figurative expressions in addressing the Supreme Being; and I never use them. Taylor gives a very good advice: Never lie in your prayers; never confess more than you really believe; never promise more than you mean to perform.' I recollected this precept in his 'Golden Grove;' but his example for prayer contradicts his precept.

Dr. Johnson and I went in Dr. Adams's coach to dine with Dr. Nowell, Principal of St. Mary Hall, at his villa at Iffley, on the banks of the Isis, about two miles from Oxford. While we were upon the road, I had the resolution to ask Johnson whether he thought that the roughness of his manner had been an advantage or not, and if he would not have done more good if he had been more gentle. I proceeded to answer myself thus: "Perhaps it has been of advantage, as it has given weight to what you said; you could not, perhaps, have talked with such authority without it." JOHNSON. "No, Sir; I have done more good as I am. Obscenity and

impiety have always been repressed in my company."(1) Boswell. "True, Sir; and that is more than can be said of every bishop. Greater liberties have been taken in the presence of a bishop, though a very good man, from his being milder, and therefore not commanding such awe. Yet, Sir, many people who might have been benefited by your conversation have been frightened away. A

the last supposition, we may refer to the following passage in one of his prayers:- "I beg of thee by all the parts of our redemption, and thy infinite mercy, in which thou pleasest thyself above all the works of the creation (iv. 485). — MARKLAND.

(1) See antè, Vol. VI. p. 160. C.

worthy friend of ours has told me, that he has often been afraid to talk to you." JOHNSON. "Sir, he need not have been afraid, if he had any thing rational to say (1). If he had not, it was better he did not talk."

Dr. Nowell is celebrated for having preached a sermon before the House of Commons, on the 30th of January, 1772, full of high Tory sentiments, for which he was thanked as usual, and printed it at their request; but, in the midst of that turbulence and faction which disgraced a part of the present reign, the thanks were afterwards ordered to be expunged (2). This strange conduct sufficiently exposes itself; and Dr. Nowell will ever have the honour which is due to a lofty friend of our monarchical constitution. Dr. Johnson said to me, "Sir, the court will be very much to blame if he is not promoted." I told this to Dr. Nowell; and asserting my humbler, though not less zealous, exertions in the same cause, I suggested, that whatever return we might receive, we should still have the consolation of being like Butler's steady and generous royalist,

"True as the dial to the sun,

Although it be not shone upon."

We were well entertained and very happy at Dr. Nowell's, where was a very agreeable company; and we drank "Church and King" after dinner, with true Tory cordiality.

(1) The words of Erasmus may be applied to Johnson: "Qui ingenium, sensum, dictionem hominis noverant, multis non offenduntur, quibus graviter erant offendendi, qui hæc ignorarunt." KEARNEY.

(2) See antè, Vol. III. p. 178. n. — .C.

We talked of a certain clergyman (1) of extraordinary character, who, by exerting his talents in writing on temporary topics, and displaying uncommon intrepidity, had raised himself to affluence. I maintained that we ought not to be indignant at his success; for merit of every sort was entitled to reward. JOHNSON. “Sir, I will not allow this man to have merit. No, Sir; what he has is rather the contrary: I will, indeed, allow him courage; and on this account we so far give him credit. We have more respect for a man who robs boldly on the highway, than for a fellow who jumps out of a ditch, and knocks you down behind your back. Courage is a quality so necessary for maintaining virtue, that it is always respected, even when it is associated with vice."

I censured the coarse invectives which were become fashionable in the House of Commons, and said, that if members of parliament must attack each other personally in the heat of debate, it should be done more genteelly. JOHNSON. "No, Sir; that would be much worse. Abuse is not so dangerous

(1) The Rev. Henry Bate, who, in 1784, took the name of Dudley, was created a baronet in 1815, and died in 1824, without issue. He became first known to the world for a rather unclerical exhibition of personal prowess in a Vauxhall squabble (see Lond. Mag. for 1773, p. 461.); he was afterwards actively connected with the public press; and in consequence of something that appeared in the Morning Post, of which he was the proprietor, which was supposed to reflect on Lady Strathmore, he was involved in a duel (or pretended duel, Gent. Mag. 1810, p. 183. 1828, p. 496.) with Mr. Robinson Stoney, who soon after married the lady, and took the name of Bowes. He afterwards quarrelled with his co-proprietors in the Post, one of whom, Joseph Richardson, he wounded in another duel, and set up the Morning Herald. He was afterwards high in the church, and an active and respectable magistrate. C.

when there is no vehicle of wit and delicacy, no subtle conveyance. The difference between coarse and refined abuse is as the difference between being bruised by a club, and wounded by a poisoned arrow." - I have since observed his position elegantly expressed by Dr. Young:

"As the soft plume gives swiftness to the dart,

Good breeding sends the satire to the heart." (1)

On Saturday, June 12., there drank tea with us at Dr. Adams's, Mr. John Henderson, student of Pembroke College, celebrated for his wonderful acquirements in alchymy, judicial astrology, and other abstruse and curious learning (2) and the Reverend Herbert Croft, who, I am afraid, was somewhat mortified by Dr. Johnson's not being highly pleased with some Family Discourses which he had printed; they were in too familiar a style to be approved of by so manly a mind. I have no note of this evening's conversation, except a single fragment. When I mentioned Thomas Lord Lyttelton's vision, the prediction of the time of his death, and its exact fulfilment : - JOHNSON.

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"It

is the most extraordinary thing that has happened in my day. I heard it with my own ears, from his

(1) The feather does not give swiftness, but only serves to guide the arrow; so that Young's allusion is incorrect as well as Mr. Boswell's - C.

(2) See an account of him, in a sermon by the Rev. Mr. Agutter.-B. He was a young man of very extraordinay abilities, but of strange habits and manners. He was supposed to be well read in books which no one else reads. He took his batchelor's degree, but never got out into the world, having died in college in 1788.. -HALL. See Hannah More's Life, vol. i. p. 194., by which it appears that Henderson was sent to college by Dean Tucker, aided by a subscription.

C.

-

uncle, Lord Westcote ('). I am so glad to have every evidence of the spiritual world, that I am willing to believe it." Dr. ADAMS. "You have evidence enough; good evidence, which needs not such support." JOHNSON. "I like to have more." Mr. Henderson, with whom I had sauntered in the venerable walks of Merton College, and found him a very learned and pious man, supped with us. Dr. Johnson surprised him not a little, by acknowledging with a look of horror, that he was much oppressed by the fear of death. The amiable Dr. Adams suggested that GOD was infinitely good: JOHNSON. "That he is infinitely good, as far as the perfection of his nature will allow, I certainly believe; but it is necessary for good upon the whole, that individuals should be punished. As to an individual, therefore, he is not infinitely good; and as I cannot be sure that I have fulfilled the conditions on which salvation is granted, I am afraid I may be one of those who shall be damned." (Looking dismally.) Dr. ADAMS. "What do you mean by damned?" JOHNSON (passionately and loudly). "Sent to Hell, Sir, and punished everlastingly." Dr. ADAMS. "I don't believe that doctrine." JOHNSON." Hold, Sir, do you believe that some will be punished at all?" Dr. ADAMS. "Being excluded from Heaven will be a punishment; yet there may be no great positive suffering." JOHNSON. Well, Sir; but, if you admit any degree of punishment, there is an end of your argument for

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(1) A correct account of Lord Lyttelton's supposed Vision may be found in Nash's " History of Worcestershire.” — M.