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your address; and could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself Le vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre;—that I might obtain that regard for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so little encouraged that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in publick, I had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly scholar can possess. I have done all that I could; and no man is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.

20 24. Horne Tooke. A name assumed by John Horne, a politician and philologist whose career is briefly outlined in The Century Dictionary. The passage which so moved him follows.

This extract is taken from the fourth edition, London, MDCCLXXIII, the last to receive Johnson's corrections. If you possibly can get the opportunity, turn these volumes over enough to find a few of the whimsical definitions, such, for example, as that of lexicographer, according to Johnson "a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge." Other words worth looking up are excise, oats, and networks.

21 6. Junius and Skinner. Johnson frankly admitted that for etymologies he turned to the shelf which contained the etymological dictionaries of these seventeenth-century students of the Teutonic languages. This phase of dictionary making was not considered so deeply then as it is now.

21 13. spunging-houses. Johnson's Dictionary says: "Spunging-house. A house to which debtors are taken before commitment to prison, where the bailiffs sponge upon them, or riot at their cost."

21 26. Jenyns. This writer, who, according to Boswell, "could very happily play with a light subject," ventured so far beyond his depth that it was easy for Johnson to expose him.

22 10. Rasselas. Had Johnson written nothing else, says Boswell, Rasselas "would have rendered his name immortal in the world of literature.... It has been translated into most, if not all, of the modern languages."

22 12. Miss Lydia Languish. Of course plays are not necessarily written to be read, but Sheridan's well-known comedy, The Rivals, is decidedly readable. Every one should be familiar with Miss Languish and Mrs. Malaprop.

23 8. Bruce. The Dictionary of National Biography says that James Bruce—whose Travels to Discover the Sources of the Nile, five volumes, appeared in 1790—"will always remain the poet, and his work the epic, of African travel."

23 13. Mrs. Lennox. A woman whose literary efforts Johnson encouraged so much as he did Mrs. Lennox's is certainly worth looking up in the index to Boswell's Johnson.—Mrs. Sheridan, the dramatist's mother, gave Johnson many an entertaining evening in her home. She and her son entered heartily into the lively, stimulating conversations he loved. 23 25. Hector ... Aristotle. The sacking of Troy is generally assigned to the twelfth century B.C. Aristotle lived eight centuries later.—Julio Romano. An Italian painter of the fifteenth century.

24 5. the Lord Privy Seal. Some documents require only the privy seal; others must have the great seal too. For Johnson's admission that the printer was wise in striking out the reference alluded to, see the index to Boswell's Johnson, under Gower.

24 14. Oxford. By recalling what Macaulay said in the early part of the essay (10 26, 27) about Oxford, and by bearing in mind what House [of Stuart? of Hanover?] George the Third belonged to, one sees point to "was becoming loyal."

24 14–18. Study these four short sentences in connection with the preceding sentence beginning "George the Third." To what extent are they a repetition? To what extent an explanation?

24 22. accepted. When, in answer to Johnson's question to Lord Bute, "Pray, my Lord, what am I expected to do for this pension?" he received the ready reply, "It is not given you for anything you are to do, but for what you have done," he hesitated no longer.

Three hundred a year was a large sum in Johnson's eyes at that time. Whether he wrote less than he would have written without it may be questioned, says Mr. Hill, but he adds that probably "without the pension he would not have lived to write the second greatest of his works—the Lives of the Poets."

25 19. a ghost ... Cock Lane. If you will read Boswell's account of the affair, you will probably conclude that Johnson was not quite so "weak" as Macaulay implies.

25 26. Churchill. One of the reigning wits of the day, Boswell says.

26 3. The preface. Other critics speak with more enthusiasm of the good sense and the clear expression of the preface, and find that these qualities are not altogether lacking in the notes.

26 8. Wilhelm Meister. The hero of Goethe's novel of the same name. You may have read this passage on Hamlet in Rolfe's edition (p. 14), quoted from Furness's Hamlet, Vol. II, pp. 272 ff. Sprague also quotes it in his edition, p. 13.

26 26. Ben. The eighteenth-century Johnson has been followed by the nineteenth-century critics in putting a high estimate on the Jonson who wrote Every Man in His Humor. We are told that Shakspere took one of the parts in this play, acted in 1598. If you are not satisfied with the account in The Century Dictionary, or with any encyclopÆdia article, see The English Poets, edited by T.H. Ward, Vol. II (The Macmillan Company). 26 33–34. Æschylus, Euripides, Sophocles. Three great contemporary Greek tragedians.

