In the number of men who dishonour their own genius,
ought to be ranked Dr Samuel Johnson; for
his abilities and learning are not accompanied by candour
and generosity. His life of Pomfret concludes
with this maxim, that 'he who pleases many, must
have merit;' yet, in defiance of his own rule, the
Doctor has, a thousand times, attempted to prove,
that they who please many, have no merit. His invidious
and revengeful remark on Chesterfield, would
have disgraced any other man. He said, and nobody
but himself would have said it, that Churchill was a
shallow fellow. And he once told some of his admirers,
that Swift was a shallow, a very shallow fellow:
reminding us of the Lilliputian who drew his bow to
Gulliver[3]. For the memory of this man, who may
be classed with Cato and Phocion, the Doctor feels
no tenderness or respect. And for that[4], and other
critical blasphemies, he has undergone innumerable
floggings. No writer of this nation has made more
noise. None has discovered more contempt for other
men's reputations, or more confidence in his own. I
would humbly submit a few hints for his improvement,
if he be not 'too old to learn.' And, whatever
freedoms I take, the Doctor himself may be quoted
as a precedent for insolent invective, and brutal
reproach. He has told us[5], that 'the two lowest of
all human beings are, a scribbler for a party, and a
commissioner of excise.' This very man was himself
the hired scribbler of a party; and why should a commissioner
of excise be one of the meanest of mankind?
In the preface to his octavo Dictionary, the Doctor
affirms, that, 'by the labours of all his predecessors,
not even the lowest expectation can be gratified.'
The author of a revisal of Shakespeare[6] attacks (he
says) with 'gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging
to justice an assassin or incendiary. He bites like a
viper, and would be glad to leave inflammations
and gangrene behind him.' For this shocking language,
which could have been answered by nothing
but a blow, the primum mobile, perhaps, was, that the
critic had dedicated his book to Lord Kaims, (a Scotsman,
and another very shallow fellow) 'as the truest
judge, and most intelligent admirer of Shakespeare.'
His treatment of Colley Cibber is, if possible, worse.
That great ornament of the stage was a man of genius,
at least equal to Dr Johnson—but they had a
quarrel, and though Cibber has been more than twenty
years buried, the Doctor, in his life of Pope, studies
to revenge it. His expressions are gross. 'In
the Dunciad, among other worthless scribblers he
(Pope) had mentioned Cibber. The dishonour of
being shewn as Cibber's antagonist could never be
compensated by the victory. Cibber had nothing to
lose—The shafts of satire were directed in vain against
Cibber, being repelled by the impenetrable
impudence,' &c.[7] We have been deafened about
the Doctor's private virtues; of which these passages
are a very poor evidence.
It is believed by some, that Dr Johnson's admirable
Dictionary is the most capital monument of human
genius; that the studies of Archimedes and Newton
are but like a feather in the scale with this amazing
work; that he has given our language a stability, which,
without him, it had never known; that he has performed
alone, what, in other nations, whole academies
fail to perform; and that as the fruit of his
learning and sagacity, our compositions will be classical
and immortal. This may be true; but the book displays
many proofs or his ill-nature, and evinces what
I want to insist on, viz. that he who despises politeness
cannot deserve it. For his seditious and impudent definitions[8]
he would, in Queen Anne's reign, have
had a fair chance of mounting the pillory. Hume,
Smith, and Chesterfield may be quoted to prove, that
Walpole and Excise were improper objects of execration;
but an emanation of royal munificence has, of
late, relaxed the Doctor's frigorific virtue; and, in his
False Alarm, he affirms, that our government approaches
nearer to perfection, than any other that fiction
has feigned, or history recorded. This is going pretty
far; but the peevish, though incorruptible patriot,
proceeds a great deal farther. His political pieces
have great elegance and wit; yet, if the tenth part of
what he advances in them be true, his countrymen
are a mob of ignorant, ungrateful, rebellious ruffians.
Every member in Opposition is a fool, a firebrand,
a monster; worse, if that were possible, than Ravillac,
Hambden, or Milton[9]. Here is a short specimen:
'On the original contrivers of mischief let an insulted
nation pour out its vengeance. With whatever
design they have inflamed this pernicious contest,
they are themselves equally detestable. If they
wish success to the colonies, they are TRAITORS to
this country; if they wish their defeat, they are
TRAITORS at once to America and England. To
them (Mess. Burke & Co.) and them only, must be
imputed the interruption of commerce, and the miseries
of war, the sorrow of those who shall be ruined,
and the blood of those that shall fall[10].'
From the Doctor's volumes I am to select some passages,
illustrate them with a few observations, and
submit them to the reader's opinion. These pages
aim at perspicacity. They are ambitious to record
TRUTH.
'He that writes the life of another, is either his
friend or his enemy, and wishes either to exalt his
praise, or aggravate his infamy[11].' The Doctor betrays
a degree of inconsistency incompatible with his
reputed abilities. After such a confession, what
have we to hope for in his lives of English poets?
Having thus denied veracity both to Plutarch and
himself, this Idler, in the very next page, leaps at
once from the wildest scepticism to the wildest credulity.
The paragraph is too long for insertion; but
the tenor of it is, that 'a man's account of himself,
left behind him unpublished, may be depended on;'
because, 'by self-love all have been so often betrayed,
that (now for the strangest flight of nonsense) all
are on the watch against its artifices.'
In his Dictionary, temperance is defined to be 'moderation
opposed to gluttony and drunkenness.' And he
has since defined 'sobriety or temperance' to be 'nothing
but the forbearance of pleasure[12].' This maxim
needs no comment.
