Boswell’s Life of Johnson: 83

Edited by Dan Leo, LL.D, Assistant Professor of Physical Education, Assistant Bocce Team Coach, Olney Community College; author of Bozzie and Dr. Sam: The Case of Mrs. Cholmondeley’s Missing Poodle, the Olney Community College Press.

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In 1771 he published another political pamphlet, entitled Thoughts on the late Transactions respecting Falkland's Islands, in which, upon materials furnished to him by ministry, and upon general topicks expanded in his richest style, he successfully endeavoured to persuade the nation that it was wise and laudable to suffer the question of right to remain undecided, rather than involve our country in another war. It has been suggested by some, with what truth I shall not take upon me to decide, that he rated the consequence of those islands to Great-Britain too low. But however this may be, every humane mind must surely applaud the earnestness with which he averted the calamity of war; a calamity so dreadful, that it is astonishing how civilised, nay, Christian nations, can deliberately continue to renew it. His description of its miseries in this pamphlet, is one of the finest pieces of eloquence in the English language.  Upon this occasion, too, we find Johnson lashing the party in opposition with unbounded severity, and making the fullest use of what he ever reckoned a most effectual argumentative instrument,— contempt. Mr. Strahan, the printer, who had been long in intimacy with Johnson, in the course of his literary labours, who was at once his friendly agent in receiving his pension for him, and his banker in supplying him with money when he wanted it; who was himself now a Member of Parliament, and who loved much to be employed in political negociation; thought he should do eminent service both to government and Johnson, if he could be the means of his getting a seat in the House of Commons. With this view, he wrote a letter to one of the Secretaries of the Treasury , of which he gave me a copy in his own hand-writing, which is as follows:— 'SIR, 'You will easily recollect, when I had the honour of waiting upon you some time ago, I took the liberty to observe to you, that Dr. Johnson would make an excellent figure in the House of Commons, and heartily wished he had a seat there. My reasons are briefly these: 'I know his perfect good affection to his Majesty, and his government, which I am certain he wishes to support by every means in his power. 'He possesses a great share of manly, nervous, and ready eloquence; is quick in discerning the strength and weakness of an argument; can express himself with clearness and precision, and fears the face of no man alive. 'His known character, as a man of extraordinary sense and unimpeached virtue, would secure him the attention of the House, and could not fail to give him a proper weight there.  'He is capable of the greatest application, and can undergo any degree of labour, where he sees it necessary, and where his heart and affections are strongly engaged. His Majesty's ministers might therefore securely depend on his doing, upon every proper occasion, the utmost that could be expected from him. They would find him ready to vindicate such measures as tended to promote the stability of government, and resolute and steady in carrying them into execution. Nor is any thing to be apprehended from the supposed impetuosity of his temper. To the friends of the King you will find him a lamb, to his enemies a lion. 'For these reasons, I humbly apprehend that he would be a very able and useful member. And I will venture to say, the employment would not be disagreeable to him; and knowing, as I do, his strong affection to the King, his ability to serve him in that capacity, and the extreme ardour with which I am convinced he would engage in that service, I must repeat, that I wish most heartily to see him in the House. 'If you think this worthy of attention, you will be pleased to take a convenient opportunity of mentioning it to Lord North. If his Lordship should happily approve of it, I shall have the satisfaction of having been, in some degree, the humble instrument of doing my country, in my opinion, a very essential service. I am, with the greatest respect, Sir, ' Your most obedient and humble servant, ' WILLIAM STRAHAN.' 'New-street, March 30, 1771.' This recommendation, we know, was not effectual; but how, or for what reason, can only be conjectured. It is not to be believed that Mr. Strahan would have applied, unless Johnson had approved of it. I never heard him mention the subject; but at a later period of his life, when Sir Joshua Reynolds told him that Mr. Edmund Burke had said, that if he had come early into parliament, he certainly would have been the greatest speaker that ever was there, Johnson exclaimed,  'I should like to try my hand now.' It has been much agitated among his friends and others, whether he would have been a powerful speaker in Parliament, had he been brought in when advanced in life. I am inclined to think that his extensive knowledge, his quickness and force of mind, his vivacity and richness of expression, his wit and humour, and above all his poignancy of sarcasm, would have had great effect in a popular assembly; and that the magnitude of his figure, and striking peculiarity of his manner, would have