Lord Elibank (1) had the highest admiration of his powers. He once observed to me, "Whatever opinion Johnson maintains, I will not say that he convinces me; but he never fails to show me, that he had good reasons for it." I have heard Johnson pay his lordship this high compliment: "I never was in Lord Elibank's company without learning something."

We sat together till it was too late for the afternoon service. Thrale said, he had come with intention to go to church with us. We went at seven to evening prayers at St. Clement's church, after having drunk coffee; an indulgence which I understand Johnson yielded to on this occasion, in compliment to Thrale.()

On Sunday, April 7., Easter-day, after having been at St. Paul's cathedral, I came to Dr. Johnson, according to my usual custom. It seemed to me, that there was always something particularly mild and placid in his manner upon this holy festival, the commemoration of the most joyful event in the history of our world, the resurrection of our Lord

(1) Patrick Lord Elibank, who died in 1778 (See antè, Vol. III. p.161.).

(2) This day he himself thus records: -"Though for the past week I have had an anxious design of communicating today, I performed no particular act of devotion, till on Friday I went to church. I fasted, though less rigorously than at other times. I, by negligence, poured milk into the tea, and, in the afternoon, drank one dish of coffee with Thrale; yet at night, after a fit of drowsiness, I felt myself very much disordered by emptiness, and called for tea, with peevish and impatient eagerness. My distress was very great.”—Pr. and Med. p. 145.-C.

and Saviour, who, having triumphed over death and the grave, proclaimed immortality to mankind.(1)

I repeated to him an argument of a lady of my acquaintance, who maintained, that her husband's having been guilty of numberless infidelities, released her from conjugal obligations, because they were reciprocal. JOHNSON. "This is miserable stuff, Sir. To the contract of marriage, besides the man and wife, there is a third party-society; and if it be considered as a vow- God: and, therefore, it cannot be dissolved by their consent alone. Laws are not made for particular cases, but for men in general. A woman may be unhappy with her husband; but she cannot be freed from him without the approbation of the civil and ecclesiastical power. A man may be unhappy, because he is not so rich as another; but he is not to seize upon another's property with his own hand." BOSWELL. "But, Sir, this lady does not want that the contract should be dissolved; she only argues that she may indulge herself in gallantries with equal freedom as her husband does, provided she takes care not to introduce a spurious issue into his family. You know,

(1) Yet with what different colours he paints his own state at this moment! "The time is again [come] at which, since the death of my poor dear Tetty, on whom God have mercy, I have annually commemorated the mystery of redemption, and annually purposed to amend my life. My reigning sin, to which perhaps many others are appendant, is waste of time, and general sluggishness, to which I was always inclined, and, in part of my life, have been almost compelled by morbid melancholy and disturbance of mind. Melancholy has had in me its paroxysms and remissions, but I have not improved the intervals, nor sufficiently resisted my natural inclination, or sickly habits." He adds, however: "In the morning I had at church some radiations of comfort."- Pr. and Med. p. 145. - C.

sir, what Macrobius has told of Julia.(') JOHN"This lady of yours, Sir, I think, is very fit for a brothel."

SON.

Mr. Macbean, author of the "Dictionary of Ancient Geography," came in. He mentioned that he had been forty years absent from Scotland. "Ah, Boswell!" said Johnson smiling, "what would you give to be forty years from Scotland ?" I said, “I should not like to be so long absent from the seat of my ancestors." This gentleman, Mrs. Williams, and Mr. Levett, dined with us.

Dr. Johnson made a remark, which both Mr. Macbean and I thought new. It was this: that "the law against usury is for the protection of creditors as well as debtors; for if there were no such check, people would be apt, from the temptation of great interest, to lend to desperate persons, by whom they would lose their money. Accordingly, there are instances of ladies being ruined, by having injudiciously sunk their fortunes for high annuities, which, after a few years, ceased to be paid, in consequence of the ruined circumstances of the borrower."

Mrs. Williams was very peevish (2); and I wondered at Johnson's patience with her now, as I had often done on similar occasions. The truth is, that his humane consideration of the forlorn and indigent

(1) "Nunquam enim nisi navi plenâ tollo vectorem.”— Lib. ii. c. vi.

(2) Boswell was not partial to Mrs. Williams. Peevish she probably was: but let it be remembered that she was old, blind, poor, and a dependent. And see antè, Vol. I. p. 274., a more favourable account from Malone and Miss Hawkins.- C.

state in which this lady was left by her father induced him to treat her with the utmost tenderness, and even to be desirous of procuring her amusement, so as sometimes to incommode many of his friends, by carrying her with him to their houses, where, from her manner of eating, in consequence of her blindness, she could not but offend the delicacy of persons of nice sensations.

After coffee, we went to afternoon service in St. Clement's church. Observing some beggars in the street as we walked along, I said to him, I supposed there was no civilised country in the world where the misery of want in the lowest classes of the people was prevented. JOHNSON. "I believe, Sir, there is not; but it is better that some should be unhappy, than that none should be happy, which would be the case in a general state of equality."

When the service was ended, I went home with him, and we sat quietly by ourselves. He recommended Dr. Cheyne's books. I said, I thought Cheyne had been reckoned whimsical. "So he was,' said he, "in some things; but there is no end of objections. There are few books to which some objection or other may not be made." He added, "I would not have you read any thing else of Cheyne, but his book on Health, and his 'English Malady.""

Upon the question whether a man who had been guilty of vicious actions would do well to force himself into solitude and sadness? JOHNSON. "No, Sir, unless it prevent him from being vicious again. With some people, gloomy penitence is only mad

ness turned upside down. A man may be gloomy, till, in order to be relieved from gloom, he has recourse again to criminal indulgencies."

On Wednesday, 10th April, I dined with him at Mr. Thrale's, where were Mr. Murphy and some other company. Before dinner, Dr. Johnson and I passed some time by ourselves. I was sorry to find it was now resolved that the proposed journey to Italy should not take place this year. He said, "I am disappointed, to be sure; but it is not a great disappointment." I wondered to see him bear, with a philosophical calmness, what would have made most people peevish and fretful. (1) I perceived that he had so warmly cherished the hope of enjoying classical scenes, that he could not easily part with the scheme; for he said, "I shall probably contrive to get to Italy some other way. (2) But I won't mention it to Mr. and Mrs. Thrale, as it might vex them.". I suggested that going to Italy might have done Mr. and Mrs. Thrale good. JOHNSON. “I rather believe not, Sir. While grief is fresh, every You must wait

attempt to divert only irritates.

it

(1) That he cordially assented to the reasons which operated on the minds of Mr. and Mrs. Thrale to postpone the journey, appears from his letter to the lady:. April 9. 1776. Mr. Thrale's alteration of purpose is not weakness of resolution; is a wise man's compliance with the change of things, and with the new duties which the change produces. Whoever expects me to be angry will be disappointed. I do not even grieve at the effect; I only grieve for the cause.' His desire, however, to go abroad was, says Mrs. Piozzi, "very great; and he had a longing wish, too, to leave some Latin verses at the Grand Chartreux." - C.

(2) He probably may have had some idea of accompanying his friend Mr. Saunders Welsh, who went to Italy in the May of this year. See post, Feb. 1778. C.