27 3. Fletcher. Point out why an editor of Shakspere's plays should be familiar with the work of this group of Elizabethan dramatists.

27 11. Royal Academy. "His Majesty having the preceding year [1768] instituted the Royal Academy of Arts in London, Johnson had won the honour of being appointed Professor in Ancient Literature."—Boswell. Goldsmith was Professor in Ancient History in the same institution, and Boswell was Secretary for Foreign Correspondence. Look in The Century Dictionary under academy, the third meaning, and recall whatever you may have heard or read about the French Academy.

27 12. the King. "His Majesty expressed a desire to have the literary biography of this country ably executed, and proposed to Dr. Johnson to undertake it."—Boswell. Read Boswell's account of the interview. In consulting the index look under George III.

27 22. colloquial talents. Madame d'Arblay once said that Johnson had about him more "fun, and comical humour, and love of nonsense" than almost anybody else she ever saw.

28 23. Goldsmith. Macaulay's article on Goldsmith in The EncyclopÆdia Britannica is short, and so thoroughly readable that there is no excuse for not being familiar with it. Boswell is continually giving interesting glimpses of Dr. Oliver Goldsmith, and by taking advantage of the index in the Life of Johnson one may in half an hour learn a great deal about this remarkable man. According to Boswell, "he had sagacity enough to cultivate assiduously the acquaintance of Johnson, and his faculties were gradually enlarged by the contemplation of such a model."

28 24. Reynolds. We can learn from short articles about Sir Joshua's career, but the index to Boswell's Johnson will introduce us to the good times the great portrait painter had with the great conversationalist whom we are studying. Reynolds was the first proposer of the Club, and "there seems to have been hardly a day," says Robina Napier, "when these friends did not meet in the painting room or in general society." Ruskin says, "Titian paints nobler pictures and Vandyke had nobler subjects, but neither of them entered so subtly as Sir Joshua did into the minor varieties of human heart and temper." The business of his art "was not to criticise, but to observe," and for this purpose the hours he spent at the Club might be as profitable as those spent in his painting room. It will be interesting to make a list of some of the most notable "subjects" Reynolds painted.—Burke. Be sure to read Boswell's account of the famous Round Robin. It will make you feel better acquainted with Burke, Johnson, Reynolds, and Goldsmith. The student will find valuable material in Professor Lamont's edition of Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America, published by Ginn & Company.

28 25. Gibbon. You noticed on the Round Robin the autograph of the author of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire?

28 26. Jones. Sir William Henry Rich Jones was "the first English scholar to master Sanskrit, and to recognize its importance for comparative philology," says The Century Dictionary.

29 9. Johnson's Club. The Club still flourishes. Both Scott and Macaulay belonged to it.

29 14. James Boswell. "Out of the fifteen millions that then lived, and had bed and board, in the British Islands, this man has provided us a greater pleasure than any other individual, at whose cost we now enjoy ourselves; perhaps has done us a greater service than can be specially attributed to more than two or three: yet, ungrateful that we are, no written or spoken eulogy of James Boswell anywhere exists; his recompense in solid pudding (so far as copyright went) was not excessive; and as for the empty praise, it has altogether been denied him. Men are unwiser than children; they do not know the hand that feeds."

So Carlyle writes of the man; the book, he says, is "beyond any other product of the eighteenth century"; it draws aside the curtains of the Past and gives us a picture which changeful Time cannot harm or hide. The picture charms generation after generation because it is true. "It is not speaking with exaggeration, but with strict measured sobriety, to say that this Book of Boswell's will give us more real insight into the History of England during those days than twenty other Books, falsely entitled 'Histories,' which take to themselves that special aim.... The thing I want to see is not Redbook Lists, and Court Calendars, and Parliamentary Registers, but the Life of Man in England: what men did, thought, suffered, enjoyed; the form, especially the spirit, of their terrestrial existence, its outward environment, its inward principle; how and what it was; whence it proceeded, whither it was tending....

"Hence, indeed, comes it that History, which should be 'the essence of innumerable Biographies,' will tell us, question it as we like, less than one genuine Biography may do, pleasantly and of its own accord!"