aided the effect. But I remember it was observed by Mr. Flood, that Johnson, having been long used to sententious brevity and the short flights of conversation, might have failed in that continued and expanded kind of argument, which is requisite in stating complicated matters in publick speaking. The opinion of one who was himself so eminent an orator, must be allowed to have great weight. It was confirmed by Sir William Scott, who mentioned that Johnson had told him that he had several times tried to speak in the Society of Arts and Sciences, but 'had found he could not get on.' From Mr. William Gerrard Hamilton I have heard that Johnson, when observing to him that it was prudent for a man who had not been accustomed to speak in publick, to begin his speech in as simple a manner as possible, acknowledged that he rose in that society to deliver a speech which he had prepared; 'but (said he), all my flowers of oratory forsook me.' I however cannot help wishing, that he had 'tried his hand' in Parliament; and I wonder that ministry did not make the experiment. I at length renewed a correspondence which had been too long discontinued:— 'To DR. JOHNSON. 'Edinburgh, April 18, 1771. 'MY DEAR SIR,  'I can now fully understand those intervals of silence in your correspondence with me, which have often given me anxiety and uneasiness; for although I am conscious that my veneration and love for Mr. Johnson have never in the least abated, yet I have deferred for almost a year and a half to write to him.'  In the subsequent part of this letter, I gave him an account of my comfortable life as a married man, and a lawyer in practice at the Scotch bar; invited him to Scotland, and promised to attend him to the Highlands, and Hebrides. 'To JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.  'DEAR SIR,  'If you are now able to comprehend that I might neglect to write without diminution of affection, you have taught me, likewise, how that neglect may be uneasily felt without resentment. I wished for your letter a long time, and when it came, it amply recompensed the delay. I never was so much pleased as now with your account of yourself; and sincerely hope, that between publick business, improving studies, and domestick pleasures, neither melancholy nor caprice will find any place for entrance. Whatever philosophy may determine of material nature, it is certainly true of intellectual nature, that it abhors a vacuum: our minds cannot be empty; and evil will break in upon them, if they are not pre-occupied by good.  ‘My dear Sir, mind your studies, mind your business, make your lady happy, and be a good Christian.  'If we perform our duty, we shall be safe and steady, whether we climb the Highlands, or are tost among the Hebrides; and I hope the time will come when we may try our powers both with cliffs and water. 'I am, dear Sir,  'Your most affectionate,  ‘And most humble servant,  'SAM. JOHNSON.’  'London, June 20, 1771.' In his religious record of this year, we observe that he was better than usual, both in body and mind, and better satisfied with the regularity of his conduct. But he is still 'trying his ways' too rigorously. He charges himself with not rising early enough; yet he mentions what was surely a sufficient excuse for this, supposing it to be a duty seriously required, as he all his life appears to have thought it.  'One great hindrance is want of rest; my nocturnal complaints grow less troublesome towards morning; and I am tempted to repair the deficiencies of the night.'  Alas! how hard would it be if this indulgence were to be imputed to a sick man as a crime.  In his retrospect on the following Easter-Eve, he says,  'When I review the last year, I am able to recollect so little done, that shame and sorrow, though perhaps too weakly, come upon me.'  Had he been judging of any one else in the same circumstances, how clear would he have been on the favourable side. How very difficult, and in my opinion almost constitutionally impossible it was for him to be raised early, even by the strongest resolutions, appears from a note in one of his little paper-books, (containing words arranged for his Dictionary,) written, I suppose, about 1753: 'I do not remember that since I left Oxford I ever rose early by mere choice, but once or twice.' I think he had fair ground enough to have quieted his mind on this subject, by concluding that he was physically incapable of what is at best but a commodious regulation.  In 1772 he was altogether quiescent as an authour; but it will be found from the various evidences which I shall bring together that his mind was acute, lively, and vigorous. (To be continued. This project is made possible by the continuing generosity of the Bob’s Bowery Bar™ Foundation for the Impossible Arts: “Why not escape the oppressive city heat in that delightfully dim and air-conditioned caravansary known as Bob’s Bowery Bar, conveniently close to the subway at Bleecker and the Bowery? This week only, mention my name and get your first schooner of Bob’s justifiably-renowned basement-brewed house bock free! (Sorry, only one per customer! Offer expires next Sunday at 4am.)” – Horace P. Sternwall, host of Bob’s Bowery Bar Presents “Teatime with Horace”, weekdays at 4pm (EST), exclusively on the Dumont Radio Network: this week’s very special guest co-host: Dame Edith Evans.) part 84

