said he, "there can be nothing new among us, we have travelled over one another's minds." Johnson seemed a little angry, and said, "Sir, you have not travelled over my mind, I promise you." Sir Joshua, however, thought Goldsmith was right, as when people are much together they usually know what each will say on every ordinary subject of conversation.

DR. YOUNG OF THE NIGHT
THOUGHTS.

HE admiration of Young and John

THE

66

son was mutual and warm. Young said of Rasselas that the book was one mass of good sense.' Johnson said of the "Night Thoughts" that it "exhibited a very wide display of original poetry, variegated with deep reflection and striking allusions," and that it was "one of the few poems in which blank verse could not be changed for rhyme but with disadvantage."

WORKS OF FICTION.

SPEAKING

of the sameness in

writers of novels he said, "There is very small quantity of real fiction. in the world; and the same images, with very little variation, have served all the authors who have ever written."

BOSWELL asked what works of

Baxter he should read. He said, "Read any of them; they are all good."

A MEDICAL FOP.

A FOPPISH physician once

re

minded Johnson of his having been in company with him on a former occasion. "I do not remember it, sir." The physician still insisted, adding that he that day wore so fine a coat that it must have attracted his notice. "Sir," said Johnson, "had you been dipped in Pactolus, I should not have noticed you."

THE

FINE COATS.

'HE mention of a fine coat by the medical fop recals the strange costumes fashionable in those days. The first time Johnson met Wilkes, at a dinner party given by Mr. Dilly the bookseller, while the guests were assembling Johnson asked, "Who is that with the lace coat?" It was Jack Wilkes, who usually assumed the garb and airs of "a fine gentleman." When Goldsmith once got some money his first purchase was a gay plum-coloured coat!

THE

CLASSICAL QUOTATIONS.

HE subject of quoting well-known authors being introduced, Wilkes censured it as pedantry. Johnson said, "No, sir; it is a good thing; there is a community of mind in it. Classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world."

TAL

PLACES FOR WORSHIP.

ALKING of devotion he said, 'Though it be true that 'God dwelleth not in a temple made with hands,' yet in this state of being our minds are more piously affected in places appropriated to divine worship than in other places. Some people have a particular room in their houses where they say their prayers; of which I do not disapprove, as it may animate their devotion."

HUME'S ARGUMENT AGAINST
MIRACLES.

TALKING of Johnson's unwilling

ness to believe extraordinary things, or things contrary to the ordinary course of nature, Boswell said, "Sir, you come very near Hume's argument against miracles; that it is more probable witnesses should be deceived or lie than that miracles should happen." Johnson said, "Why, sir, Hume, taking the proposition simply, is right. But a Christian

revelation is not proved by miracles alone, but as connected with the prophecies, and with the doctrines in confirmation of which miracles were wrought."

JOHNSON'S OPINION OF HUME.

BOSWELL having mentioned that

he was much shocked by David Hume persisting in his infidelity when he was dying, Johnson said, "Why should it shock you, sir? Hume owned he had never read the New Testament with attention. Here then was a man who had been at no pains to inquire into the truth of religion, and had continually turned his mind the other way. It was not to be expected that the prospect of death would alter his way of thinking, unless God should send an angel to set him right." Boswell said he had reason to believe that the thought of annihilation gave Hume no pain. Johnson: "It was not so, sir. He had a vanity in being thought easy.