'A man will, in the hour of darkness and fatigue,
be content to leave behind him every thing but
himself[13].' Here the Doctor supposes, that a person
can leave himself behind himself. When the reader
examines the passage in the original, he will be convinced,
that this cannot be an error of the press only.
Had the Rambler, when he crossed Tweed, left
behind him his pride, his indolence, and his vulgarity,
he would have returned a much wiser, better,
and happier man than he did.
Form, he explains to be, 'the external appearance
of any thing, shape;' but, when speaking of hills
in the North of Scotland, he says, 'the appearance
is that of matter incapable of FORM[14]!' He has seen
matter, not only destitute, but incapable of shape. He
has seen an appearance which is incapable of external
appearance. And yet, in the same book, he seems
to regret the weakness of his vision.
Beauty is 'that assemblage of graces which pleases
the eye.' But, in the Idler[15], he displays his
true idea of beauty; and it is a very lame piece of
philosophy. Judge from a few samples: 'If a man,
born blind, was to recover his sight, and the most
beautiful woman was to be brought before him, he
could not determine whether she was handsome or
not. Nor if the most handsome and most deformed
were produced, could he any better determine
to which he should give the preference, having seen
only these two.' And again, 'as we are then more
accustomed to beauty than deformity, we may conclude
that to be the reason why we approve and
admire it.' Moreover, 'though habit and custom
cannot be said to be the cause[16] of beauty, IT is certainly
the cause of our liking it[17]. I have no doubt,
but that, if we were more used to deformity than
beauty, deformity would then lose the idea now annexed
to it, and take that of beauty; as if the whole
world should agree that yes and no should change
their meanings, yes would then deny, and no would
affirm.' This is such a perfection of nonsense, that
the reader will, perhaps, think it a forgery; but he
will find it verbatim et literatim, and the whole number
is in the same stile.
'Swift in his petty treatise on the English language,
allows that new words must sometimes be introduced,
but proposes that none should be suffered to become
obsolete[18].' The Doctor has not given a fair
quotation from Swift. One would imagine that Swift
had proposed to retain every word which is to be
found in any of our popular authors, but he neither
said nor meant any such thing. His words are these:
'They' (the members of the proposed society) 'will
find many words that deserve to be utterly thrown out
of our language!' And the Dean says nothing afterwards
which infers a contradiction[19].
In his account of Lyttleton, the Doctor's good nature
is evident. He speaks not a word as to the merit
of the history of Henry II. but—'It was published
with such anxiety as only vanity can dictate.'
We are next entertained with a page of dirty anecdotes
concerning its publication, which the Doctor
seems to have picked up from some printer's journeyman.
'The Persian Letters have something of that
indistinct and headstrong ardour for liberty which
a man of genius always catches when he enters the
world, and always suffers to cool as he passes forward.'
Of the admired monody to the memory of
Lady Lyttleton, we are told only that it is long. 'His
dialogues of the dead were very eagerly read, tho'
the production rather, as it seems of leisure than of
study, rather effusions than compositions. The
names of his persons too often enable the reader to
anticipate their conversation; and when they have
met, they too often part without a conclusion.'
These remarks apply with peculiar justice to Dr Johnson's
dictionary, for that work is an effusion rather than a
composition. His reader is for the most part able to anticipate
his definitions, and they generally end without
conclusion. Lord Lyttleton's poems 'have nothing
to be despised and little to be admired.' But
here, as usual, the Doctor contradicts himself, and in
the very next line 'of his Progress of Love, it is sufficient
blame to say that it is pastoral. His blank
verse in Blenheim has neither much force, nor much
elegance. His little performances, whether songs
or epigrams, are sometimes spritely, and sometimes
insipid'—and of course despicable. The candid and
accurate author of the Rambler has forgot the existence
of that beautiful blossom of sensibility, that pure
effusion of friendship, the prologue to Coriolanus.
The life of Dr Young has been written by a lawyer,
who conveys the meanest thoughts in the meanest
language. His stile is dry, stiff, grovelling, and
impure. His anecdotes and ideas, are evidently the
cud of Dr Johnson's conversation. He continues in
the same fretful tone from the first line to the last. He
is at once most contemptuous and contemptible.
Whatever he says is insipid or disgusting. He is the
bad imitator of a bad original; and an honest man
cannot peruse his libel without indignation. He steps
out of his way to remind us of Milton's corporal correction,
a story fabricated, as is well known, by his
Employer. His ignorance has already been illustrated
in a periodical pamphlet. Johnson himself, with
all his imperfections, is often as far superior to this
unhappy penman, as the author of the Night-Thoughts
is superior to Johnson. And yet this critical
assassin, this literary jackall, is celebrated by the
Doctor[20]. Pares cum paribus facile congregantur.
'Dryden's poem on the death of Mrs Killigrew is
undoubtedly the noblest ode that our language ever
has produced. The first part flows with a torrent
of enthusiasm. All the stanzas, indeed, are not equal.'
He proceeds to compare it with an imperial
crown, &c. But, a little after, 'the ode on St Cecilia's
day is allowed to stand without a rival[21].'
These are his identical words; and his admirers may
reconcile them if they can. Indeed, he seems ashamed
of his own inconsistency, and is ready to relapse;
but thinks, upon the whole, that Alexander's Feast
'may, perhaps, be pronounced superior to the ode
on Killigrew.' Dr Johnson is said to be the greatest
critic of his age; yet the verses on Mrs Killigrew
are beneath all criticism; and, perhaps, no person ever
read them through, except their author, and himself.
