He had published an answer to Hume’s Essay on Miracles. See post, March 20, 1776.
[66] Macleod asked if it was not wrong in Orrery to expose the defects of a man [Swift] with whom he lived in intimacy, Johnson, ‘Why no, Sir, after the man is dead; for then it is done historically.’ Boswell’s Hebrides, Sept. 22, 1773. See also post, Sept 17, 1777.
[67] See Mr. Malone’s Preface to his edition of Shakspeare. BOSWELL.
[68] ‘April 6, 1791.
‘My Life of Johnson is at last drawing to a close…. I really hope to publish it on the 25th current…. I am at present in such bad spirits that I have every fear concerning it—that I may get no profit, nay, may lose—that the Public may be disappointed, and think that I have done it poorly—that I may make many enemies, and even have quarrels. Yet perhaps the very reverse of all this may happen.’ Letters of Boswell, p. 335.
‘August 22, 1791.
‘My magnum opus sells wonderfully; twelve hundred are now gone, and we hope the whole seventeen hundred may be gone before Christmas.’ Ib. p. 342.
Malone in his Preface to the fourth edition, dated June 20, 1804, says that ‘near four thousand copies have been dispersed.’ The first edition was in 2 vols., quarto; the second (1793) in 3 vols., octavo; the third (1799), the fourth (1804), the fifth (1807), and the sixth (1811), were each in 4 vols., octavo. The last four were edited by Malone, Boswell having died while he was preparing notes for the third edition.
[69] ‘Burke affirmed that Boswell’s Life was a greater monument to Johnson’s fame than all his writings put together.’ Life of Mackintosh, i. 92.
[70] It is a pamphlet of forty-two pages, under the title of The Principal Corrections and Additions to the First Edition of Mr. Boswell’s Life Of Johnson. Price two shillings and sixpence.
[71] Reynolds died on Feb. 23, 1792.
[72] Sir Joshua in his will left £200 to Mr. Boswell ‘to be expended, if he thought proper, in the purchase of a picture at the sale of his paintings, to be kept for his sake.’ Taylor’s Reynolds, ii. 636.
[73] Of the seventy-five years that Johnson lived, he and Boswell did not spend two years and two months in the same neighbourhood. Excluding the time they were together on their tour to the Hebrides, they were dwelling within reach of each other a few weeks less than two years. Moreover, when they were apart, there were great gaps in their correspondence. Between Dec. 8, 1763, and Jan. 14, 1766, and again between Nov. 10, 1769 and June 20, 1771, during which periods they did not meet, Boswell did not receive a single letter from Johnson. The following table shows the times they were in the same neighbourhood.
1763, May 16 to Aug. 6, London. 1766, a few days in February ” 1768, ” ” March, Oxford. 1768, a few days in May, London. 1769, end of Sept. to Nov. 10, ” 1772, March 21 to about May 10, ” 1773, April 3 to May 10, ” ” Aug. 14 to Nov. 22, Scotland. 1775, March 21 to April 18, London. May 2 to May 23, ” 1776, March 15 to May 16, London, Oxford, Birmingham, with an interval of Lichfield, about a fortnight, Ashbourne, when Johnson was at and Bath and Boswell at Bath. London, 1777, Sept. 14 to Sept. 24, Ashbourne. 1778, March 18 to May 19, London. 1779, March 15 to May 3, ” ” Oct. 4 to Oct. 18, ” 1781, March 19 to June 5, London and Southill. 1783, March 21 to May 30, London. 1784, May 5 to June 30, London and Oxford.
[74]
‘To shew what wisdom and what sense can do,
The poet sets Ulysses in our view.’
Francis. Horace, Ep. i. 2. 17.
[75] In his _Letter to the People of Scotland, p. 92, he wrote:—‘Allow me, my friends and countrymen, while I with honest zeal maintain your cause—allow me to indulge a little more my own egotism and vanity. They are the indigenous plants of my mind; they distinguish it. I may prune their luxuriancy; but I must not entirely clear it of them; for then I should be no longer “as I am;” and perhaps there might be something not so good.’
[76] See post, April 17, 1778, note.
[77] Lord Macartney was the first English ambassador to the Court of Pekin. He left England in 1792 and returned in 1794.
[78] Boswell writing to Temple ten days earlier had said:—‘Behold my hand! the robbery is only of a few shillings; but the cut on my head and bruises on my arms were sad things, and confined me to bed, in pain, and fever, and helplessness, as a child, many days…. This shall be a crisis in my life: I trust I shall henceforth be a sober regular man. Indeed, my indulgence in wine has, of late years especially, been excessive.’ Letters of Boswell, p. 346.
[79] On this day his brother wrote to Mr. Temple: ‘I have now the painful task of informing you that my dear brother expired this morning at two o’clock; we have both lost a kind, affectionate friend, and I shall never have such another.’ Letters of Boswell, p. 357. What was probably Boswell’s last letter is as follows:—
‘My Dear Temple,
‘I would fain write to you in my own hand, but really cannot. [These words, which are hardly legible, and probably the last poor Boswell ever wrote, afford the clearest evidence of his utter physical prostration.] Alas, my friend, what a state is this! My son James is to write for me what remains of this letter, and I am to dictate. The pain which continued for so many weeks was very severe indeed, and when it went off I thought myself quite well; but I soon felt a conviction that I was by no means as I should be—so exceedingly weak, as my miserable attempt to write to you afforded a full proof. All then that can be said is, that I must wait with patience. But, O my friend! how strange is it that, at this very time of my illness, you and Miss Temple should have been in such a dangerous state. Much occasion for thankfulness is there that it has not been worse with you. Pray write, or make somebody write frequently. I feel myself a good deal stronger to-day, not withstanding the scrawl. God bless you, my dear Temple! I ever am your old and affectionate friend, here and I trust hereafter,
‘JAMES BOSWELL.’ Ib. p. 353.
[80] Malone died on May 25, 1812.
[81] I do not here include his Poetical Works; for, excepting his Latin Translation of Pope’s Messiah, his London, and his Vanity of Human Wishes imitated from Juvenal; his Prologue on the opening of Drury-Lane Theatre by Mr. Garrick, and his Irene, a Tragedy, they are very numerous, and in general short; and I have promised a complete edition of them, in which I shall with the utmost care ascertain their authenticity, and illustrate them with notes and various readings. BOSWELL. Boswell’s meaning, though not well expressed, is clear enough. Mr. Croker needlessly suggests that he wrote ‘they are not very numerous.’ Boswell a second time (post, under Aug. 12, 1784, note) mentions his intention to edit Johnson’s poems. He died without doing it. See also post, 1750, Boswell’s note on Addison’s style.
[82] The Female Quixote was published in 1752. See post, 1762, note.
[83] The first four volumes of the Lives were published in 1779, the last six in 1781.
[84] See Dr. Johnson’s letter to Mrs. Thrale, dated Ostick in Skie, September 30, 1773:—‘Boswell writes a regular Journal of our travels, which I think contains as much of what I say and do, as of all other occurrences together; “for such a faithful chronicler is Griffith.”’ BOSWELL. See Piozzi Letters, i. 159, where however we read ‘as Griffith.’
[85] Idler, No. 84. BOSWELL.—In this paper he says: ‘Those relations are commonly of most value in which the writer tells his own story. He that recounts the life of another … lessens the familiarity of his tale to increase its dignity … and endeavours to hide the man that he may produce a hero.’
[86] ‘It very seldom happens to man that his business is his pleasure. What is done from necessity is so often to be done when against the present