If we go further and extend the inquiry to those who can scarcely be called intimate friends, but with whom he was brought into more or less frequent social contact, the list becomes, of course, too long to give. But it may be worth while to mention that it would again include a very large number of men who had something in them above the ordinary. For instance, so great a name as that of Hogarth would be found in it, making with Allan Ramsay whom he also knew well and Reynolds who was perhaps the most intimate of all his friends, a remarkable trio to gather round a man who cared nothing for painting. He managed without that to impress them so much that Reynolds gave the credit of whatever was best in hisDiscoursesto the "education" he had had under Johnson: and Hogarth declared that his conversation was to the talk {248} of other men "like Titian's painting compared to Hudson's." This outer circle includes also distinguished architects like Sir William Chambers who built Somerset House, and Gwynn who built Magdalen Bridge at Oxford and the English bridge at Shrewsbury: bishops like Barnard of Killaloe, and Shipley the liberal and reforming bishop of St. Asaph: poets like Collins and Young: historians and divines like Robertson and Hugh Blair: philosophers and men of science like Adam Smith and Sir Joseph Banks: with a certain number of intelligent peers like Lord Orrery the friend of Swift, Lord Marchmont the friend of Pope, and Lord Elibank whom Smollett praised for his "universal intelligence" and who said, when he was already seventy, that he would go five hundred miles to enjoy a day in Johnson's company; besides public men like Lord Charlemont the Irish statesman and traveller who once went to visit Montesquieu, and Lord Macartney who had gone as ambassador to Russia and was soon to go in the same position to Pekin.
It is unnecessary to extend the list. All these men knew Johnson to a greater or less extent, and added to the interest of his life, as they add to the interest of Boswell's record of it. Many or most of them are known to have recognized the greatness of Johnson. {249} The words of some have been quoted and others might easily be added. Johnson often appears great in the books he wrote, and often too in the books which others have written about him: but it seems certain that unlike most authors he was far greater in bodily presence than he can be in his own or any one else's books. Even Boswell's magic pen cannot quite equal the living voice. To the overpowering impression made by that voice upon those who heard it, sometimes of almost bodily fear, oftener of a delight that could not have enough, always of amazed astonishment, the testimonies are not only innumerable, but so strongly worded and so evidently sincere as to suggest the conclusion that the fortunate listeners are attempting to relate an experience unique in the world's history. Even those who had suffered from his rudeness like Wraxall, the author of the well-knownMemoirs, give the impression of being unable to find words strong enough to describe the power of his presence, so that they use expressions like the "compass of his gigantic faculties" and "the sublime attainments of his mind" in speaking of the gap felt by the company when he left a room. The latter expression at any rate hardly seems to us exactly to fit Johnson; but no doubt Wraxall uses the word "sublime" because he wants {250} to imply that there was something in Johnson's talk utterly out of the reach of ordinary men of ability. In fact it does seem probable that no recorded man has ever talked with Johnson's amazing freedom and power. Such an assertion cannot be proved, of course; but it would be difficult to exaggerate the weight of the evidence pointing in that direction. We have seen the kind of society in which he lived. In that society, rich in so many kinds of distinction, he was always accorded, as his right, a kind of informal but quite undisputed precedence. And it seems to have been the same among strangers as soon as he had opened his mouth. Whenever and wherever tongues were moving his primacy was immediate and unquestioned. The actual ears that could hear him were necessarily few; no man's acquaintances can be more than an insignificant fraction of the public. But in his case they were sufficiently numerous, distinguished and enthusiastic to send the fame of his talk all over the country. Is he the only man whose "Bon Mots," as they were called, have been published in his lifetime? "A mighty impudent thing," as he said of it, but also an irrefragable proof of his celebrity.
