part of my life.

Sicknefs brought it back, and I hope I have never loft it fince."-B." My dear Sir, what a man muft you have been without religion! Why you must have gone on drinking, and fwearing, and —." J. (with a fmile) "I drank enough and fwore enough, to be fure."-S." One fhould think that fickness, and the view of death, would make more men religious."-7. "Sir, they do not know how to go about it; they have not the firft notion. A man who has never had religion before, no more grows religious when he is fick, than a man who has never learnt figures can count when he has need of calculation."

A gentleman was mentioned as being too ready to introduce religious difcourfe upon all occafions. Johnfon obferved, Why yes, Sir, he will introduce religious difcourfe without feeing whether it will end in inftruction and improvement, or produce fome prophane jeft. He would introduce it in the company of ******, and twenty more fuch."

Mr. Bofwell mentioned the Doctor's excellent diftinction between liberty of confcience and liberty of teaching *. Johnson faid, "Confider, Sir; if you have children whom you wish to educate in the principles of the church of England, and there comes a Quaker

who tries to pervert them to his principles, you would drive away the Quaker. You would not trust to the predomination of right, which you believe is in your opinions; you would keep wrong out of their heads. Now the vulgar are the children of the State. If any one attempts to teach them doctrines contrary to what the State approves, the magiftrate may and ought to reftrain him."-S." Would you reftrain private converfation, Sir?"-7. "Why, Sir, it is difficult to fay where private converfation begins, and where it ends. If we three fhould discuss even the great queftion concerning the existence of a Supreme Being by ourselves, we fhould not be reftrained; for that would be to put an end to all improvement; but if we should discuss it in the prefence of ten boarding-fchool girls, and as many boys, I think the magiftrate would do well to put us in the stocks, to finish the debate there."

A gentleman once expreffed a wish to go and live three years at Otaheite or New Zealand, in order to obtain a full acquaintance with people fo totally different from all that we have ever known, and be fatisfied what pure nature can do for man.-JOHNSON. "What could you learn, Sir? What can favages tell, but what they themselves have seen? Of the

paft, or the invifible, they can tell nothing. The inhabitants. of Otaheite and New Zealand are not in a state of pure nature; for it is plain they broke off from fome other people. Had they grown out of the ground, you might have judged of a state of pure nature. Fanciful people may talk of a mythology being amongst them, but it must be invention. They have once had religion, which has been gradually debafed; and what account of their religion can you fuppofe to be learnt from favages? Only confider, Sir, our own ftate: our religion is in a book; we have an order of men whofe duty it is to teach it; we have one day in the week fet apart for it, and this is in general pretty well obferved; yet afk the first ten grofs men you meet, and hear what they can tell of their religion."

.

Mr. Murray one day praised the ancient philofophers for the candour and good humour with which thofe of different fects difputed with each other. "Sir (faid Johnson) they difputed with good humour, because they were not in earnest as to religion. Had the ancients been serious in their belief, we fhould not have had their Gods exhibited in the manner we find them reprefented in the Poets. The people would not have suffered it. They difputed with good humour upon their fanciful

theories,

theories, because they were not interefted in the truth of them; when a man has nothing to lofe, he may be in good humour with his opponent. Accordingly, you fee in Lucian that the Epicurean, who argues only negatively, keeps his temper; the Stoick, who has fomething pofitive to preferve, grows, angry. Being angry with one who controverts an opinion which you value, is a neceflary confequence of the uneafinefs which you feel. Every man who attacks my belief diminishes in fome degree my confidence in it, and therefore makes me uneafy; and I am angry with him who makes me uncafy, Thofe only who believed in revelation have been angry at having their faith called in queftion, because they only had fomething upon which they could reft as matter of fact." Mr. MURRAY." It feems to me that we are not angry at a man for controverting an opinion which we believe and value; we rather pity him," JOHNSON. "Why, Sir; to be fure when you with a man to have that belief which you think is of infinite advantage, you with well to him; but your primary confideration is your own quiet. If a madman were to come into this room with a ftick in his hand, no doubt we should pity the state of his mind; but our primary confideration would be to take care of ourfelves. We fhould knock

1

him down first, and pity him afterwards. No, Sir; every man will difpute with great good humour upon a fubject in which he is not interefted. I will difpute very calmly upon the probability of another man's fon being hanged; but if a man zealously enforces the probability that my own fon will be hanged, I fhall certainly not be in a very good humour with him." Mr. Bofwell added this illuftration, "If a man endeavours to convince me that my wife, whom I love very much, and in whom I place great confidence, is a difagreeable woman, and is even unfaithful to me, I fhall be very angry, for he is putting me in fear of being unhappy." -MURRAY. "But, Sir, truth will always

"Yes,

bear an examination."-JOHNSON. Sir, but it is painful to be forced to defend it. Confider, Sir, how should you like, though confcious of your innocence, to be tried before a jury for a capital crime, once a week."

Talking of devotion, he faid, Though it be true that God dwelleth not in temples made with hands,' yet in this ftate of being, our minds are more pioufly affected in places appropriated to divine worship, than in others. Some people have a particular room in their house where they fay their prayers; of this I do not difapprove, as it may animate their devotion."

He