Selections from Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary: “Q”

Edited by Dan Leo, LL.D., Assistant Professor of Young Adult Fiction, Assistant Scrabble Team Coach, Olney Community College; author of Bozzie and Dr. Sam: The Case of the Scolding Quean; the Olney Community College Press.

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Quab. A sort of fish. *** Quack.  A vain boastful pretender to physick; one who proclaims his own medical abilities in publick places. At the first appearance that a French quack made in Paris: a little boy walked before him, publishing with a shrill voice, "My father cures all sorts of distempers;" to which the doctor added in a grave manner, "The child says true."  Addison. *** Quadrivial.  Having four ways meeting in a point. *** Quadruped.  An animal that goes on four legs, as perhaps all beasts. Most quadrupeds, that live upon herbs, have incisor teeth to pluck and divide them.  Arbuthnot. *** Quaff.  To drink; to swallow in large draughts. He calls for wine; a health, quoth he, as if H'ad been abroad carousing to his mates After a storm, quafft off the muscadel, And threw the sops all in the sexton's face.  Shakesp. *** Quagmire.  A shaking marsh; a bog that trembles under the feet. Your hearts I'll stamp out with my horse's heels, And make a quagmire of your mingled brains.  Shakesp. *** To Quake.  To shake with cold or fear; to tremble. In fields they dare not fight where honour calls, The very noise of war their souls does wound, They quake but hearing their own trumpets sound.  Dryden *** Quality.  Disposition; temper. To-night we'll wander through the streets, and note The qualities of people.  Shakesp. Ant. and Cleopatra. *** Quean.  A worthless woman, generally a strumpet. As fit as the nail to his hole, or as a scolding quean to a wrangling knave.  Shakesp. *** Queen.  A woman who is sovereign of a kingdom. That queen Elizabeth lived sixty-nine, and reigned forty-five years, means no more than, that the duration of her existence was equal to sixty-nine, and the duration of her government to forty-five revolutions of the sun.  Locke. *** Queen-Apple.  A species of apple. The queen-apple is of the summer kind, and a good cyder apple mixed with others.  Mortimer's Husbandry. *** To Queme.  To please. An old word. *** Quidam.  Somebody. *** To Quob.  To move as the embryo does in the womb; to move as the heart does when throbbing. *** Quodlibetarian.  One who talks or disputes on any subject. *** Quondam.  Having been formerly. A ludicrous word. This is the quondam king, let's seize upon him. Shakesp. *** Quotidian.  Daily; happening every day. Nor was this a short fit of shaking, as an ague, but a quotidian fever, always increasing to higher inflammation.  King Charles. *** (Our illustrated adaptation of Boswell’s Life of Johnson will resume next week. Classix Comix is made possible through a generous endowment from the Bob’s Bowery Bar™ Endowment for the Cybernetic Arts: “One of my perennial favorites on the Bob’s Bowery Bar menu is ‘Bob’s Mom’s’ House-Cured Pickled Pig’s Feet, served with Mom’s special stoneground spicy mustard and Uneeda Biscuits – goes superbly with Bob’s famous basement-brewed bock!” – Horace P. Sternwall, host of Bob’s Bowery Bar’s Presents Horace P. Sternwall’s Tales of the Bizarre, exclusively on the Dumont Radio Network, Tuesdays at 10pm, EST.) "R"

Boswell’s Life of Johnson: 82

Edited by Dan Leo, LL.D, Associate Professor of Remedial Creative Writing, Assistant Canasta Team Coach, Olney Community College; author of Bozzie and Dr. Sam: The Case of Mrs. Cholmondeley’s Missing Jewels, the Olney Community College Press.

Artwork personally supervised by rhoda penmarq (layout, pencils, inks, and colors and lettering by roy dismas, assisted by eddie el greco); a penmarq studios™/bob’s bowery bar™ co-production in association with dumont enterprises™.

