That is a very noble line, not that young men should not pray, or old men not give counsel, but that every season of life has its proper duties. I have thought of retiring, and have talked of it to a friend; but I find my vocation is rather to active life." I said some young monks might be allowed, to show that it is not age alone that can retire to pious solitude; but he thought this would only show they could not resist temptation. He wanted to mount the steeples, but it could not be done. There are no good inscriptions here. Bad Roman characters he naturally mistook for half Gothick, half Roman. One of the steeples which he was told was in danger, he wished not to be taken down; "for, said he, it may fall on some of the posterity of John Knox; and no great matter!" Dinner was mentioned.-JOHNSON. "Aye, aye; amidst all these sorrowful scenes, I have no objection to dinner." We went and looked at the castle, where Cardinal Beaton was murdered, and then visited Principal Murison at his college, where is a good library-room; but the Principal was abundantly vain of it, for he seriously said to Dr. Johnson, "you have not such a one in England." The professors entertained us with a very good dinner. Present: Murison, Shaw, Cooke, Hill, Haddo, Watson, Flint, Brown. I observed, that I wondered to see him eat so well, after viewing so many sorrowful scenes of ruined religious magnificence. "Why, said he, I am not sorry, after seeing these gentlemen; for they are not sorry." Murison said, all sorrow was bad, as it was murmuring against the dispensations of Providence. JOHNSON. "Sir, sorrow is inherent in humanity. As you cannot judge two and two to be either five, or three, but certainly four, so, when comparing a worse present state with a better which is past, you cannot but feel sorrow. It is not cured by reason, but by the incursion of present objects, which wear out the past. You need not murmur, though you are sorry." MURISON. "But St. Paul says, 'I have learnt, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content.'" JOHNSON. "Sir, that relates to riches and poverty; for we see St. Paul, when he had a thorn in the flesh, prayed earnestly to have it removed; and then he could not be content." Murison, thus refuted, tried to be smart, and drank to Dr. Johnson, "Long may you lecture!" Dr. Johnson afterwards, speaking of his not drinking wine, said, "The Doctor spoke of lecturing (looking to him). I give all these lectures on water." He defended requiring subscription in those admitted to universities, thus :-" As all who come into the country must obey the king so all who come into an university must be of the church." And here I must do Dr. Johnson the justice to contradict a very absurd and ill-natured story, as to what passed at St. Andrew's. It has been circulated, that, after grace was said in English, in the usual manner, he with the greatest marks of contempt, as if he had held it to be no grace in an university, would not sit down till he had said grace aloud in Latin. This would have been an insult indeed to the gentlemen who were entertaining us. But the truth was precisely thus. In the course of conversation at dinner, Dr. Johnson, in very good humour, said, "I should have expected to have heard a Latin grace, among so many learned men: we had always a Latin grace at Oxford. I believe I can repeat it." Which he did, as giving the learned men in one place a specimen of what was done by the learned men in another place. We went and saw the church, in which is Archbishop Sharp's monument. I was struck with the same kind of feelings with which the churches of Italy impressed me. I was pleased, curiously pleased, to see Dr. Johnson actually in St. Andrew's, of which we had talked so long. Professor Haddo was with us this afternoon, along with Dr. Watson. We looked at St. Salvador's College. The rooms for students seemed very commodious, and Dr. Johnson said, the chapel was the neatest place of worship he had seen. The key of the library could not be found; for it seems Professor Hill, who was out of town, had taken it with him. Dr. Johnson told a joke he had heard of a monastery abroad, where the key of the library could never be found. It was somewhat dispiriting, to see this ancient archiepiscopal city now sadly deserted. We saw in one of its streets a remarkable proof of liberal toleration; a nonjuring clergyman, with a jolly countenance and a round belly, like a well-fed monk, strutting about in his canonicals. We observed two occupations united in the same person, who had hung out two sign-posts. Upon one was "James Hood, White Iron Smith" (i. e. Tin-plate Worker). Upon another, "The Art of Fencing taught, by James Hood."-Upon this last were painted some trees, and two men fencing, one of whom had hit the other in the eye, to shew his great dexterity; so that the art was well taught. JOHNSON. "Were I studying here, I should go and take a lesson. I remember Hope, in his book on this art, says, 'the Scotch are very good fencers."" Second Edition.-Line 17: "I was pleased, curiously pleased," altered to "I was much pleased." We returned to the inn, where we had been entertained at dinner, and drank tea in company with some of the Professors, of whose civilities I beg leave to add my humble and very grateful acknowledgement to the honourable testimony of Dr. Johnson, in his "Journey." We talked of composition, which was a favourite topick of Dr. Watson's, who first distinguished himself by lectures on rhetorick. JOHNSON. "I advised Chambers, and would advise every young man beginning to compose, to do it as fast as he can, to get a habit of having his mind to start promptly; it is so much more difficult to improve in speed than in accuracy." WATSON. "I own I am for much attention to accuracy in composing, lest one should get bad habits of doing it in a slovenly manner." JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, you are confounding doing inaccurately with the necessity of doing inaccurately. A man knows when his composition is inaccurate, and when he thinks fit he'll correct it. But, if a man is accustomed to compose slowly, and with difficulty, upon all occasions, there is danger that he may not compose at all, as we do not like to do that which is not done easily; and, at any rate, more time is consumed in a small matter than