does it not keep pace, in some measure, with the progress of time? If it stops because there is now no need of it, then it is plain there is, and ever has been, an all-powerful intelligence. But stay! (said he, with one of his satyric laughs). Ha! ha! ha! I shall suppose Scotchmen made necessarily, and Englishmen by choice." At dinner this day we had Sir Alexander Dick, whose amiable character and ingenious and cultivated mind are so generally known; (he was then on the verge of seventy, and is now (1785) eightyone, with his faculties entire, his heart warm, and his temper gay) (1); Sir David Dalrymple, Lord Hailes; Mr. Maclaurin, advocate; Dr. Gregory, who now worthily fills his father's medical chair; and my uncle, Dr. Boswell. This was one of Dr. Johnson's best days. He was quite in his element. All was literature and taste, without any interruption. Lord Hailes, who is one of the best philologists in Great Britain, who has written papers in the World, and a variety of other works in prose and in verse, both Latin and English, pleased him highly. He told him he had discovered the Life of Cheynel, in the Student, to be his. JOHNSON. "No one else knows it." Dr. Johnson had before this dictated to me a law-paper (2) upon a question purely in the law of Scotland, concerning vicious intromission, that is to say, intermeddling with the effects of a deceased person, without a regular title; which formerly was understood to subject the inter (1) [Sir A. Dick was born in 1703; died Nov. 10. 1785. (2) See Vol. III. p. 234. and Appendix, No. II.-C. meddler to payment of all the defunct's debts. The principle has of late been relaxed. Dr. Johnson's argument was for a renewal of its strictness. The paper was printed, with additions by me, and given into the court of session. Lord Hailes knew Dr. Johnson's part not to be mine, and pointed out exactly where it began and where it ended. Dr. Johnson said, "It is much now that his lordship can distinguish so." In Dr. Johnson's Vanity of Human Wishes there is the following passage:· "The teeming mother, anxious for her race, Begs, for each birth, the fortune of a face: Yet Vane could tell what ills from beauty spring: And Sedley cursed the charms which pleased a king.” Lord Hailes told him he was mistaken in the instances he had given of unfortunate fair ones; for neither Vane nor Sedley had a title to that description. His lordship has since been so obliging as to send me a note of this, for the communication of which I am sure my readers will thank me. "The lines in the tenth Satire of Juvenal, according to my alteration, should run thus: "Yet Shore (1) could tell -; And Valière (2) cursed "The first was a penitent by compulsion, the second by sentiment; though the truth is, Mademoiselle de la Valière threw herself (but still from sentiment) in the king's way. "Our friend chose Vane (3), who was far from being well-looked; and Sedley (4), who was so ugly (1) Mistress of Edward IV. (2) Mistress of Louis XIV. (4) Catherine Sedley, created Countess of Dorchester for that Charles II. said his brother had her by way of penance." () Mr. Maclaurin's (2) learning and talents enabled him to do his part very well in Dr. Johnson's company. He produced two epitaphs upon his father, the celebrated mathematician. One was in English, life. Her father, Sir Charles, resenting the seduction of his daughter, joined in the Whig measures of the Revolution, and excused his revolt from James under an ironical profession of gratitude. "His Majesty," said he, "having done me the unlooked-for honour of making my daughter a countess, I cannot do less in return than endeavour to make his daughter a queen."-C. (1) Lord Hailes was hypercritical. Vane was handsome, or, what is more to our purpose, appeared so to her royal lover; and Sedley, whatever others may have thought of her, had the "charms which pleased a king." So that Johnson's illustrations are morally just. His lordship's proposed substitution of a fabulous (or at least apocryphal) beauty like Jane Shore, whose story, even if true, was obsolete; or that of a foreigner, like Mlle. De la Valière, little known and less cared for amongst us, is not only tasteless but inaccurate; for Mlle. De la Va lière's beauty was quite as much questioned by her contemporaries as Miss Sedley's. Bussy Rabutin was exiled for sneering at Louis's admiration of her mouth, which he calls un bec amoureux, Qui d'une oreille à l'autre va."