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ciously, that his steel-dust is mistaken by many for a shower of gold'.]

On Friday, April 12, I dined with him at our friend Tom Davies's, where we met Mr. Cradock, of Leicestershire, authour of "Zobeide," a tragedy; a very pleasing gentleman, to whom my friend Dr. Farmer's very excellent Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare is addressed; and Dr. Harwood, who has written and published various works; particularly a fantastical translation of the New Testament, in modern phrase, and with a Socinian twist 3.

I introduced Aristotle's doctrine, in his "Art of Poetry," of " kataрois τwv ñalŋμatwr, the purging of the passions," as the purpose of tragedy. "But how are the passions to be purged by terrour and pity?" said I, with an assumed air of ignorance, to incite him to talk, for which it was often necessary to employ some address. JOHNSON. "Why, sir, you are to consider what is the meaning of purging in the original sense. It is to expel impurities from the human body. The mind is subject to the same imperfection. The passions are the great movers of human actions; but they are mixed with such impurities, that it is necessary they should be purged

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[This and some subsequent extracts are from a collection of Dr. Johnson's “Apophthegms, Sentiments, Opinions, and occasional Reflections," made by Sir John Hawkins, and published in the last volume of his edition of Johnson's works. ED.]

2

[Who has since published Memoirs of his own Times, of which the Editor has made occasional use.-ED.]

3 [He is more advantageously known by a work on the classics. This poor man had, about 1783, a stroke of the palsy, which rendered him a cripple, and, in 1788, he published, in the European Magazine, a letter, written to him in 1773 by Bishop Lowth, to show that the bishop, though no friend to dissenters, was kind and liberal towards him. Harwood concludes his appeal by saying, that, had be been a dishonest man, and could have conformed to the trinitarian worship of the church, he should not have been in indigent and necessitous circumstances. Bishop Lowth, he says, contributed, to the last year of his life, to relieve his wants. European Magazine, 1788, p. 413.-ED.]

4 See an ingenious essay on this subject by the late Dr. Moor, Greek professor at Glasgow.-BosWELL. See also a learned note on this passage of Aristotle, by Mr. Twining, in his admirable translation of the Poeticks, in which the various explanations of other criticks are considered, and in which Dr. Moor's essay is particularly discussed.-J. BOSWELL.

or refined by means of terrour and pity. For instance, ambition is a noble passion; but by seeing upon the stage, that a man who is so excessively ambitious as to raise himself by injustice is punished, we are terrified at the fatal consequences of such a passion. In the same manner a certain degree of resentment is necessary; but if we see that a man carries it too far, we pity the object of it, and are taught to moderate that passion." My record upon this occasion does great injustice to Johnson's expression, which was so forcible and brilliant, that Mr. Cradock whispered me, "O that his words were written in a book 1!"

I observed, the great defect of the tragedy of "Othello" was, that it had not a moral; for that no man could resist the circumstances of suspicion which were artfully suggested to Othello's mind. JOHNSON. "In the first place, sir, we learn from Othello this very useful moral, not to make an unequal match; in the second place, we learn not to yield too readily to suspicion. The handkerchief is merely a trick, though a very pretty trick; but there are no other circumstances of reasonable suspicion, except what is related by Iago of Cassio's warm expressions concerning Desdemona in his sleep; and that depended entirely upon the assertion of one man. No, sir, I think Othello has more moral than almost any play."

Talking of a penurious gentleman of our acquaintance, Johnson said, "Sir, he is narrow, not so much from avarice, as from impotence to spend his money. He cannot find in his heart to pour out a bottle of wine; but he would not much care if it should sour."

He said, he wished to see "John Dennis's Critical

[Perhaps in allusion to, "Oh, that my words were now written! Oh that they were printed in a book !”—Job, xix. 23.—HALL.]

Works" collected.

Davies said, they would not sell.

Dr. Johnson seemed to think otherwise.

Davies said of a well known dramatick authour 1, that "he lived upon potted stories, and that he made his way as Hannibal did, by vinegar; having begun by attacking people, particularly the players.”

He reminded Dr. Johnson of Mr. Murphy's having paid him the highest compliment that ever was paid to a layman, by asking his pardon for repeating some oaths in the course of telling a story.

