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Tony. Bandbox! She's all a made-up thing, man. Ah! could you but see Bet Bouncer of these parts, you might then talk of beauty. She has two eyes as black as sloes, and cheeks as broad and red as a pulpit-cushion. She'd make two of she.-id.

Mr. Hardcastle. I believe, sir, you must be sensible, sir, that no man alive ought to be more welcome than your father's son, sir. I hope you think so.

Marlow. I do from my soul, sir. I don't want much entreaty; I generally make my father's son welcome wherever he goes.-Act 4.

Tony. "To Anthony Lumpkin, Esq." Its very odd; I can read the outside of my letters, where my own name is, well enough; but when I come to open it, its all buzz. That's hard, very hard; for the inside of the letter is always the cream of the correspondence.-id.

BOSWELL.-LIFE OF JOHNSON.

EDITED BY CROKER. (1847.)

Ir is related of the great Dr. Clarke, that when in one of his leisure hours he was unbending himself with a few friends in the most playful and frolicksome manner, he observed Beau Nash approaching, upon which he suddenly stopped. My boys," said he, "let us be grave-here comes a fool."-Boswell. Dedication to Reynolds.

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AN Athenian blockhead is the worst of all blockheads.— Johnson, 17.

THE original MS. of Pope's Homer (preserved in the British Museum) is almost entirely written on the covers of letters, and sometimes between the lines of the letters themselves.— Nichols, 41.

Or the reports in the Gentleman's Magazine Mr. Murphy says: :- "That Johnson was the author of the debates was not generally known; but the secret transpired several years afterwards, and was avowed by himself on the following occasion: - Mr. Wedderburne (afterwards Lord Loughborough and Earl of Rosslyn), Dr. Johnson, Dr. Francis (the translator of Horace), Murphy himself, and others, dined with the late Mr. Foote. An important debate towards the end of Sir Robert Walpole's administration being mentioned, Dr. Francis observed, that Mr. Pitt's speech on that occasion was the best he had ever read.' He added, 'that he had employed eight

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years of his life in the study of Demosthenes, and finished a translation of that celebrated orator with all the decorations of style and language within the reach of his capacity, but he had met with nothing equal to the speech above mentioned.' Many of the company remembered the debate; and some passages were cited with the approbation and applause of all present. During the ardour of conversation Johnson remained silent. As soon as the warmth of praise subsided, he opened with these words:-'That speech I wrote in a garret in Exeter-street.'"-Croker, 45.

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JOHNSON has been heard to say (August 11, 1753), “I wrote forty-eight of the printed octavo pages of the Life of Savage' at a sitting; but then I sat up all night.”—Boswell, 50.

THE Bishop (of Dromore) told Mr. Tyers that Johnson composed it ("Vision of Theodore the Hermit, found in his cell,") in one night, after finishing an evening at Holborn. -Croker, 59.

I HAVE heard him say that he composed seventy lines of it ("The Vanity of Human Wishes") in one day, without putting one of them upon paper till they were finished.— Boswell.

I THINK Scarce any temporal good equally to be desired with the regard and familiarity of worthy men.-Johnson, 66. MR. BURKE said pleasantly, that "his ladies were all Johnsons in petticoats."-Croker, 71.

JOHNSON, during the whole course of his life, had no shy-. ness, real or affected, but was easy of access to all who were properly recommended; and even wished to see numbers at his levee, as his morning circle of company might, with strict propriety, be called. Mr. Langton was exceedingly surprised when the sage first appeared. He had not received the smallest intimation of his figure, dress, or manner. From perusing his writings, he fancied he should see a decent, welldressed-in short, a remarkably decorous philosopher. Instead of which, down from his bed-chamber about noon came, as newly risen, a huge uncouth figure, with a little dark wig which scarcely covered his head, and his clothes hanging loose about him.-Boswell, 79.

No MAN is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.-Johnson, 86.

A FLY may sting a stately horse, and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a horse still.

Ir has been long observed, that men do not suspect faults which they do not commit.-95.

IF a man does not make new acquaintance as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in constant repair.-98.