ought to be." Watson said, "Dr. Hugh Blair took a week to compose a sermon." JOHNSON. "Then, Sir, that is for want of the habit of composing quickly, which I am insisting one should acquire." Watson said, "Blair was not composing all the week, but only such hours as he found himself disposed for composition." JOHNSON. "Nay, Sir, unless you tell me the time he took, you tell me nothing. If I say I took a week to walk a mile, and have had the gout five days, and been ill otherwise another day, I have taken but one day. I myself have composed about forty sermons. I have begun a sermon after dinner, and sent it off by the post that night. I wrote forty-eight of the printed octavo pages of the Life of Savage at a sitting; but then I sat up all night. I have also written six sheets in a day of translation from the French." BOSWELL. "We have all observed how one man dresses himself slowly, and another fast." JOHNSON. "Yes, Sir; it is wonderful how much time some people will consume in dressing; taking up a thing and looking at it, and laying it down, and taking it up again. Every one should get the habit of doing it quickly. I would say to a young divine, 'Here is your text; let me see how soon you can make a sermon.' Then I'd say, how much better you can make it.' Thus I should powers and his judgement." 'Let me see see both his We all went to Dr. Watson's to supper. Miss Sharp, great grandchild of Archbishop Sharp, was there; as was Mr. Craig, the ingenious architect of the new town of Edinburgh, and nephew of Thomson, to whom Dr. Johnson has since done so much justice, in his "Lives of the Poets." We talked of memory, and mory will play strange tricks. its various modes.-JOHNSON. "MeOne sometimes loses a single word. I once lost fugaces in the Ode 'Posthume, Posthume." " I mentioned to him, that a worthy gentleman of my acquaintance actually forgot his own name. JOHNSON. "Sir, that was a morbid oblivion." Friday, 20th August. Dr. Shaw, the professor of divinity, breakfasted with us. I took out my "Ogden on Prayer," and read some of it to the company. Dr. Johnson praised him. "Abernethy (said he) allows only of a physical effect of prayer upon the mind, which may be produced many ways, as well as by prayer; for instance, by meditation. Ogden goes farther. In truth, we have the consent of all nations for the efficacy of prayer, whether offered up by individuals, or by assemblies; and Revelation has told us, it will be effectual." I said, "Leechman seemed to incline to Abernethy's doctrine." Watson observed, that Leechman meant to shew, that, even admitting no effect to be produced by prayer, respecting the Deity, it was useful to our own minds. He had given only a part of his system: Dr. Johnson thought he should have given the whole. Dr. Johnson enforced the strict observance of Sunday. Said he, 'It should be different from another day. People may walk; but not throw stones at birds. There may be relaxation, but there should be no levity." We went and saw Colonel Nairne's garden and grotto. Here was a fine old plane tree. Unluckily the colonel said, there was but this and another large tree in the county. This was an excellent cue for Dr. Johnson, who laughed enormously, calling to me to hear this. He had expatiated to me on the nakedness of that part of Scotland which he had seen. His Journey has been violently abused, for what he has said upon this subject. But let it be considered, that, when Dr. Johnson talks of trees, he means trees of good size, such as he was accustomed to see in England; and of these there are certainly very few upon the eastern coast of Scotland. Besides, he said, that he meant to give only a map of the road; and let any traveller observe how many trees, which Second Edition.-Line 18: altered-"Dr. Watson." deserve the name, he can see from the road from Berwick to Aberdeen. Had Dr. Johnson said "there are no trees" upon this line, he would have said what is colloquially true; because, by no trees, in common speech, we mean few. When he is particular in counting, he may be attacked. I know not how Colonel Nairne came to say there were but two large trees in the county of Fife. I did not perceive that he smiled. There are not a great many, to be sure; but I could have shewn him more than two at Balmuto, from whence my ancestor came. In the grotto, we saw a wonderful large lobster claw. In front of it were petrified stocks of fir, plane, and some other tree. Dr. Johnson said, "Scotland has no right to boast of this grotto; it is owing to personal merit. I never denied personal merit to many of you." Professor Shaw said to me, as we walked, "This is a wonderful man he is master of every subject he handles." Dr. Watson allowed him a very strong understanding, but wondered at his total inattention to established manners, as he came from London. I have not preserved, in my Journal, any of the conversation which passed between Dr. Johnson and Professor Shaw; but I recollect Dr. Johnson said to me afterwards, "I took much to Shaw." We left St. Andrew's about noon, and some miles from it observing, at Leuchars, a church with an old tower, we stopped to look at it. The manse, as the parsonage-house is called in Scotland, was close by. I waited on the minister, mentioned our names, and begged he would tell us what he knew about it. He was a very civil old man; but could only inform us, that it was supposed to have stood eight hundred years. He told us, there was a colony of Danes in his parish; that they had landed at a remote period of time, and still remained a distinct people. Dr. Johnson shrewdly inquired if they had brought women with them. We were not satisfied, as to this colony. We saw, this day, Dundee and Aberbrothick, the last of which Dr. Johnson has celebrated in his "Journey." Upon the road we talked of the Roman Catholick faith. He mentioned (I think) Second Edition.-Line 7: Altered to "there are certainly not a great many." Ibid.-Line 9: Altered to "from whence my ancestors came, and which now belongs to a branch of my family. In the grotto we saw a lobster's claw uncommonly large." Third Edition.-Line 10: Dele "In the grotto," &c., to "claw;" and read"The grotto was ingeniously constructed." 1 Scotticisms. Mr. Boswell no doubt felt that there VOL. III. was a want of dignity in recording the incident of the lobster-claw. 16 |