And on the whole his popularity, then and since, has equalled his fame. Much is said of his rudeness and violence, but the fact remains {251} that in all his life it does not appear to have cost him a single friend except the elder Sheridan. Those who knew him best bear the strongest testimony to the fundamental goodness of his heart. Reynolds said that he was always the first to seek a reconciliation, Goldsmith declared that he had nothing of the bear but his skin, and Boswell records many instances of his placability after a quarrel. The love his friends felt for him is written large all over Boswell's pages. And of that feeling the public outside came more and more to share as much as strangers could. Even in his lifetime he began to receive that popular canonization which has been developing ever since. Perhaps the most curious of all the proofs of this is the fact mentioned by Boswell in a note, "that there were copper pieces struck at Birmingham with his head impressed on them, which pass current as halfpence there, and in the neighbouring parts of the country." Has that ever happened to any other English writer? Well may Boswell cite it in evidence of Johnson's extraordinary popularity. It is that and it is more. There is in it not merely a tribute of affection to the living and speaking man, there is also an anticipation of the most remarkable thing about his subsequent fame. That has had all along, as we saw at first, a {252} popular element in it. It has never been, like that of most scholars and critics, an exclusively literary thing, confined solely to people of literary instincts. Rather it has been, more and more, what the newspapers and theJohnsonianaand these coins or medals already suggested, something altogether wider. Samuel Johnson was in his lifetime a well-known figure in the streets, a popular name in the press. He is now a national institution, with the merits, the defects, and the popularity which belong to national institutions. His popularity is certainly not diminished by the fact that he was the complacent victim of many of our insular prejudices and exhibited a good deal of the national tendency to a crude and self-confident Philistinism. These things come so humanly from him that his wisest admirers have scarcely the heart to complain or disapprove. They laugh at him, and with him, and love him still. But they could not love him as they do if he embodied only the weaknesses of his race. The position he holds in their affection, and the affection of the whole nation, is due to other and greater qualities. It is these that have given him his rare and indeed unique distinction as the accepted and traditional spokesman of the integrity, the humour, and the obstinate common sense, of the English people.
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The finest Library Edition of the complete works of Johnson is that published at Oxford in nine volumes in 1825. Another good one, the volumes of which are less heavy, is that of 1823 in twelve volumes, edited by Alexander Chalmers.
Among the very numerous editions of particular works the following may be mentioned—
The Six Chief Lives from Johnson's "Lives of the Poets"; with Macaulay's "Life of Johnson." Edited, with a Preface by MATTHEW ARNOLD. 1878.
History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia. Edited, with Introduction and Notes by GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL. 1887.
Lives of the English Poets. By SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D. Edited by GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL, D.C.L. In three volumes. 1905.
Johnson on Shakespeare. Essays and Notes selected and set forth with an Introduction. By WALTER RALEIGH. 1908.
The Letters of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.Collected and edited by GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL. In two volumes. 1892. Only a few of the letters are given in the editions of the complete works. In this edition the letters already given by Boswell in hisLifeare not reprinted.
Select Essays of Dr. Johnson. Edited by GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL. In two volumes. 1889. (Temple Library.) These Essays are chiefly fromThe RamblerandThe Idler.
Wit and Wisdom of Samuel Johnson. Selected and arranged by GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL. 1888. This consists of sayings on various subjects arranged alphabetically, with an interesting introduction.
The main authority for the life of Johnson is, of course, Boswell. His account is given in two books, theJournal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D., published in 1785, and theLifewhich followed in two volumes in 1791. {254} The best edition of theLifeis that edited by Dr. Birkbeck Hill in six volumes, one of which is given to theTour to the Hebrides, published in 1887. No one who has worked on Johnson since that year can overstate his debt to this book or his gratitude to its author. The prettiest and pleasantest of all editions of Boswell is that known as Wright's Croker. It is a revision by J. Wright of the edition by J. W. Croker, and includes a collection of Johnsoniana. It consists of ten handy volumes, illustrated by many steel engravings, and first appeared in 1831.
The most important of the many accounts of Johnson left by other contemporaries are those given by Mrs. Thrale, Fanny Burney and his executor, Sir John Hawkins. Mrs. Thrale's is contained in a volume entitledAnecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL. D., during the last Twenty Years of his Life.By Hester Lynch Piozzi. It was first published in 1786. Fanny Burney's picture of him is to be found in herDiary and Letters, of which the best edition is that by Austin Dobson, 1904. Sir John Hawkins prefixed a Life of Johnson to the edition of his works which he brought out in 1787. Dr. Birkbeck Hill has reprinted a large collection of biographical matter drawn from a variety of sources in his two volumes ofJohnsonian Miscellanies, 1897.
