Theobald burton than Theobald. O poor Tib.! (said Johnind War- son) he was ready knocked down to my hands burton Warburton stands between me and him."

;

" But, Sir, (said Mr. Burney,) you'll have Warburton upon your bones, won't you?" No, Sir; he'll not come out he'll only growl in his den.' But you think, Sir, that Warburton is a superiour critick to Theobald?'-'O, Sir, he'd make two-and-fifty Theobalds, cut into slices! The worst of Warburton is, that he has a rage for saying something, when there's nothing to be said.'-Mr. Burney then asked him whether he had seen the letter which Warburton had written in answer to a pamphlet addressed To the most impudent Man alive.' He answered in the negative. Mr. Burney told him it was supposed to be written by Mallet. The controversy now raged between the friends of Pope and Bolingbroke; and Warburton and Mallet were the leaders of the several parties. Mr. Burney asked him then if he had seen Warburton's book against Bolingbroke's Philosophy? No, Sir; I have never read Bolingbroke's impiety, and therefore am not interested about its confutation.'

On the fifteenth of April he began a new periodical paper, entitled “THE Idler, "*which came out every Saturday in a weekly news-paper, called "The Universal Chronicle, or Weekly Gazette," published by Newbery. These essays were continued till

1 [This is a slight mistake. The first number of "The Idler" appeared on the 15th of April, 1758, in No. 2 of the Universal Chronicle, &c., which was published by J. Payne, for whom also the Rambler had been printed. On the 29th of April this newspaper assumed the title of PAYNE'S Úniversal Chronicle, &c.—M.]on 3nts

April 5, 1760. Of one hundred and three, their The Idle total number, twelve were contributed by his friends; of which, Numbers 33, 93, and 96, were written by Mr. Thomas Warton; No. 67 by Mr. Langton; and Nos. 76, 79, and 82, by Sir Joshua Reynolds; the concluding words of No. 82, "and pollute his canvas with deformity," being added by Johnson; as Sir Joshua informed me.

The IDLER is evidently the work of the same mind which produced the RAMBLER, but has less body and more spirit. It has more variety of real life, and greater facility of language. He describes the miseries of idleness, with the lively sensations of one who has felt them; and in his private memorandums while engaged in it, we find "This year I hope to learn diligence."1 Many of these excellent essays were written as hastily as an ordinary letter. Mr. Langton remembers Johnson, when on a visit at Oxford, asking him one evening how long it was till the post went out; and on being told 1/spaced about half an hour, he exclaimed, "then we shall do very well." He upon this instantly sat down and finished an Idler, which it was necessary should come! be in London the next day. Mr. Langton having signified a wish to read it, "Sir, (said he) you shall not do more than I have done myself." He then folded it up, and sent it off.

Yet there are in the Idler several papers which shew as much profundity of thought, and labour of language, as any of this great man's writings. No. 14, "Robbery of time; " No. 24, "Thinking; No. 41, "Death of a friend; No. 66 43, Flight of time;" No. 51, "Domestick greatness unattaina Prayers and Meditations, p. 30. abouis bit

weather

Depend- able; " No. 52, "Self-denial; " No. 58, "Actual, ence on how short of fancied, excellence; " No. 89, "Phythe sical evil moral good;" and his concluding paper on "The horrour of the last," will prove this assertion. I know not why a motto, the usual trapping of periodical papers, is prefixed to very few of the Idlers, as I have heard Johnson commend the custom; and he never could be at a loss for one, his memory being stored with innumerable passages of the classicks. In this series of essays he exhibits admirable instances of grave humour, of which he had an uncommon share. Nor on some occasions has he repressed that power of sophistry which he possessed in so eminent a degree. In No. 11, he treats with the utmost contempt the opinion that our mental faculties depend, in some degree, upon the weather; an opinion, which they who have never experienced its truth are not to be envied, and of which he himself could not but be sensible, as the effects of weather upon him were very visible. Yet thus he declaims "Surely, nothing is more reproachful to a being endowed with reason, than to resign its powers to the influence of the air, and live in dependence on the weather and the wind for the only blessings which nature has put into our power, tranquillity and benevolence.—This distinction of seasons is produced only by imagination operating on luxury. To temperance, every day is bright; and every hour is propitious to diligence. He that shall resolutely excite his faculties, or exert his virtues, will soon make himself superiour to the seasons; and may set at defiance the morning mist and the evening damp, the blasts of the east, and the clouds of the south."

ridiculed

Alas! it is too certain, that where the frame has Rhetòridelicate fibres, and there is a fine sensibility, such cal influences of the air are irresistible. He might as gesture well have bid defiance to the ague, the palsy, and all other bodily disorders. Such boasting of the mind is false elevation.

But in this number of his Idler his spirits seem to run riot; for in the wantonness of his disquisition he forgets, for a moment, even the reverence for that which he held in high respect; and describes "the attendant on a Court," as one "whose business is to watch the looks of a being, weak and foolish as himself."for oi

His unqualified ridicule of rhetorical gesture or action is not, surely a test of truth; yet we cannot help admiring how well it is adapted to produce the effect which he wished. Neither the judges of our laws, nor the representatives of our people, would be much affected by laboured gesticulations, or believe any man the more because he rolled his eyes, or puffed his cheeks, or spread abroad his arms, or stamped the ground, or thumped his breast; or turned his eyes sometimes to the ceiling, and sometimes to the floor."

A casual coincidence with other writers, or an adoption of a sentiment or image which has been found in the writings of another, and afterwards appears in the mind as one's own, is not unfrequent. The richness of Johnson's fancy, which could supply his page abundantly on all occasions, and the strength of his memory, which at once

943

An in- detected the real owner of any thought, made him genious less liable to the imputation of plagiarism than, parallel perhaps, any of our writers. In the Idler, how

ever, there is a paper, in which conversation is
assimilated to a bowl of punch, where there is the
same train of comparison as in a poem by Black-
lock, in his collection published in 1756; in which
a parallel is ingeniously drawn between human life
and that liquor. It ends,

"Say, then, physicians of each kind,
Who cure the body or the mind,
What harm in drinking can there be,
Since punch and life so well agree

?

To the Idler, when collected in volumes, he added, beside the Essay on Epitaphs, and the Dissertation on those of Pope, an Essay on the Bravery of the English common Soldiers. He, however, omitted one of the original papers, which in the folio copy, is No. 22.1

"TO THE REVEREND MR. THOMAS WARTON.

DEAR SIR,

"YOUR notes upon my poet were very acceptable. I beg that you will be so kind as to continue your searches. It will be reputable to my work, and suitable to your professorship, to have something of yours in the notes. As you have given no

1 This paper may be found in Stockdale's supplemental volume, of Johnson's Miscellaneous Pieces.