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servant's way, in order to try his honesty, Sir Godfrey sent the master to prison." (1) JOHNSON. "To resist temptation once is not a sufficient proof of honesty. If a servant, indeed, were to resist the continued temptation of silver lying in a window, as some people let it lie, when he is sure his master does not know how much there is of it, he would give a strong proof of honesty. But this is a proof to which you have no right to put a man. You know, humanly speaking, there is a certain degree of temptation which will overcome any virtue. Now, in so far as you approach temptation to a man, you do him an injury; and, if he is overcome, you share his guilt." P. "And, when once overcome, it is easier for him to be got the better of again." BosWELL. "Yes, you are his seducer; you have debauched him. I have known a man resolved to put friendship to the test, by asking a friend to lend him money, merely with that view, when he did not want it." JOHNSON. "That is very wrong, Sir. Your friend may be a narrow man, and yet have many good qualities: narrowness may be his only fault. Now you are trying his general character as a friend by one particular singly, in which he happens to be

(1) Pope thus introduces this story :

"Faith, in such case if you should prosecute,
I think Sir Godfrey should decide the suit,
Who sent the thief who stole the cash away,
And punish'd him that put it in his way."

Imit. of Horace, b. ii. ep. 2. - В.

Horace Walpole, in his "Anecdotes of Painting," relates the story as of Sir Godfrey's "dismissing a soldier who had stolen a joint of meat, and accusing the butcher of having tempted him by it." - CHALMERS.

defective, when, in truth, his character is composed of many particulars."

E. " I understand the hogshead of claret, which this society was favoured with by our friend the dean (1), is nearly out; I think he should be written to, to send another of the same kind. Let the request be made with a happy ambiguity of expression, so that we may have the chance of his sending it also as a present." JOHNSON. " I am willing to offer my services as secretary on this occasion." P. "As many as are for Dr. Johnson being secretary hold up your hands. - Carried unanimously." BOSWELL. "He will be our dictator." JOHNSON. "No, the company is to dictate to me. I am only to write for wine; and I am quite disinterested, as I drink none; I shall not be suspected of having forged the application. I am no more than humble scribe." E. "Then you shall prescribe." BOSWELL. " Very well. The first play of words to-day.” J. "No, no; the bulls in Ireland." JOHNSON. "Were I your dictator, you should have no wine. It would be my business cavere ne quid detrimenti Respublica caperet, and wine is dangerous. Rome was ruined by luxury." (Smiling). E. "If you allow no wine as dictator, you shall not have me for your master of horse."

On Saturday, April 4., I drank tea with Johnson at Dr. Taylor's, where he had dined. He entertained us with an account of a tragedy written by a Dr. Kennedy (not the Lisbon physician). "The

(1) Dr. Barnard, Dean of Derry, afterwards Bishop of Killaloe and Limerick. - C.

catastrophe of it," said he, "was, that a king who was jealous of his queen with his prime minister, castrated himself. (1) This tragedy was actually shown about in manuscript to several people, and, amongst others, to Mr. Fitzherbert, who repeated to me two lines of the prologue:

Our hero's fate we have but gently touch'd;

The fair might blame us, if it were less couch'd!

It is hardly to be believed what absurd and indecent images men will introduce into their writings, without being sensible of the absurdity and indecency. I remember Lord Orrery told me, that there was a pamphlet written against Sir Robert Walpole, the whole of which was an allegory on the Phallick Obscenity. The Duchess of Buckingham asked Lord Orrery who this person was? He answered he did not know. She said, she would send to Mr. Pulteney, who, she supposed, could inform her. So, then, to prevent her from making herself ridiculous, Lord Orrery sent her grace a note, in which he gave her to understand what was meant."

He was very silent this evening, and read in a variety of books; suddenly throwing down one, and taking up another.

He talked of going to Streatham that night. TAYLOR. "You'll be robbed, if you do; or you

(1) The reverse of the story of Combabus, on which Mr. David Hume told Lord Macartney, that a friend of his had written a tragedy. It is, however, possible, that I may have been inaccurate in my perception of what Dr. Johnson related, and that he may have been talking of the same ludicrous tragical subject that Mr. Hume had mentioned. - B. - The story of Combabus, which was originally told by Lucian, may be found in Bayle's Dictionary. - M.

must shoot a highwayman. Now, I would rather be robbed than do that; I would not shoot a highwayman." JOHNSON. "But I would rather shoot him in the instant when he is attempting to rob me, than afterwards swear against him at the Old Bailey, to take away his life, after he has robbed me. I am surer I am right in the one case, than in the other. I may be mistaken as to the man when I swear; I cannot be mistaken, if I shoot him in the act. Besides, we feel less reluctance to take away a man's life, when we are heated by the injury, than to do it at a distance of time by an oath, after we have cooled." BOSWELL. "So, Sir, you would rather act from the motive of private passion, than that of public advantage." Johnson. "Nay, Sir, when I shoot the highwayman, I act from both." BOSWELL. "Very well, very well. There is no catching him." JOHNSON. "At the same time, one does not know what to say. For perhaps one may, a year after, hang himself from uneasiness for having shot a highwayman. (1) Few minds are fit to be trusted with so great a thing." BoSWELL. " Then, Sir,

(1) The late Duke of Montrose was generally said to have been uneasy on that account; but I can contradict the report from his grace's own authority. As he used to admit me to very easy conversation with him, I took the liberty to introduce the subject. His grace told me, that when riding one night near London, he was attacked by two highwaymen on horseback, and that he instantly shot one of them, upon which the other galloped off; that his servant, who was very well mounted, proposed to pursue him and take him, but that his grace said, "No, we have had blood enough; I hope the man may live to repent." His grace, upon my presuming to put the question, assured me, that his mind was not at all clouded by what he had thus done in self-defence.

you would not shoot him?" Johnson. might be vexed afterwards for that too."

"But I

Thrale's carriage not having come for him, as he expected, I accompanied him some part of the way home to his own house. I told him, that I had talked of him to Mr. Dunning a few days before, and had said, that in his company we did not so much interchange conversation, as listen to him; and that Dunning observed, upon this, "One is always willing to listen to Dr. Johnson;" to which I answered, "That is a great deal from you, Sir." "Yes, Sir," said Johnson, "a great deal indeed. Here is a man willing to listen, to whom the world is listening all the rest of the year." Boswell. " I think, Sir, it is right to tell one man of such a handsome thing, which has been said of him by another. It tends to increase benevolence." JOHN

SON.

"Undoubtedly it is right, Sir."

On Tuesday, April 7., I breakfasted with him at his house. He said, "Nobody was content." I mentioned to him a respectable person (1) in Scotland whom he knew; and I asserted, that I really believed he was always content. Johnson. " No, Sir, he is not content with the present; he has always some new scheme, some new plantation, something which is future. You know he was not content as a widower, for he married again." BOSWELL. "But he is not restless." JOHNSON. " Sir, he is only locally at rest. A chymist is locally at rest; but his mind is hard at work. This gentleman has

(1) Lord Auchinleck, Mr. Boswell's father. - C.

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