The critical studies of Johnson are of course innumerable. Among the best are Carlyle's, printed in hisWorksamong theMiscellaneous Essays, Sir Leslie Stephen's volume in the "English Men of Letters" series, and Sir Walter Raleigh'sSix Essays on Johnson. TheLifewritten by Macaulay for theEncyclopedia Britannicaand reprinted by Matthew Arnold in his edition of theSix Chief Livesmust not be confused with the essay reprinted in the collected Essays.
Dr. Birkbeck Hill published in 1879 an edition of Boswell's correspondence with the Hon. A. Erskine, and of hisJournal of a Tour to Corsica, reprinted from the original editions. Boswell's Letters to his and Gray's friend, the Rev. J. W. Temple, were first published in 1857.
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(Principally of Persons known to Dr. Johnson, or mentioned in his Writings or Conversation)
Adams, Dr., 91, 166Addison, J., 140, 192, 194, 222, 224, 229Argyll, Duke of, 73, 83, 84, 121, 124Auchinleck, Lord, 71, 72, 142
Bankes, Sir J., 108, 218, 246Barclay, Mr., 105Baretti, J., 89, 113, 218Barnard, Bishop, 233, 248Beauclerk, Topham, 55, 108, 115, 242, 243Berkeley, Bishop, 203, 204Binning, Lord, 234Blair, H., 248Bolingbroke, Lord, 166Boswell, J., 8 and passimBoswell, Mrs., 49Bryant, J., 90Burke, E., 54, 56, 70, 83, 108, 136,144-5, 173, 232, 233, 234, 236, 237,239, 240, 241, 242Burney, Fanny, 105, 127, 130, 131,136, 143, 184, 246Bute, Lord, 103Butler, Bishop, 120, 138, 248
Carmichael, Miss, 167, 169Carter, Elizabeth, 246Cave, E., 245Chambers, Sir R., 246Chambers, Sir W., 248Charlemont, Lord, 248Charles II, 138Chatham, Earl of, 81, 95Chesterfield, Earl of, 86, 88, 124Clarissa Harlowe, 196-7Clive, Kitty, 243"Club, The," 37, 47, 54, 67, 83Collins, W., 177, 220, 224, 227, 248Colman, G., 108, 233Corbet, Mr., 91Cowley, A., 23, 65, 186, 189, 207Cowper, W., 108, 246Croker, 38
Davies, Mr., 16, 73, 74, 115, 245Davies, Mrs., 74Dempster, G., 240Derrick, S., 73Devonshire, Duchess of, 243Devonshire, Duke of, 18Dictionary, The, 8, 15, 30, 98, 100-2,124, 147, 187, 202, 207-111Dilly, C., 164, 245Dodsley, R., 98Douglas, Bishop, 245Dryden, J., 177, 184, 186, 189, 192,201, 205, 214, 220, 221, 222, 226
Edwards, O., 44Elegy, Gray's, 225Elibank, Lord, 84, 248Errol, Lord, 84
Falkland Islands, 107False Alarm, The, 107, 188Fielding, H., 109Fitzherbert, W., 240Foote, S., 115-6Ford, Sarah, 87Fox, C. J., 83, 145, 161, 233, 236, 237,238, 243Frank, 129Franklin, B., 81Frederick the Great, 76
Garrick, D., 83, 94, 98, 115, 144, 147,149, 245Gentleman, Mr., 73Gentleman's Magazine, 92, 95George III, 17, 86, 103, 106, 236, 238Gibbon, E., 54, 68, 83, 138, 184, 201,233, 242, 243Gifford, W., 90Goldsmith, O., 54, 83, 107, 128, 155,156, 181, 184-5, 233, 234, 236, 243,250, 251Gray, T., 16, 17, 66-7, 80, 151, 177,220, 224, 225, 227, 228, 236Gwynn, J., 248
