hope you will continue to cultivate this kind of learning, which has too long lain neglected, and which, if it be suffered to remain in oblivion for another century, may, perhaps, never be retrieved. As I wish well to all useful undertakings, I would not forbear to let you know how much you deserve, in my opinion, from all lovers of study, and how much pleasure your work has given to, Sir, your most obliged, and most humble servant, "SAM. JOHNSON."

LETTER 53. TO THE REV. THOMAS WARTON.

"[London,] June 21. 1757. "DEAR SIR,-Dr. Marsili, of Padua, a learned gentleman, and good Latin poet, has a mind to see Oxford. I have given him a letter to Dr. Huddesford, and shall be glad if you will introduce him, and shew him any thing in Oxford.

"I am printing my new edition of Shakspeare.

"I long to see you all, but cannot conveniently come yet. You might write to me now and then, if you were good for any thing. But (1) honores mutant mores. Professors forget their friends. I shall certainly complain to Miss Jones. (2) I am, your, &c.

"SAM. JOHNSON." "Please to make my compliments to Mr. Wise."

(1) Mr. Warton was elected Professor of Poetry at Oxford in the preceding year. - WARTON.

(2) Miss Jones lived at Oxford, and was often of our parties. She was a very ingenious poetess, and published a volume of poems; and, on the whole, was a most sensible, agreeable, and amiable woman. She was sister to the Rev. River Jones, Chanter of Christ Church Cathedral at Oxford, and Johnson used to call her the Chantress. I have heard him often address her in this passage from "Il Penseroso: "

"Thee, Chantress, oft the woods among
I woo," &c.

She died unmarried. WARTON.

Mr. Burney having enclosed to him an extract from the review of his Dictionary in the Bibliothèque des Savans [t. iii. p. 482.] and a list of subscribers to his Shakspeare, which Mr. Burney had procured in Norfolk, he wrote the following answer:

Gough Square, Dec. 24. 1757. “SIR,—That I may shew myself sensible of your favours, and not commit the same fault a second time, I make haste to answer the letter which I received this morning. The truth is, the other likewise was received, and I wrote an answer; but being desirous to transmit you some proposals and receipts, I waited till I could find a convenient conveyance, and day was passed after day, till other things drove it from my thoughts; yet not so, but that I remember with great pleasure your commendation of my Dictionary. Your praise was welcome, not only because I believe it was sincere, but because praise has been very scarce. man of your candour will be surprised when I tell you, that among all my acquaintance there were only two, who upon the publication of my book did not endeavour to depress me with threats of censure from the public, or with objections learned from those who had learned them from my own preface. Yours is the only letter of good-will that I have received; though, indeed, I am promised something of that sort from Sweden.

A

I

"How my new edition (1) will be received I know not; the subscription has not been very successful. shall publish about March.

"If you can direct me how to send proposals, I should wish that they were in such hands.

"I remember, Sir, in some of the first letters with (1) Of Shakspeare.

which you favoured me, you mentioned your lady. May I inquire after her? In return for the favours which you have shewn me, it is not much to tell you, that I wish you and her all that can conduce to your happiness. I am, Sir, your most obliged, and most humble servant, "SAM. JOHNSON."

In 1758 we find him, it should seem, in as easy and pleasant a state of existence, as constitutional unhappiness ever permitted him to enjoy.

LETTER 55. TO BENNET LANGTON, ESQ.
At Langton. (1)

"DEAREST SIR,

"Jan. 9. 1758.

I must have indeed slept very fast, not to have been awakened by your letter. None of your suspicions are true; I am not much richer than when you left me; and what is worse, my omission of an answer to your first letter will prove that I am not much wiser. But I go on as I formerly did, design-. ing to be some time or other both rich and wise; and yet cultivate neither mind nor fortune. Do you take notice of my example, and learn the danger of delay. When I was as you are now, towering in [the] confidence of twenty-one, little did I suspect that I should. be, at forty-nine, what I now am. ·(2)

66 But you do not seem to need my admonition. You are busy in acquiring and in communicating knowledge, and while you are studying, enjoy the end of study, by

(1) [Mr. Croker is of opinion, that this letter must have been written in January, 1759.]