Mr. Leslie Stephen says that "Macaulay's graphic description of his absurdities, and Carlyle's more penetrating appreciation of his higher qualities, contain all that can be said"; but the more recent testimony of Dr. George B. Hill, in Dr. Johnson, His Friends and His Critics, should count for something. Dr. Hill points out that while Macaulay grants Boswell immortality he refuses him greatness, and calls attention to what he considers elements of greatness. In regard to the accuracy of a biographer who would "run half over London, in order to fix a date correctly," he says: "That love, I might almost say that passion for accuracy, that distinguished Boswell in so high a degree does not belong to a mind that is either mean or feeble. Mean minds are indifferent to truth, and feeble minds can see no importance in a date."

29 27. Wilkes. John Wilkes, a notorious politician, was imprisoned for writing an article in which he attacked George the Third. The liberty of the press was involved and Wilkes was released, much to the delight of the people. For a brief summary of the Bill of Rights, see Brewer's Historic Note-book or A Handbook of English Political History, by Acland and Ransome.

29 29. Whitfield. Macaulay's short sentence implies, does it not, that Whitfield (or Whitefield) was a noisy, open-air preacher among the Calvinistic Methodists? In testing the accuracy of this inference in The EncyclopÆdia Britannica or in Franklin's Autobiography, note in what countries Whitefield preached, and where he died. Boswell quotes Johnson's opinion of Whitefield in two places.

29 30. In a happy hour. May 16, 1763. By all means read Boswell's account of the rough reception he received and the persistence necessary to secure the fastening.

31 14. pity ... esteem. The Thrales were not alone in overlooking these oddities. "His tricks and contortions, a subject for pity not ridicule," says Mr. Hoste, "were ignored by the celebrated wits and beauties who visited him in his gloomy 'den,' and by the duchesses and other distinguished ladies who gathered 'four and five deep' around him at fashionable assemblies, hanging on his sentences, and contended for the nearest places to his chair."

31 15. Southwark. South of the commercial center of London and across the Thames.

31 16. Streatham. About five miles southwest of London City. The Southwark apartment was in a commercial district; the Streatham apartment in a thinly settled residential suburb.

31 34. Maccaroni. See The Century Dictionary or Brewer's Handbook of Phrase and Fable.

32 21. Levett. Of Levett, Goldsmith said to Boswell, "He is poor and honest, which is recommendation enough to Johnson." 32 30. the Mitre Tavern. "The Mitre Tavern still stands in Fleet Street: but where now is its Scot-and-lot paying, beef-and-ale loving, cock-hatted, potbellied Landlord; its rosy-faced, assiduous Landlady, with all her shining brass-pans, waxed tables, well-filled larder-shelves; her cooks, and bootjacks, and errand-boys, and watery-mouthed hangers-on? Gone! Gone! The becking waiter, that with wreathed smiles was wont to spread for Samuel and Bozzy their 'supper of the gods,' has long since pocketed his last sixpence; and vanished, six-pences and all, like a ghost at cockcrowing." Yet, Carlyle goes on to say, thanks to this book of Boswell's, "they who are gone are still here; though hidden they are revealed, though dead they yet speak."

33 27. Hebrides. Locate these picturesque islands on the map.

34 10. Lord Mansfield. William Murray, chief justice of the King's Bench from 1756 to 1788, has been called "the founder of English commercial law."

34 23. Macpherson. In 1760 James Macpherson published what purported to be fragments of Gaelic verse with translations. These were so interesting that he was sent to the Highlands to hunt for more, and within three years he published the Poems of Ossian, consisting of two epics, "Fingal" and "Temora." Their genuineness has been discussed ever since. Evidently Johnson settled the matter to his own satisfaction and to Macaulay's, and you may be interested in what Boswell has to say. At the same time it seems clear that Johnson went too far in his charge of forgery. Macpherson probably did not find a complete epic, yet he undoubtedly found some Gaelic poetry.

34 27. contemptuous terms. Boswell gives the following letter:

35 11–12. The Kenricks, Campbells, MacNicols, and Hendersons. If Johnson and Macaulay do not tell enough about these men, Boswell does. 35 30. Bentley. Richard Bentley (1662–1742), a well-known English classical scholar and critic.

36 13. Taxation no Tyranny. The rest of the title is An Answer to the Resolutions and Address of the American Congress.