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{This chapter continues the reminiscences of the Rev. Dr. Maxwell, “for many years the social friend of Johnson, who spoke of him with a very kind regard”. – Editor} 'He was of opinion, that the English nation cultivated both their soil and their reason better than any other people: but admitted that the French, though not the highest, perhaps, in any department of literature, yet in every department were very high. Intellectual pre-eminence, he observed, was the highest superiority; and that every nation derived their highest reputation from the splendour and dignity of their writers.  'Speaking of the French novels, compared with Richardson's, he said, they might be pretty baubles, but a wren was not an eagle. 'In a Latin conversation with the Père Boscovitch, at the house of Mrs. Cholmondeley, I heard him maintain the superiority of Sir Isaac Newton over all foreign philosophers, with a dignity and eloquence that surprized that learned foreigner.  ‘It being observed to him, that a rage for every thing English prevailed much in France after Lord Chatham's glorious war, he said, he did not wonder at it, for that we had drubbed those fellows into a proper reverence for us, and that their national petulance required periodical chastisement. 'Lord Lyttelton's Dialogues, he deemed a nugatory performance. "That man, (said he ,) sat down to write a book, to tell the world what the world had all his life been telling him." 'Being asked by a young nobleman, what was become of the gallantry and military spirit of the old English nobility, he replied, "Why, my Lord, I'll tell you what is become of it; it is gone into the city to look for a fortune." 'Speaking of a dull tiresome fellow, whom he chanced to meet, he said, "That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one." 'Much enquiry having been made concerning a gentleman, who had quitted a company where Johnson was, and no information being obtained; at last Johnson observed, that "he did not care to speak ill of any man behind his back, but he believed the gentleman was an attorney." 'He spoke with much contempt of the notice taken of Woodhouse, the poetical shoemaker. He said, it was all vanity and childishness: and that such objects were, to those who patronised them, mere mirrours of their own superiority. "They had better (said he,) furnish the man with good implements for his trade, than raise subscriptions for his poems. He may make an excellent shoemaker, but can never make a good poet. A school-boy's exercise may be a pretty thing for a school-boy; but it is no treat for a man." 'Johnson observed, that so many objections might be made to every thing, that nothing could overcome them but the necessity of doing something. No man would be of any profession, as simply opposed to not being of it: but every one must do something. 'He remarked, that a London parish was a very comfortless thing; for the clergyman seldom knew the face of one out of ten of his parishioners. 'A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died: Johnson said, it was the triumph of hope over experience. 'He observed, that a man of sense and education should meet a suitable companion in a wife. It was a miserable thing when the conversation could only be such as, whether the mutton should be boiled or roasted, and probably a dispute about that. 'He did not approve of late marriages, observing that more was lost in point of time, than compensated for by any possible advantages. Even ill assorted marriages were preferable to cheerless celibacy. 'He said, foppery was never cured; it was the bad stamina of the mind, which, like those of the body, were never rectified: once a coxcomb, and always a coxcomb. 'He observed, "it was a most mortifying reflexion for any man to consider, what he had done, compared with what he might have done." 'He said few people had intellectual resources sufficient to forego the pleasures of wine. They could not otherwise contrive how to fill the interval between dinner and supper. 'One evening at Mrs. Montagu's, where a splendid company was assembled, consisting of the most eminent literary characters, I thought he seemed highly pleased with the respect and attention that were shewn him, and asked him on our return home if he was not highly gratified by his visit: "No, Sir, (said he) not highly gratified; yet I do not recollect to have passed many evenings with fewer objections." 'Though of no high extraction himself, he had much respect for birth and family, especially among ladies. He said, "adventitious accomplishments may be possessed by all ranks; but one may easily distinguish the born gentlewoman." 'He said, "the poor in England were better provided for, than in any other country of the same extent: he did not mean little Cantons, or petty Republicks. Where a great proportion of the people (said he,) are suffered to languish in helpless misery, that country must be ill policed, and wretchedly governed: a decent provision for the poor, is the true test of civilization.— Gentlemen of education, he observed, were pretty much the same in all countries; the condition of the lower orders, the poor especially, was the true mark of national discrimination." 'He observed, a principal source of erroneous judgement was, viewing things partially and only on one side: as for instance, fortune-hunters, when they contemplated the fortunes singly and separately, it was a dazzling and tempting object; but when they came to possess the wives and their fortunes together, they began to suspect that they had not made quite so good a bargain. 'He advised me, if possible, to have a good orchard. He knew, he said, a clergyman of small income, who brought up a family very reputably which he chiefly fed with apple dumplings. ‘”Few have all kinds of merit belonging to their character. We must not examine matters too deeply — No, Sir, a fallible being will fail somewhere." 'We dined tête à tête at the Mitre, as I was preparing to return to Ireland, after an absence of many years. I regretted much leaving London, where I had formed many agreeable connexions: ‘"Sir, (said he,) I don't wonder at it; no man, fond of letters, leaves London without regret. But remember, Sir, you have seen and enjoyed a great deal;— you have seen life in its highest decorations, and the world has nothing new to exhibit. No man is so well qualifyed to leave publick life as he who has long tried it and known it well. We are always hankering after untried situations, and imagining greater felicity from them than they can afford. No, Sir, knowledge and virtue may be acquired in all countries, and your local consequence will make you some amends for the intellectual gratifications you relinquish." 'He then took a most affecting leave of me; said, he knew, it was a point of duty that called me away. "We shall all be sorry to lose you," said he.’ (To be continued. This series is sponsored by Bob’s Bowery Bar™, conveniently located at Bleecker and the Bowery: “If a gun were put to my head and I were forced to choose a favorite from the Bob’s Bowery Bar ‘Late Nite Menu’ I daresay I would choose ‘Bob’s Mom’s Tripe ‘n’ Egg’: bock-braised grass-fed tripe on a bed of slow-simmered collard greens ‘n’ caramelized leeks and topped with a ‘cage-free’ egg scrambled with fresh-churned butter, served on a warm fresh-baked sourdough roll – goes swell with a schooner of Bob’s internationally renowned ‘basement-brewed house bock!” – Horace P. Sternwall, host of Bob’s Bowery Bar Presents Horace P. Sternwall’s Poetry Hour, Sundays at 11am, exclusively on the Dumont Television Network: this week’s very special guest: Mr. T.S. Eliot.) part 83