Hallam, 83Hamilton, W. G., 289Hawking, Sir J., 128, 131, 232Heberden, Dr., 108, 246Hervey, H., 94Hodge, 129Hogarth, W., 247Holland, Lord, 80Hume, D., 81, 138, 236
Idler, The, 15, 103, 185, 193-5Irene, 94, 95, 98
Johnson, M., 87, 91Johnson, Mrs. (mother), 87, 92, 101, 128Johnson, Mrs. (wife), 92-6, 99-100Journey to the Western Islands, 107,147, 150, 193
King Lear, 177
Langton, B., 89, 113, 115, 232 Laurence, Dr., 246 Law, W., 120, 141Letter to Lord Chesterfield, 86, 88 Levett, R., 108, 183Life of Richard Savage, 96Lives of the Poets, 14, 36, 107, 177, 185, 188, 193, 202, 207, 219et seq.London, 95, 96 Lonsdale, Lord, 86 Loudoun, Lord, 84 Lucan, Lord, 104-6Lycidas, 203-4, 224, 226
M'Aulay, Rev. J., 50Macartney, Lord, 248Macaulay, Mrs., 20, 246Macbeth, 97, 177Maclean, Sir A., 112Macpherson, J., 117, 166Mallet, D., 192Marchmont, Lord, 248Milton, J., 9, 152, 153, 177, 190, 203,204, 206, 220, 221, 222, 224, 225, 228Monboddo, Lord, 84, 149Montagu, Mrs., 246Montgomerie, Margaret, 82More, Hannah, 246Murphy, A., 109
Newton, Bishop, 166-7Northumberland, Duke of, 121
Orlando Furioso, 89Orrery, Lord, 222, 248Ossian, 117, 166
Paoli, 71, 72, 77, 79, 80, 82, 109, 245Paradise Lost, 204, 228Parliamentary Debates, 95Patriot, The, 107Percy, Bishop, 244, 249Pitt, W., 51Pope, A., 11, 16, 17, 18, 25, 34-5, 59,65, 96, 102, 177, 180, 181, 182, 220,221, 222, 225, 226, 229, 248Porter, Mrs.SeeMrs. JohnsonPot, Mr., 98Prayers and Meditations, 194Prologues, 98, 107Psalmanazar, G., 245
Queen Anne, 87
Rambler, The, 15, 224, 99-100, 127,140, 179, 185, 186, 193et seq., 197,199, 200Ramsay, A., 234, 247Rasselas, 15, 28, 103, 185, 186, 187,193, 194, 196-7, 201-3Reliques of Poetry, Percy, 249Reynolds, Sir J., 44-5, 54, 70, 83,85, 97, 109, 111, 122, 160, 161, 188,189, 233, 234, 236, 238, 243, 247,250, 251Richardson, S., 196-7, 245Robertson, W., 145, 146, 150, 234, 248Rousseau, J. J., 77, 80, 174
Samson Agonistes, 204, 228Savage, R., 96, 245Scott, Sir W., 245Settle, E., 189Shakespeare, 7, 9, 14, 15, 31-3, 97,98, 102, 107, 176, 177, 193, 202,207, 211et seq., 220Shelburne, Lord, 124, 236-7Sheridan, R. B., 197, 233, 250Sheridan, T., 251Shipley, Bishop, 246, 248Siddons, Mrs., 163-4Smith, Adam, 83, 150, 248Smollett, T., 103, 248Sterne, L., 236Stowell, Lord, 246Swift, 12, 123, 182, 217, 222, 225
Tate, N., 177Taxation no Tyranny, 66, 107, 126Taylor, Rev. J., 107, 108Temple, Rev. W., 56, 81Thomson, J., 220Thrale, Mr., 102, 104, 106, 107, 108,131, 186-7Thrale, Mrs., 19, 46, 102, 104, 105,106, 107, 112, 113, 121, 122-3, 125,127, 131, 133, 134, 140, 246-7Thurlow, Lord, 47-8, 240-1
Vanity of Human Wishes, 99, 182, 183Voltaire, 76, 77, 90, 138, 173, 174
Waller, E., 205Warburton, Bishop, 25, 97Warren, Mr., 92Warton, J., 233, 245Warton, T., 245Wesley, J., 47, 56, 138, 159, 242Wilkes, J., 148, 164, 188, 241-2Williams, Mrs., 108Windham, W., 108, 239Wraxall, Sir N., 243, 248-9
Young, E., 248