Dryden's fable 'of the Cock and Fox seems hardly worth
the labour of rejuvenescence[22].' Some narcotic
seems to have refrigerated the red liquor which circulates
in the Doctor's veins[23], and to have hebetated and
obtunded his powers of excogitation[24], for elegance and
wit never met more happily than here. Peruse only
the first page of this poem, and then judge. The
nonsense which has been written by critics is, in
quantity and absurdity, beyond all conception. Perhaps
his admirers may answer, that my remark is but
the ramification of envy, the intumescence of ill-nature,
the exacerbation of 'gloomy malignity.' However,
it would not be amiss to commit that page of inanity
to the power of cremation; and let not his fondest idolaters
confide in its indiscerptibility. In painting
the sentiments and the scenes of common life, to write
English which Englishmen cannot read, is a degree
of insolence hardly known till now, and seems to
be nothing but the poor refuge of pedantic dullness.
His Abyssinian tale hath many beauties, yet the
characters are insipid, the narrative ridiculous, the
moral invisible, and the reader disappointed. 'Intercepting
interruptions and volant animals' are above
common comprehension. The Newtonian system had
reached the happy valley; for its inhabitants talk of
the earth's attraction and the body's gravity[25]. To
tell a tale is not the Doctor's most happy talent; he
can hardly be proud of his success in that species of
fiction.
Speaking of Scotland, he says, 'The variety of sun
and shade is here[26] utterly unknown. There is no
tree for either shelter or timber. The oak and the
thorn is equally a stranger. They have neither
wood for palisades, nor thorns for hedges. A
tree may be shown in Scotland as a horse in Venice[27].'
An English reader may, perhaps, require to
be told, that there are thousands of trees of all ages
and dimensions, within a mile of Edinburgh; that
there are numerous and thriving plantations in Fife;
and that, as some of them overshadow part of the
post-road to St Andrew's, the Doctor must have been
blinder than darkness, if he did not see them. But
why would any man travel at all, who is determined
to believe nothing which he hears, and who, at the
same time, cannot see six inches beyond his nose?
'We are not very sure that the bull is ever without
horns, though we have been told that such bulls
there are[28].' Who are the we he refers to? and
who but the Doctor ever started so weak a question?
His ignorance is below ridicule. It is true, that, in
England, bulls which want horns are less numerous
than husbands who have them; yet such bulls are always
to be found. For the performance which contains
this profound remark, this agglomerated ramification
of torpid imbecility, be it known, that we have
paid six shillings, which verifies the proverb, that a
fool and his money are soon parted.
'We found a small church, clean to a degree unknown
in any other part of Scotland[29]!' Here the fact
may be true; but Dr Johnson must be ignorant whether
it is or not. It is certain, that some buildings of that
kind in Edinburgh, are no high specimens of national
taste; but, if the Rambler would insinuate that this
want of elegance is general, we must impeach his veracity;
we must remind him, that there are gloomy,
dirty, and unwholesome cathedrals in both countries;
and we must lament, that, when entering Scotland,
the Doctor left every thing behind him but HIMSELF.
'Suspicion has been always considered, when it
exceeds the common measure, as a token of depravity
and corruption; and a Greek writer has laid
it down as a standing maxim, that he who believes
not the oath of another, knows himself to be perjured.—Suspicion
is, indeed, a temper so uneasy and restless,
that it is very justly appointed the concomitant
of guilt. Suspicion is not less an enemy to
virtue than to happiness. He that is already corrupt,
is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes
suspicious, will quickly be corrupt[30].' This cannot
always be true; but, if it were, the Rambler is by far
the greatest miscreant who ever infested society.
Speaking of Scotland, he says, 'I know not whether
I found man or woman whom I interrogated concerning
payments of money, that could surmount
the illiberal desire of deceiving me, by representing
every thing as dearer than it is.—The Scot must be
a sturdy moralist who does not love Scotland better
than truth[31].' Apply the Doctor's maxims to
his own conduct, and then judge of his honesty. He
adds a little after: 'The civility and respect which we
found at every place, it is ungrateful to omit, and
tedious to repeat[32].' He should not have spoke of
ingratitude. The picture grows quite shocking.
'How they lived without kail, it is not easy to
guess. They cultivate hardly any other plant for
common tables; and, when they had not kail, they
probably had NOTHING[33].' As the word kail is not
to be found in his Dictionary, an English reader will
be at a loss to find out what he means. His conjecture
is ridiculous; and here a new contradiction must
be swallowed by the Doctor's believers; for, if OATS
be 'a grain, which, in England, is generally given
to horses, but, in Scotland, supports the people[34],'
in that case, it is easy to guess how they lived without
kail. Any thing else had surely been better than
to fill up his heavy folios with such peevish nonsense.
In his life of Butler, the Doctor has confined his
remarks to Hudibras, though the rest of that author's
works, both in prose and verse, merit equal attention.
What are we to think of this invidious and
culpable omission? Hudibras itself would, perhaps,
have been omitted, if the book had not tended to ridicule
dissenters; for no man in England seems to
hate that sect so heartily. In Watt's life, he takes
care to tell us, that the author was to be praised in
every thing but his non-conformity; and, in his ever
memorable Tour, the Rambler says, 'I found several
(Highland Ministers), with whom I could not converse,
without wishing, as my respect increased, that they
had not been presbyterians[35].' Here a critic has
very properly interrogated the Doctor, what he would
have said or thought, if the Highland ministers had
lamented that he was not a presbyterian? This man
has no tincture of the liberal and humane manners of
the present age; and yet, with his peculiar consistency,
he laughs at the dissenter who refused to eat a
Christmas pye[36]. This quondam believer in the
Cocklane ghost says, 'though I have, like the rest
of mankind, many failings and weaknesses, I have
not yet, by either friends or enemies, been charged
with superstition[37];' yet, with all the Doctor's 'contempt
of old women and their tales[38],' he would,
if a Roman consul, have disbanded his army for the
scratching of a rat[39].