Apoph.

[He never suffered any one to swear before him. Hawk. When a libertine, but a man of some note, p. 210. was talking before him, and interlarding his stories with oaths, Johnson said, "Sir, all this swearing will do nothing for our story; I beg you will not swear.” The narrator went on swearing: Johnson said, “I must again entreat you not to swear." He swore again; Johnson quitted the room.]

Johnson and I supped this evening at the Crown and Anchor tavern, in company with Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Langton, Mr. Nairne, now one of the Scotch judges, with the title of Lord Dunsinan 2, and my very worthy friend, Sir William Forbes, of Pitsligo.

We discussed the question, whether drinking improved conversation and benevolence. Sir Joshua maintained, it did. JOHNSON. "No, sir: before dinner men meet with great inequality of understanding; and those who are conscious of their inferiority have the modesty not to talk. When they have drunk wine, every man feels himself happy, and loses that modesty, and grows impudent and vociferous but he is not improved: he is only not sensible of his defects." Sir Joshua said the Doctor

[Probably Mr. Cumberland.—ED.] 2 [See ante, v. ii. p. 289.—ED.]

was talking of the effects of excess in wine; but that a moderate glass enlivened the mind, by giving a proper circulation to the blood. "I am," said he, “in very good spirits, when I get up in the morning. By dinner-time I am exhausted; wine puts me in the same state as when I got up: and I am sure that moderate drinking makes people talk better." JOHNSON. "No, sir; wine gives not light, gay, ideal, hilarity; but tumultuous, noisy, clamorous merriment. I have heard none of those drunken,―nay, drunken is a coarse word,-none of those vinous flights." SIR JOSHUA. "Because you have sat by, quite sober, and felt an envy of the happiness of those who were drinking." JOHNSON. "Perhaps, contempt. And, sir, it is not necessary to be drunk one's self, to relish the wit of drunkenness. Do we not judge of the drunken wit of the dialogue between Iago and Cassio, the most excellent in its kind, when we are quite sober? Wit is wit, by whatever means it is produced; and, if good, will appear so at all times. I admit that the spirits are raised by drinking, as by the common participation of any pleasure: cock-fighting or bear-baiting will raise the spirits of a company, as drinking does, though surely they will not improve conversation. I also admit, that there are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits which are not good till they are rotten. There are such men, but they are medlars. I indeed allow that there, have been a very few men of talents who were improved by drinking: but I maintain that I am right as to the effects of drinking in general and let it be considered, that there is no position, however false in its universality, which is not true of some particular man.” Sir William Forbes said, "Might not a man warmed with wine be like a bottle of beer, which is made brisker by

being set before the fire?" "Nay," said Johnson, laughing, "I cannot answer that: that is too much for me."

I observed, that wine did some people harm, by inflaming, confusing, and irritating their minds; but that the experience of mankind had declared in favour of moderate drinking. JOHNSON. "Sir, I do not say it is wrong to produce self-complacency by drinking; I only deny that it improves the mind. When I drank wine', I scorned to drink it when in company. I have drunk many a bottle by myself; in the first place, because I had need of it to raise my spirits in the second place, because I would have nobody to witness its effects upon me."

Apoph.

p. 215.

[At one period of his life, however, he was recon- Hawk. ciled to the bottle. Sweet wines were his chief favourites; when none of these were before him, he would sometimes drink port with a lump of sugar in every glass. The strongest liquors, and in very large quantities, produced no other effect on him than moderate exhilaration. Once, and but once, he is known to have had his dose; a circumstance which he himself discovered, on finding one of his sesquipedalian words hang fire; he then started up, and gravely observed,-I think it time we should go to bed.

"After a ten years' forbearance of every fluid except tea and sherbet, I drank," said he, "one glass of wine to the health of Sir Joshua Reynolds, on the evening of the day on which he was knighted. I never swallowed another drop, till old Madeira was prescribed to me as a cordial during my present indisposition; but this liquor did not relish as formerly, and I therefore discontinued it."]

[Wine-drinkers will not be much affected by the censure of one who, when he did drink wine, drank alone, and whose choice beverage was port in hasty draughts, sweetened with sugar or capillaire. See ante, v. i. p. 482.- ED.]

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