(2) If the reader will look back to Johnson's deplorable situation when he was about the age of twenty-one, he will be inclined to think that he might rather have prided himself at having attained to the station which he now held in society. CROKER.Was not Johnson alluding, not to his comparative "station in society," but to his not being "much richer?" for in this letter he says, "I have left off housekeeping."— MARK

LAND.

making others wiser and happier. I was much pleased with the tale that you told me of being tutor to your sisters. I, who have no sisters, nor brothers, look with some degree of innocent envy on those who may be said to be born to friends (1); and cannot see, without wonder, how rarely that native union is afterwards regarded. It sometimes, indeed, happens, that some supervenient cause of discord may overpower this original amity; but it seems to me more frequently thrown away with levity, or lost by negligence, than destroyed by injury or violence. We tell the ladies that good wives make good husbands; I believe it is a more certain position that good brothers make good sisters.

“I am satisfied with your stay at home, as Juvenal with his friend's retirement to Cuma: I know that your absence is best, though it be not best for me.

Laudo tamen vacuis quod sedem figere Cumis

Destinet, atque unum civem donare Sibyllæ.' (2)

"Langton is a good Cumæ, but who must be Sibylla? Mrs. Langton is as wise as Sibyl, and as good ; and will

(1) See, however, antè (p. 3.). Gibbon, in his Memoirs, alludes to this subject with good taste and feeling: · -"From my childhood to the present hour, I have deeply and sincerely regretted my sister, whose life was somewhat prolonged, and whom I remember to have seen an amiable infant. The relation of a brother and a sister, particularly if they do not marry, appears to me of a very singular nature. It is a familiar and tender friendship with a female much about our own age; an affection perhaps softened by the secret influence of the sex, but pure from any mixture of sensual desire-the sole species of Platonic love that can be indulged with truth and without danger."- Mem., p. 25. — CROker.

(2) [" Grieved though I am to see the man depart,

Who long has shared, and still must share my heart,
Yet (when I call my better judgment home)

I praise his purpose; to retire from Rome

And give on Cuma's solitary coast,

The Sibyl-one inhabitant to boast!"—

!"— GIFFORD.]

live, if my wishes can prolong life, till she shall in time be as old. But she differs in this, that she has not scattered her precepts in the wind, at least not those which she bestowed upon you.

"The two Wartons just looked into the town, and were taken to see Cleone, where, David [Garrick] says, they were starved for want of company to keep them warm. David and Doddy (1) have had a new quarrel and, I think, cannot conveniently quarrel any more. 'Cleone' was well acted by all the characters, but Bellamy (2) left nothing to be desired. I went the first night, and supported it as well as I might; for Doddy, you know, is my patron, and I would not desert him. The play was very well received. Doddy, after the danger was over, went every night to the stage-side, and cried at the distress of poor Cleone.

me.

"I have left off housekeeping, and therefore made presents of the game which you were pleased to send The pheasant I gave to Mr. Richardson (3), the bustard to Dr. Lawrence, and the pot I placed with Miss Williams, to be eaten by myself. She desires that her compliments and good wishes may be accepted by the family; and I make the same request for myself.

"Mr. Reynolds has within these few days raised his price to twenty guineas a head (4), and Miss (5) is much

(1) Mr. Dodsley, the author of Cleone.

(2) The well-known Miss George Ann Bellamy, who played the heroine. C.- [An Apology for her very irregular Life, written by Herself, in six volumes, was published in 1785.] (3) The author of Clarissa.

(4) Sir Joshua afterwards greatly advanced his price. I have been informed by Sir Thomas Lawrence, his admirer and rival, that in 1787 his prices were, two hundred guineas for the whole length, one hundred for the half-length, seventy for the kit-cat, and fifty for (what is called) the three-quarters. But even on these prices some increase must have been made, as Horace Walpole said, "Sir Joshua, in his old age, becomes avaricious. He had one thousand guineas for my picture of the three ladies Waldegrave."-Walpoliana. This picture are half-lengths 0. the three ladies on one canvas. — .C.

(5) Miss Reynolds, the sister of Sir Joshua. C.