'We found tea here, as in every other place, but
our spoons were of horn[40].' This important fact
had been hinted in a former page; and such is the
Doctor's politeness!
Some rugged rock's hard entrails gave thee form,
And raging seas produc'd thee in a storm.
Pope.
'They do what I found it not very easy to endure.
They pollute the tea-table by plates piled with large
slices of Cheshire cheese[41].' The happiness of this
remark will be fully felt by those acquainted with the
peculiar purity of Pomposo's person.
'M'Leod left them lying dead by families as they
stood[42].' This is profound; for no man can stand
and lie at the same time. The line ought to be read
thus: 'M'Leod left them lying dead by families as
they HAD stood.'
Of the Memoirs of Scriblerus, the Doctor says: 'If
the whole may be estimated by this specimen, which
seems to be the production of Arbuthnot, with a
few touches, perhaps, by Pope, the want of more
will not be much lamented; for the follies which
the writer ridicules, are so little practised, that they
are not known; nor can the satire be understood
but by the learned: He raises phantoms of absurdity,
and then drives them away: He cures diseases
that were never felt.
'For this reason[43], the joint production of three
great writers has never obtained any notice from
mankind. It has been little read, or when read,
has been forgotten, as no man could be wiser, better,
or merrier by remembering it.
'The design cannot boast of much originality;
for, besides its general resemblance to Don Quixote,
there will be found in it particular imitations of
the history of Mr Ouffle.
'Swift carried so much of it into Ireland as supplied
him with hints for his travels; and with those
the world might have been contented, though the
rest had been suppressed[44].'
Here we have a copious specimen of the Doctor's
taste; and all the volumes of English criticism cannot
produce a poorer page.
The work thus condemned, displays a very rich
vein of wit and learning. The follies which it exposes,
though a little heightened, were, in that age,
frequent, and perfectly well known. The writers
whom it ridicules, have sunk into nihility. The book
is always reprinted with the prose works of Pope,
and Swift, and Arbuthnot; and what stronger mark
of notice can the public bestow? Every man who reads
it, must be the wiser and the merrier; and the satire
may be understood with very little learning.
Dr Arbuthnot was a Scotsman, and, probably, a
Presbyterian. He was an amiable man. He is dead.
Dr Johnson feels himself to be his inferior; and,
therefore, endeavours to murder the reputation of
his works. To gain credit with the reader, he artfully
draws a very high character of Arbuthnot, a few
pages before, and here, in effect, overturns it. He
had said that Arbuthnot was 'a scholar, with great
brilliancy of wit.' But, if his wit and learning
are not displayed in the Memoirs of Scriblerus, we
may ask where wit and learning are to be found?
Of this extract, the style is as slovenly as the leading
sentiments are false.
The book is said to be, the 'production of Arbuthnot.'
Within ten lines, it is 'the joint production
of three great writers.' How can follies be practised
which are not known? or diseases cured, which
were never felt? He claims the attributes of omniscience
when saying, that 'it has been little read, or
when read, has been forgotten;' for, as it has been
so frequently reprinted, no human being can be certain
that it has been little read, or forgotten; but
there is the strongest evidence of the contrary. This
period concludes, as it began, with a most absurd assertion.
If 'the design cannot boast of much originality,'
there is nothing original in the literary
world. Who is Mr Ouffle? and who told the Doctor
that Swift carried any part of Scriblerus into Ireland,
to supply hints for his travels? When Gulliver
was published, Dr Arbuthnot, as appears from their
correspondence, did not know whether that book
was written by Swift or not; so that we are sure the
Dean carried nothing of Arbuthnot's along with him.
Had Dr Johnson 'flourished and stunk' in their age,
he would have been the hero of Martin's memoirs;
and, to suppose him conscious of this circumstance, will
account for the Rambler's malevolence, and explain
why the bull broke into a china-shop.
I beg particular attention to the following passage.
'His (Pope's) version may be said to have tuned
the English tongue; for, since its appearance, no
writer[45], however deficient in other powers, has
wanted melody[46].' This is wild enough; but, of
Gray's two longest Odes, 'the language is laboured
into harshness.' Hammond's verses 'never glide in
a stream of melody.' The diction of Collins 'was
often harsh, unskilfully laboured, and injudiciously
selected. His lines, commonly, are of slow motion,
clogged and impeded with clusters of consonants.'
Of the style of Savage, 'The general fault is, harshness.'
The diction of Shenstone 'is often harsh,
improper, and affected,' &c.
Of these five poets, some were not born when Pope's
version was published; and, of the rest, not one had
penned a line now extant. They are all here charged,
in the strongest terms, with harshness; and yet,
(mirabile dictu!) since the appearance of Pope's version,
'no writer, however deficient in other powers, has
wanted melody.'
It is no less curious, that the author of this wonder-working
translation is himself charged with want of
melody; and that too in a poem written many years
after the appearance of Pope's Homer. 'The essay
on man contains more lines unsuccessfully laboured,
more harshness of diction, more thoughts imperfectly
expressed, more levity without elegance, and
more heaviness without strength,[47]' &c.
