Aetat. 41.] Johnson's influence on style. 257 remarkably fond of Anglo-Latian diction; and to his example we are to ascribe Johnson's sometimes indulging himself in this kind of phraseology'. Johnson's comprehension of mind was the mould for his language. Had his conceptions been narrower, his expression would have been easier. His sentences have a dignified march; and, it is certain, that his example has given a general elevation to the language of his country, for many of our best writers have approached very near to him; and, from the influence which he has had upon our composition, scarcely any thing is written now that is not better expressed than was usual before he appeared to lead the national taste. This circumstance, the truth of which must strike every critical reader, has been so happily enforced by Mr. Courtenay, in his Moral and Literary Character of Dr. Johnson, that I cannot prevail on myself to withhold it, notwithstanding his, perhaps, too great partiality for one of his friends: of 1756), yet he saw much to censure in Browne's style. His style is, indeed, a tissue of many languages; a mixture of heterogeneous words, brought together from distant regions, with terms originally appropriated to one art, and drawn by violence into the service of another. He must however be confessed to have augmented our philosophical diction. His innovations are sometimes pleasing, and his temerities happy.' Johnson's Works, vi. 500. It is remarkable that the pomp of diction, which has been objected to Johnson, was first assumed in the Rambler. His Dictionary was going on at the same time, and in the course of that work, as he grew familiar with technical and scholastic words, he thought that the bulk of his readers were equally learned; or at least would admire the splendour and dignity of the style.' Murphy's Johnson, p. 156. • The observation of his having imitated Sir Thomas Brown has been made by many people; and lately it has been insisted on, and illustrated by a variety of quotations from Brown, in one of the popular Essays written by the Reverend Mr. Knox [the Essay is No. xxii. of Winter Evenings, Knox's Works, ii. 397], master of Tunbridge school, whom I have set down in my list [post, under Dec. 6, 1784] of those who have sometimes not unsuccessfully imitated Dr. Johnson's style. BOSWELL. 1.-17 By 258 Courtenay's lines on Johnson's school. [A.D. 1750. 'By nature's gifts ordain'd mankind to rule, The following observation in Mr. Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides [p. 9] may sufficiently account for that Gentleman's being ' now scarcely esteem'd a Scot' by many of his countrymen :-' If he [Dr. Johnson] was particularly prejudiced against the Scots, it was because they were more in his way; because he thought their success in England rather exceeded the due proportion of their real merit; and because he could not but see in them that nationality which, I believe, no liberal-minded Scotchman will deny.' Mr. Boswell, indeed, is so free from national prejudices, that he might with equal propriety have been described as •Scarce by South Britons now esteem'd a Scot.' COURTENAY. BOSWELL. The Aetat. 41.] The styles of Addison and Johnson. The keen research, the exercise of mind, 259 Johnson's language, however, must be allowed to be too masculine for the delicate gentleness of female writing. His ladies, therefore, seem strangely formal, even to ridicule; and are well denominated by the names which he has given them, as Misella', Zozima, Properantia, Rhodoclia. It has of late been the fashion to compare the style of Addison and Johnson, and to depreciate, I think very unjustly, the style of Addison as nerveless and feeble, because it has not the strength and energy of that of Johnson. Their prose may be balanced like the poetry of Dryden and Pope. Malone says that 'Baretti used sometimes to walk with Johnson through the streets at night, and occasionally entered into conversation with the unfortunate women who frequent them, for the sake of hearing their stories. It was from a history of one of these, which a girl told under a tree in the King's Bench Walk in the Temple to Baretti and Johnson, that he formed the story of Miseila in the Rambler [Nos. 170 and 171].' Prior's Malone, p. 161. Of one [of these women] who was very handsome he asked, for what she thought God had given her so much beauty. She answered :-" To please gentlemen."' Hawkins's Johnson, p. 321. See also post, under Dec. 2, 1784. * Hawkins (Life, p. 270) had said that 'the characteristics of Addison's style are feebleness and inanity.' He was thus happily ridiculed by Porson :-'Soon after the publication of Sir John's book, a parcel of Eton boys, not having the fear of God before their