37 6. Wilson. Richard Wilson was one of the greatest English landscape painters, says The Dictionary of National Biography.

37 14. Cowley. The man who wrote

37 18. Restoration. The International Dictionary offers a brief explanation in case you are not absolutely certain of the exact meaning.

37 23. Walmesley. See note to 5 32.—Button's. Button's coffeehouse flourished earlier in the century. Do you remember any other reference to it? to Will's? to Child's?—Cibber. Colley Cibber, actor and dramatist, altered and adapted some of Shakspere's plays. Both Johnson and Boswell express their opinions of him frankly enough. He was appointed poet laureate in 1730.

37 25. Orrery. Orrery did more than enjoy this privilege,—he wrote a book entitled Remarks on the Life and Writings of Jonathan Swift. Boswell records Johnson's opinion of it. What other great literary men enjoyed the society of Swift? The Century Dictionary gives a column to Swift, and Johnson has a sketch in his Lives of the Poets.

37 26. services of no very honourable kind. By supplying Pope with private intelligence for his Dunciad he "gained the esteem of Pope and the enmity of his victims."

38 32. Malone. Edmund Malone was a friend of Johnson, Burke, and Reynolds. He wrote a supplement to Johnson's edition of Shakspere, published an edition of Reynolds's works, and after bringing out his own edition of Shakspere, left material for another edition, which was published by James Boswell the younger in 1821. Boswell's Malone, the "third variorum" edition, is generally considered the best. To Boswell the elder, an intimate friend, he was of much assistance in preparing the Life of Johnson, and he edited with valuable notes the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth reissues of the work.

40 21–22. In a solemn and tender prayer.

41 1. Italian fiddler. A violinist of much talent. Piozzi was the music master from Brescia who, a little over three years after Mr. Thrale's death, married the widow. After learning what you can from Boswell, you will enjoy some such account as the EncyclopÆdia Britannica offers. While doing your reading it may be well to keep in mind what two or three critics have said. Mr. Mowbray Morris writes: "After all the abuse showered on the unfortunate woman it is pleasant to know that the marriage proved a happy one in every respect. Piozzi, who was really a well-mannered, amiable man, took every care of his wife's fortune, and on their return to England her family and friends were soon reconciled to him." Mr. Leslie Stephen says: "Her love of Piozzi, which was both warm and permanent, is the most amiable feature of her character." Mr. Herbert Paul, after praising Macaulay's Life of Johnson, adds, "Yet, if I may say so, I can never forgive Macaulay for his cruel and unaccountable injustice to Mrs. Thrale."

41 3. the Ephesian matron. She cared so much for her husband that she went into the vault to die with him, and there, in the midst of her violent grief, fell in love with a soldier who was guarding some dead bodies near by. For the story (told by a Latin writer, Petronius), see Jeremy Taylor's The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying, Chapter V, section 8.—the two pictures. In Act III.

42 2. Burke parted from him. After twenty-seven years of uninterrupted friendship with Johnson, says Robina Napier.—Windham. The Right Hon. William Windham, a member of the Club, a friend of Malone, Burke, Fox, and Pitt; in 1794 Secretary at War (Pitt's ministry), in 1806 War and Colonial Secretary (Lord Grenville's ministry); in the words of Macaulay, "the first gentleman of his age, the ingenious, the chivalrous, the high-souled Windham." Johnson wrote him appreciative letters in August and October, 1784. See Boswell.

42 4. Frances Burney. In Macaulay's essay on Madame d'Arblay, he says: "Her appearance is an important epoch in our literary history. Evelina was the first tale written by a woman, and purporting to be a picture of life and manners, that lived or deserved to live." Read this account of the "timid and obscure girl" who suddenly "found herself on the highest pinnacle of fame," eulogized by such men as Burke, Windham, Gibbon, Reynolds, and Sheridan. 42 6. Langton. See page 30.

42 10–11. his temper. In connection with this closing sentence let us remember a paragraph from Boswell (1776):

"That he was occasionally remarkable for violence of temper may be granted: but let us ascertain the degree, and not let it be supposed that he was in a perpetual rage, and never without a club in his hand to knock down every one who approached him. On the contrary, the truth is, that by much the greatest part of his time he was civil, obliging, nay, polite in the true sense of the word; so much so, that many gentlemen who were long acquainted with him never received, or even heard a strong expression from him."