'Gray thought his language more poetical, as it
was more remote from common use[48].' This assertion
is not entirely without foundation, but it is very
far from being quite true.
'Finding in Dryden, honey redolent of spring, an
expression that reaches the utmost limits of our language,
Gray drove it a little more beyond common
apprehension, by making gale to be redolent of joy
and youth[49].' The censure is just. But Dr Johnson
is the last man alive, who should blame an author
for driving our language to its utmost limits: For
a very great part of his life has been spent in corrupting
and confounding it. In some verses to a Lady, he
talks of his arthritic pains[50], an epithet not very suitable
to the dialect of Parnassus. Dr Johnson himself cannot
always write common sense. 'In a short time many
were content to be shewn beauties which they
could not see[51].' He must here mean—'Beauties
which they could not have seen;'—for it is needless
to add, that no man can be shewn what he cannot
see.
It is curious to observe a man draw his own picture,
without intending it. Pomposo, when censuring
some of Gray's odes, observes, That 'Gray is too fond
of words arbitrarily compounded. The mind of
the writer seems to work with unnatural violence.
Double, double, toil and trouble.' He (the author of
an Elegy in a country church-yard) 'has a kind of
strutting dignity, and is tall by walking on tip-toe.
His art and his struggle are too visible, and there is
too little appearance of ease, or nature. In all
Gray's odes, there is a kind of cumbrous splendour
which we wish away[52].' We may say like Nathan,
Thou art the man.
Mr. Gray, and Mr. Horace Walpole, are said to have
wandered through France and Italy[53]. And as a contrast
to this polite expression, I shall add some remarks
which have occurred on the Doctor's own mode of
wandering.
'It must afford peculiar entertainment to see a person
of his character, who has scarcely ever been
without the precincts of this metropolis (London),
and who has been long accustomed to the adulation of a
little knot of companions of his own trade, sallying forth
in quest of discoveries—Neither the people nor the
country that he has visited will perhaps be considered
as the most extraordinary part of the phænomena
he has described.—The Doctor has endeavoured
to give an account of his travels; but he has furnished
his readers with a picture of himself. He
has seen very little, and observed still less. His
narration is neither supported by vivacity, to
make it entertaining, nor accompanied with information,
to render it instructive. It exhibits the
pompous artificial diction of the Rambler with the
same vacuity of thought.—The reader is led from one
Highland family to another merely to be informed
of the number of their children, the barrenness of
their country, and of the kindness with which the
Doctor was treated. In the Highlands he is like a
foolish peasant brought for the first time into a great
city, staring at every sign-post, and gaping with equal
wonder and astonishment at every object he
meets[54].'
'At Florence they (Gray and Walpole) quarelled
and parted; and Mr. Walpole is now content to
have it told that it was by his fault[55].' This is a
dirty insinuation; and the rant which follows in the
next period is of equal value.
He observes, That 'A long story perhaps adds little
to Gray's reputation[56].' Perhaps was useless here,
and indeed the Doctor has introduced it in a thousand
places, where it was useless, and left it out in as many
where it was necessary. In justice to Gray, he
ought to have added, that their Author rejected, from
a correct edition of his works, this insipid series of
verses.
'Gray's reputation was now so high that he had
the honour of refusing the laurel[57].' No man's reputation
has ever yet acquired him the laurel, without
some particular application from a courtier. What
honour is acquired by refusing the laurel? An hundred
pounds a-year would have enabled an œconomist
like Mr Gray to preserve his independence and exert
his generosity. The office of laureat is only ridiculous
in the hands of a fool. Mr. Savage in that character
produced nothing which would dishonour an
Englishman and a poet. It is probable that Mr. Gray,
a very costive writer, could hardly have made a decent
number of verses within the limited time. From
the passage now quoted the reader will not fail to remark,
that the Rambler 'nurses in his mind a foolish
disesteem of kings[58].'
Mr. Gray 'had a notion not very peculiar, that he
could not write but at certain times, or at happy
moments; a fantastic foppery to which my kindness
for a man of learning and of virtue wishes him to
have been superior[59].' Milton, who was no doubt
a shallow fellow compared with the Reformer of our
language, had the same 'fantastic foppery.' Mr
Hume remarks that Milton had not leisure 'to watch
the returns of genius.'—Every man feels himself at
some times less capable of intellectual effort, than at
others. The Rambler himself has, in the most express
terms, contradicted his present notion. In Denham's
life he quotes four lines which must, he says, have
been written 'in some hour propitious to poetry.' In
another place in the same lives his tumid and prolix
eloquence disembogues itself to prove, what no man
ever doubted, viz. 'That a tradesman's hand is often
out, he cannot tell why.' And an inference is
drawn, That this is still more apt to be the case with
a man straining his mental abilities.
In Gray's ode on spring, 'The thoughts have nothing
new, the morality is natural, but too stale[60].'
Read the poem, and then esteem the critic if you
can. Speaking of the Bard he says, 'Of the first
stanza the abrupt beginning has been celebrated;
but technical beauties can give praise only to the inventor[61].'
The question here is, What he means
by a technical beauty? That word he explains, 'Belonging
to arts; not in common or popular use'—How
can this word in either of these senses apply
here with propriety?
What he says of 'these four stanzas[62]'—conveys, I
think, no sentiment. Every word may be understood
separately, but in their present arrangement they seem
to have no meaning, or they mean nonsense, and
perhaps, contradiction; but this passage I leave to
the supreme tribunal of all authors—to the reason and
common sense of the reader. He can best determine
whether he has 'never seen the notions in any other
place, yet persuades himself that he always felt
them.' These ideas are very beautifully expressed
in many passages of Gaelic poetry: and Mr. Gray, let
it be remembered, to the honour of his taste and candour,
was the warm admirer of Fingal.