-C. (2) Mr. Maclaurin, advocate, son of the great mathematician, and afterwards a judge of session by the title of Lord Dreghorn. He wrote some indifferent English poems; but was a good Latin scholar, and a man of wit and accomplishment. His quotations from the classics were particularly apposite. In the famous case of Knight, which determined the right of a slave to freedom if he landed in Scotland, Maclaurin pleaded the cause of the negro. The counsel opposite was the celebrated Wight, an excellent lawyer, but of a very homely appearance, with heavy features, a blind eye, which projected from the socket, a swag belly, and a limp. To him Maclaurin applied the lines of Virgil Quamvis ille niger, quamvis tu candidus esses, Mr. Maclaurin wrote an essay against the Homeric tale of Troy divine," I believe, for the sole purpose of introducing a happy motto, "Non anni domuere decem, non mille carinæ."WALTER SCOTT. of which Dr. Johnson did not change one word. In the other, which was in Latin, he made several alterations. In place of the very words of Virgil, "Ubi luctus et pavor et plurima mortis imago,” he wrote "Ubi luctus regnant et pavor." He introduced the word prorsus into the line "Mortalibus prorsus non absit solatium ;" and after "Hujus enim scripta evolve," he added, "Mentemque tantarum rerum capacem corpori caduco superstitem crede;" which is quite applicable to Dr. Johnson himself.(1) Mr. Murray, advocate, who married a niece of Lord Mansfield's, and is now one of the judges of Scotland, by the title of Lord Henderland, sat with us a part of the evening; but did not venture to say any thing that I remember, though he is certainly possessed of talents which would have enabled him to have shown himself to advantage if too great anxiety had not prevented him. At supper we had Dr. Alexander Webster (2), (1) Mr. Maclaurin's epitaph, as engraved on a marble tombstone, in the Grayfriars churchyard, Edinburgh: Infra situs est COLIN MACLAURIN, Non ut nomini paterno consulat, (2) Dr. Webster was remarkable for the talent with which he at once supported his place in convivial society, and a high character as a leader of the strict and rigid presbyterian party in the church of Scotland. He was ever gay amid the gayest: when it once occurred to some one present to ask, what one of his Elders would think, should he see his pastor in such a merry who, though not learned, had such a knowledge of mankind, such a fund of information and entertainment, so clear a head, and such accommodating manners, that Dr. Johnson found him a very agreeable companion. When Dr. Johnson and I were left by ourselves, I read to him my notes of the opinions of our judges upon the questions of literary property. He did not like them; and said, "they make me think of your judges not with that respect which I should wish to do." To the argument of one of them, that there can be no property in blasphemy or nonsense, he answered," then your rotten sheep are mine! By that rule, when a man's house falls into decay, he must lose it." (1) I mentioned an argument of mine, that literary performances are not taxed. As Churchill says, "No statesman yet has thought it worth his pains mood." Think!" replied the Doctor; "why he would not believe his own eyes."-WALTER SCOTT. (1) Dr. Johnson's illustration is sophistical, and might have been retorted upon him; for if a man's sheep are so rotten as to render the meat unwholesome, or, if his house be so decayed as to threaten mischief to passengers, the law will confiscate the mutton and abate the house, without any regard to property, which the owner thus abuses. Moreover, Johnson should have discriminated between a criminal offence and a civil right. Blasphemy is a crime; would it not be in the highest degree absurd, that there should be a right of property in a crime, or that the law should be called upon to protect that which is illegal? If this be true in law, it is much more so in equity, as he who applies for the extraordinary assistance of a court of equity should have a right, consistent at least with equity and morals; and a late question [that as to the Cain of Lord Byron] was so decided, and upon that principle, by the greatest judge of modern times, Lord Eldon.-C. |