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HIS defence of tea against Mr. Jonas Hanway's violent attack upon that elegant and popular beverage, shows how very well a man of genius can write upon the slightest subject, when he writes, as the Italians say, con amore. I suppose no person ever enjoyed with more relish the infusion of that fragrant leaf than Johnson. The quantities which he drank of it at all hours were so great, that his nerves must have been uncommonly strong not to have been extremely relaxed by such an intemperate use of it. He assured me that he never felt the least inconvenience from it, which is a proof that the fault of his constitution was rather a too great tension of fibres than the contrary. Mr. Hanway wrote an angry answer to Johnson's review of his "Essay on Tea; and Johnson, after a full and deliberate pause, made a reply to it-the only instance, I believe, in the whole course of his life when he condescended to oppose anything that was written against him. [In this review Johnson candidly describes himself as "a hardened and shameless tea-drinker, who has for many years diluted his meals with only the infusion of this fascinating plant; whose kettle has scarcely time to cool; who with tea amuses the evening, with tea solaces the midnights, and with tea welcomes the morning." This last phrase his friend Tom Tyers happily parodied, " te veniente die-te decedente." Hawkins call his addiction to it unmanly, and almost gives it the colour of a crime. The Rev. Mr. Parker, of Henley, is in possession of a teapot which belonged to Dr. Johnson, and which contains above two quarts!-Croker.]-Boswell, 105.

SOME time after Dr. Johnson's death there appeared in the newspapers and magazines (the following) illiberal and petulant attack upon him, in the form of an epitaph, under the name of Mr. Soame Jenyns, very unworthy of that gentleman, who had quietly submitted to the critical lash while Johnson lived. It assumed, as characteristics of him, all the vulgar circumstances of abuse which had circulated amongst the ignorant:

"Here lies poor Johnson-reader, have a care:
Tread lightly, lest you rouse a sleeping bear;
Religious, moral, generous, and humane
He was-but self-sufficient, rude, and vain;

Ill-bred and overbearing in dispute;

A scholar and a Christian-yet a brute.
Would you know all his wisdom and his folly,
His actions, sayings, mirth, and melancholy,
Boswell and Thrale, retailers of his wit,

Will tell you how he wrote, and talk'd, and cough'd, and spit.” This was an unbecoming indulgence of puny resentment, at a time when he himself was at a very advanced age, and had a near prospect of descending to the grave. He could not expect that Johnson's numerous friends would patiently bear to have the memory of their master stigmatised by his mean pen, but that at least one would be found to retort. Accordingly, this unjust and sarcastic epitaph was met in the same public field by an answer, in terms by no means soft, and such as wanton provocation only could justify :

EPITAPH

Prepared for a creature not quite dead yet.

"Here lies a little, ugly, nauseous elf,
Who, judging only from its wretched self,
Feebly attempted, petulant and vain,

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The Origin of Evil' to explain.

A mighty genius, at this elf displeas'd,

With a strong critic-grasp the urchin squeez'd.
For thirty years its coward spleen it kept,
Till in the dust the mighty genius slept;
Then stunk and fretted in expiring snuff,
And blink'd at Johnson with its last poor puff."

-Boswell.

This answer was no doubt by Mr. Boswell himself; and does more credit to his zeal than his poetical talents.-Croker, 106.

THERE is a composure and gravity in draughts which insensibly tranquillises the mind; and, accordingly, the Dutch are fond of it, as they are of smoking, of the sedative influence of which, though he himself never smoked, he had a high opinion. [Hawkins heard Johnson say, that insanity had grown more frequent since smoking had gone out of fashion.-Croker.] We talked of change of manners. Dr. Johnson observed, that our drinking less than our ancestors was owing to the change from ale to wine. "I remember," said he, "when all the decent people in Lichfield got drunk every night, and were not the worse thought of. Ale was

cheap, so you pressed strongly. When a man must bring a bottle of wine he is not in such haste. Smoking is gone out. To be sure, it is a shocking thing, blowing smoke out of our mouths into other people's mouths, eyes, and noses, and having the same thing done to us. Yet I cannot account why a thing which requires so little exertion, and yet preserves the mind from total vacuity, should have gone out. Every man has something by which he calms himself, beating with his feet or [Dr. Johnson used to practice this himself very much.Boswell.]-Boswell.

so.

Ir is a rule never to be forgotten, that whatever strikes strongly should be described while the first impression remains fresh upon the mind.-Johnson, 109.

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MR. Langton remembers Johnson, when on a visit to Oxford, asking him one evening how long it was till the post went out; and on being told 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 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.Boswell, 110.

A VIOLENT death is never very painful; the only danger is, lest it should be unprovided. But if a man can be supposed to make no provision for death in war, what can be the state that would have awakened him to the care of futurity ?— Johnson, 112.

EVERY heart must lean to somebody.—114.

JOHNSON told Sir Joshua Reynolds that he composed Rasselas in the evenings of one week, sent it to the press in portions as it was written, and had never since read it over.Boswell, 115.

A SHORT letter to a distant friend is, in my opinion, an insult like that of a slight bow or cursory salutation-a proof of unwillingness to do much, even where there is a necessity of doing something.-122.

A BARREN plan must be filled with episodes.-Johnson,

123.

He that knows which way to direct his view, sees much in a little time.-124.

GENERAL truths are seldom applied to particular occasions.-128.

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