Comparing Gray's ode with an ode of Horace[63], he
says, 'there is in the Bard more force, more thought,
and more variety'—as indeed there very well may,
for in the one there are thirty-six lines only, and in
the other one hundred and forty-four. His whole
works are full of such trifling observations. 'But to
copy is less than to invent, theft is always dangerous.'
If he means to insinuate that Gray's Bard
is a copy of Horace, (and this is the plain inference
from his words) I charge him in direct terms as an
atrocious violator of Truth.
'The fiction of Horace was to the Romans credible;
(NO) but its revival disgusts us with apparent
and unconquerable falsehood, Incredulus odi[64].' How
will the Doctor's verdict be digested at Aberdeen by
'a poet, a philosopher, and a good man[65].' It is
diverting to remark how these mutual admirers clash
on the clearest point, with not a possibility of reconcilement.
I pass by five or six lines, which are not worth
contradiction, though they cannot resist it. 'I do
not see that the Bard promotes any truth moral or
political[66].' The Rambler's intellect is blind.—He
seems to have stared a great deal, to have seen little
or nothing. The Bard very forcibly impresses this
moral, political, and important truth, that eternal
vengeance would pursue the English Tyrant and his
posterity, as enemies to posterity, and exterminators
of mankind. Dr Johnson, a stickler for the jus divinum,
did not relish this idea.
He commends the 'Ode on Adversity,' but the
hint was at 'first taken from Horace[67].' The poem
referred to has almost no resemblance to Mr Gray's.
And if we go on at this rate, where will we find any
thing original? He mistakes the title of this poem,
which is not an 'Ode on,' but a 'Hymn to' Adversity.
This is a clear though trifling proof of his inattention.
As he dare not condemn this piece, it is
dismissed in six lines, to make room for 'The wonderful
wonder of wonders, the two Sister Odes, by which
many have been persuaded to think themselves delighted[68].'
He chews them through four tedious
octavo pages. We come then to Gray's Elegy, which
occupies an equal share of a paragraph containing only
fourteen lines. So much more plentiful is the critic
in gall than honey! And in reading this fragment
we may remark that nonsense is not panegyric.
Speaking of Welsh Mythology, he says, 'Attention
recoils from the repetition of a tale that, even
when it was first heard, was heard with scorn[69].'
There is no reason to think that the Welsh disbelieved
these fictions. It is much more likely that many believe
them at this day. Shakespeare has from this superstition
made a whimsical picture of Owen Glendower:
He painted nature. This is one of those assertions
which our dictator should have qualified with
a perhaps, an adverb, which, wherever it ought to be
met with in the Doctor's pages, 'will not easily be
found[70].'
'But I will no longer look for particular faults;
yet let it be observed that the ode might have been
concluded with an action of better example; but
suicide is always to be had without expence of
thought[71].'
The lines objected to are these:
'He spoke, and headlong from the mountains height,
Deep in the roaring tide, he plung'd to endless night.'
Let the Doctor, if he can, give us a better conclusion.
'The Prospect of Eaton College suggests nothing to
Gray, which every beholder does not equally think
and feel[72].' He might as well have said, that every
man in England is capable of producing Paradise Lost.
We have seen with what tenderness Dr Johnson
speaks of the dead, we shall now see his tenderness
to the living. 'Let us give the Indians arms, and
teach them discipline, and encourage them now and
then to plunder a plantation. Security and leisure
are the parents of sedition[73].' The Doctor seems
here to be serious. The proposal must reflect infinite
honour on his wisdom and humanity.
'No part of the world has yet had reason to rejoice
that Columbus found at last reception and employment[74].'
This wild opinion is fairly disproved
by Dr Smith, a philosopher not much afraid of novelty;
for he has advanced a greater variety of original,
interesting, and profound ideas, than almost
any other author since the first existence of books.
'Such is the unevenness of Dryden's compositions
that ten lines are seldom found together without
something of which the reader is ashamed[75].' This
is a very wide aberration from truth. In Dryden's
fables we may frequently meet with five hundred
lines together, without ten among them, which could
have disgraced the most eminent writer. His prologues
and epilogues are a never failing fountain of
good sense and genuine poetry. But it were insulting
the taste of the English nation to insist any farther
on this point. We shall presently see how far Dr
Johnson's Dictionary will answer the foregoing description.
Dryden it is said discovers 'in the preface to his
fables, that he translated the first book of the Iliad
without knowing what was in the second[76].' This
insinuation revolts against all probability; and whoever
peruses that elegant and delightful preface will
find it to be NOT TRUE.
'The highest pleasure which nature has indulged
to sensitive perception is that of rest after fatigue[77].'
And sensitive is defined 'having sense or perception; but
not reason.' If I understand the meaning of this passage,
it is, that no pleasure communicated through
any of the organs of sense is equal to that of rest.
This assertion leads to the most absurd consequences.
In man, to separate sensitive from rational perception
appears to be simply impossible. Even rest is not in
strict language any pleasure. It is merely a mitigation
of pain. The reader will decide whether I do the
Doctor justice, while I say, that he must have been
petrified when he composed this maxim. Thirst and
hunger had been long forgot. Handel and Titian
had no power to charm. We learn that a lover can
receive, and his mistress can bestow nothing which is
equal to the rapturous enjoyment of an easy chair.