eyes, etc., instead of playing truant, robbing orchards, annoying poultry, or performing any other part of their school exercise, fell foul in print (see the Microcosm, No. 36) upon his Worship's censure of Addison's middling style.... But what can you expect, as Lord Kames justly observes, from a school where boys are taught to rob on the highway?' Porson, Tracts, p. 339. Both 260 The styles of Addison and Johnson. [A.D. 1750. Both are excellent, though in different ways. Addison writes with the ease of a gentleman. His readers fancy that a wise and accomplished companion is talking to them; so that he insinuates his sentiments and taste into their minds by an imperceptible influence. Johnson writes like a teacher. He dictates to his readers as if from an academical chair. They attend with awe and admiration; and his precepts are impressed upon them by his commanding eloquence. Addison's style, like a light wine, pleases everybody from the first. Johnson's, like a liquor of more body, seems too strong at first, but, by degrees, is highly relished; and such is the melody of his periods, so much do they captivate the ear, and seize upon the attention, that there is scarcely any writer, however inconsiderable, who does not aim, in some degree, at the same species of excellence. But let us not ungratefully undervalue that beautiful style, which has pleasingly conveyed to us much instruction and entertainment. Though comparatively weak, opposed to Johnson's Herculean vigour, let us not call it positively feeble. Let us remember the character of his style, as given by Johnson himself': 'What he attempted, he performed; he is never feeble, and he did not wish to be energetick; he is never rapid, and he never stagnates. His sentences have neither studied amplitude, nor affected brevity: his periods, though not diligently rounded, are voluble and easy. Works, vii. 473. • When Johnson shewed me a proof-sheet of the character of Addison, in which he so highly extols his style, I could not help observing, that it had not been his own model, as no two styles could differ more from each other. - ' Sir, Addison had his style, and I have mine.' When I ventured to ask him, whether the difference did not consist in this, that Addison's style was full of idioms, colloquial phrases, and proverbs; and his own more strictly grammatical, and free from such phraseology and modes of speech as can never be literally translated or understood by foreigners; he allowed the discrimination to be just. -Let any one who doubts it, try to translate one of Addison's Spectators into Latin, French, or Italian; and though so easy, familiar, and elegant, to an Englishman, as to give the intellect no trouble; yet he Whoever Aetat. 41.] Boswell's projected works. 261 Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison'.' Though The Rambler was not concluded till the year 1752, I shall, under this year, say all that I have to observe upon it. Some of the translations of the mottos by himself are admirably done. He acknowledges to have received 'elegant translations' of many of them from Mr. James Elphinston; and some are very happily translated by a Mr. F. Lewis", of whom I never heard more, except that would find the transfusion into another language extremely difficult, if not impossible. But a Rambler, Adventurer, or Idler, of Johnson, would fall into any classical or European language, as easily as if it had been originally conceived in it. BURNEY. Mrs. Piozzi (Anec. p. 125) recounts how Johnson recommended Addison's works as a model for imitation to Mr. Woodhouse, a poetical shoemaker. "Give nights and days, Sir, (said he) to the study of Addison, if you mean either to be a good writer, or, what is more worth, an honest man." When I saw something like the same expression in his criticism on that author, I put him in mind of his past injunctions to the young poet, to which he replied, "That he wished the shoemaker might have remembered them as well."' Yet he says in his Life of Pope (Works, viii. 284), 'He that has once studiously formed a style rarely writes afterwards with complete ease.' I shall probably, in another work, maintain the merit of Addison's poetry, which has been very unjustly depreciated. BoOSWELL. He proposed also to publish an edition of Johnson's poems (ante, p. 19), an account of his own travels (post, April 17, 1778), a collection, with notes, of old tenures and charters of Scotland (post, Oct. 27, 1779), and a History of James IV. of Scotland, 'the patron,' as he said, 'of my family' (Boswell's Hebrides, Aug. 23, 1773). * Lewis thus happily translates the lines in Martial, 'Diligat illa senem quondam: sed et ipsa marito, Rambler, No. 167. Some of Johnson's own translations are happy, as :- Johnson |