The thought is new; no human being ever did, or
ever will conceive it, except this immortal Idler.
'Physicians and lawyers are no friends to religion,
and many conjectures have been formed to discover
the reason of such a combination between men who
agree in nothing else, and who seem to be less affected
in their own provinces by religious opinions than
any other part of the community[78].' He then proceeds
in the tone of an author, who has made a discovery
to inform us of the cause. 'They have all seen
a parson, seen him in a habit different from their
own, and therefore declared war against him.' But
this can be no motive for peculiar antipathy to parsons,
allowing such antipathy to exist; for in habit
all other classes differ no less from the clergy, than the
lawyer and physician. But the remark itself is frivolous
and false. Boerhaave and Hale were men of eminent
piety. Physicians and lawyers have as much
regard for religion as any other people generally have.
Their agreeing in nothing else is another of the blunders
crowded into this passage. But I have too much
respect for the reader's understanding to insist any
farther on this point. The conjecturers, the combination,
and the declaration of war, exist no where but in the
Doctor's pericranium. He was at a loss what to say,
and the position is only to be regarded as a turbid ebullition
of amphibological inanity. But while we thus
meet with something which is ridiculous in every
page, we are not to forget even for a moment, what
we have often heard, and what is most unquestionably
true, viz. That Dr Johnson is the father of British
literature, capital author of his age, and the greatest
man in Europe[79]!!!
'We are by our occupations, education, and habits
of life, divided almost into different species,
who regard one another for the most part with scorn
and malignity[80].' The Doctor is himself a proof,
that a man may look upon almost all of his own profession
with scorn and malignity: So that between his
precept and his practice, the world seems bad enough.
But I hope every heart revolts at this gross insult on
the characters of mankind. He brings as an instance
the aversion which subsists between soldiers and sailors.
There no doubt have been jealousies and bloodshed
between these two classes of men, but the same accidents
fall out more frequently between soldiers themselves.
The scorn and malignity of admirals seldom affect
any line of service but their own. His captain
of foot[81], who saw no danger in a sea-fight was a fool,
and just such a specimen of English officers, as the Doctor
himself is of English travellers. Our repulse at
Carthagena was not owing to an antipathy between
the common men. Our late victory at Savannah proves
with what ardour they can unite. The Doctor has
insulted almost every order of society.
Coblers with coblers smoke away the night,
Even players in the common cause, unite.
Authors alone with more than mortal rage,
Eternal war with brother authors wage[82].
'To raise esteem we must benefit others,' is an assertion
advanced in the same page. But the Doctor,
if he knows any thing, must know that esteem is often
felt for an enemy. We value for his courage or ingenuity
the man who never heard our name, or who
would not give a guinea to save us from perdition.
We can esteem the hero who butchers nations, and
the pedant who perplexes truth. Marlborough's avarice
led him to continue the continental war, till
he had laid the great foundation of our public debt.
He was detested as much as any general now in England,
and yet 'he was so great a man (said one of
his enemies) that I have forgot his faults.' Posterity,
while they suffer for his baseness, pay the due
tribute of esteem to his genius and intrepidity.
In every point of view this maxim is 'the baseless
fabrick of a vision.' And what had so far obumbrated
the Rambler's powers of ratiocination, it is not easy
to guess. We sometimes feel it impossible to esteem
even our benefactor. 'I have received obligations
(said Chatterton) without being obliged.' And of
consequence, his benefactors had forfeited his esteem.
The father of British literature has in forty other places
contradicted his own words. He has proved that
esteem is involuntary, and that benefits do not always
procure it.
The Doctor says, 'That Cowley having, when very
young, read Spenser, became irrecoverably a poet[83].'
And he adds a remark that shows his good sense: 'Such
are the accidents which, sometimes remembered,
and sometimes perhaps forgotten, PRODUCE that
particular designation of mind and propensity for
some certain science or employment, which is commonly
called genius. The true genius is a mind of
large general powers, accidentally determined to some
particular direction. The great painter of the present
age had the first fondness for his art excited by
a perusal of Richardson's treatise.' This drawling
definition contradicts common sense. Does the Doctor
mean that Cowley would have become a painter by perusing
Richardson? or that Reynolds would have become
a poet by perusing Spenser? This is the clear
inference from his words, and its absurdity is 'too
evident for detection, and too gross for aggravation[84].'
At this rate Garrick might have eclipsed
Newton, and Voltaire defeated Frederick. Plato
possessed 'a mind of large general powers.' He read
Homer. He wrote verses, and he found that he could
not be a poet. The Doctor himself has 'large general
powers;' but he could never have been made a
decent dancing master. Marcel might have broke his
heart, before his pupil had acquired three steps of a
minuet. In his dictionary the Doctor, without a word
of accidental determination, defines genius to be 'disposition
of nature, by which any one is qualified for
some peculiar employment.' And here I cannot
help adding, that 'the great painter' has by stepping
out of his own line, discovered the narrowness of even
a great man's knowledge. He affirms[85], That
scarce a poet from Homer down to Dryden ever felt his
fire diminished merely by his advance in years. There is
nothing more absurd, says Cicero, than what we hear
asserted by some of the philosophers. Even in painting,
the President's own profession, that rule does
not hold. Cellini tells us, that Michael Angelo's genius
decayed with years; and he speaks of it as common
to all artists. His notion was perhaps grafted
on an opinion of the Doctor's about the durability of
Waller's genius[86]. But Waller was a feeble poet;
he never had a genius, so that we need not wonder
he never lost it. All his verses are hardly worth one
of Dr Johnson's imitations of Juvenal.
Rowe (the famous tragic poet) 'seldom moves either
pity or terror[87].' Paradise Lost is a work which
'the reader admires, and lays down, and forgets to
take up again[88],' But Rowe's Lucan, which is very
little read, the Doctor pronounces to be 'one of the
greatest productions of English poetry.' Dr Johnson's
sycophants have asserted, that 'in the walks of criticism
and biography he has long been without a rival.'
And they are no doubt willing to support
their idol in his infamous assertion, that Swift 'excites
neither surprise nor admiration[89].' The Doctor's disregard
for the unanimous sentiments of mankind often
excites surprize, but never admiration. Let us
here apply his own observation, that 'there is often
found in commentaries a spontaneous train of invective
and contempt, more eager and venemous
than is vented by the most furious controvertist in
politics, against whom he is hired to defame[90].' We
may illustrate the Rambler's remark by his own example:
'Theobald, a man of narrow comprehension,
and small acquisitions, with no native and intrinsick
splendour of genius, with little of the artificial light
of learning—his contemptible ostentation I have
frequently concealed[91].' The definer of a fiddlestick
proceeds thus: 'I have in some places shewn him, as
he would have shewn himself for the reader's diversion,
that the inflated emptiness of some notes may
justify or excuse the contraction of the rest.'—The
advocate for tenderness and decorum goes on to
tell us, that 'Theobald, thus weak and ignorant,
thus mean and FAITHLESS, thus petulant and ostentatious,
by the good luck of having Pope for his
enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone with reputation
from this undertaking. So easily is he praised
whom no man can envy[92].' How does it appear
that Theobald was weak and ignorant? The
Doctor himself had in the preceding page told us,
that 'he (Theobald) collated the antient copies, and
rectified many errors.' This assertion our author,
with his wonted consistency, has flatly contradicted
in the very next line. 'What little he (Theobald)
did was commonly right.' Has the Doctor adduced,
or has he attempted to adduce evidence, that
Theobald was mean and faithless, or what provocation
has he to load this man's memory with such injurious
epithets? His burst of vulgarity can reflect
disgrace on nobody but himself. It is evident, tho'
he thinks proper to deny it, that he considered Theobald
as an object of envy; yet he is obliged to confess
that Theobald 'escaped, and escaped alone, with
reputation,' from the talk of amending Shakespeare.
In assigning a reason for this applause of Theobald,
Dr Johnson pays a very poor compliment to the penetration
of the public, for surely to combat a writer
of so much merit and popularity as Pope, was not
the plainest road to eminence in the literary world.
'In his (Shakespeare's) tragic scenes there is always
something wanting'——NO[93]——'In his comic scenes he
is seldom very successful, when he engages his characters
in reciprocations of smartness, and contests of
sarcasms; their ideas are commonly gross, and their
pleasantry licentious.' This accusation is cruel and
unjust, as all the world knows already. But a great
part of that preface is an incoherent jumble of reproach
and panegyrick[94]. If any thing can be yet
more faulty than what we have just now seen, it is
what follows: 'Whenever he (Shakespeare) solicits
his invention, or strains his faculties[95], the offspring
of his throes is tumour (i. e. puffy grandeur[96]), meanness,
tediousness, and obscurity. His declamations or
set speeches are commonly cold and weak.' The set
speeches (as the Doctor elegantly terms them) of Petruchio,
of Jacques, of Wolsey, and of Hamlet, are
perhaps neither cold nor weak. The conclusion of
this period is worthy of such a beginning; he mentions
certain attempts from which Shakespeare 'seldom
escapes without the pity or resentment of his
reader.' The Doctor himself is an object of pity.
Shakespeare has been in his grave near two centuries—His
life was innocent—His writings are immortal.
To feel resentment against so great a man because his
works are not every where equal, is an idea highly
becoming the generosity of Dr Johnson.
What 'truth, moral or political,' is promoted by
telling us, that, when Thomson came to London, his
first want was a pair of shoes; that Pope 'wore a kind
of fur doublet, under a shirt of very coarse warm
linen, with fine sleeves[97];' and a long string of such
tiresome and disgusting trifles, which make his narrative
seem ridiculous. Had Dr Johnson been Pope's
apothecary, we would certainly have heard of the
frequency of his pulse, the colour of his water, and
the quantity of his stools.
'Though Pope seemed angry when a dram was
offered him, he did not forbear to drink it[98].' And
who the Devil cares whether he did or not? The
Doctor needed hardly to have told us, that 'his petty
peculiarities were communicated by a female domestic;'
for no gentleman would have confessed
that they came within the reach of his observation.
The truly illustrious author of the Rambler, has
exerted his venemous eloquence, through several pages,
in order to convince us, that 'never were penury of
knowledge and vulgarity of sentiment so happily disguised,'
as in Pope's Essay on Man. For this purpose,
the Doctor celebrates the character of Crousaz,
whose intentions 'were always right, his opinions
were solid, and his religion pure[99].' In opposition
to such authorities, let us hear the great and immortal
citizen of Geneva.
'M. de Crousaz has lately given us a refutation of
the ethic epistles of Mr Pope, which I have read;
but it did not please me. I will not take upon me
to say, which of these two authors is in the right;
but I am persuaded, that the book of the former
will never excite the reader to do any one virtuous
action, whereas our zeal for every thing great and good
is awakened by that of Pope[100].'
The Essay on Man, he says, 'affords an egregious
instance of the predominance of genius, the dazzling
splendour of imagery, and the seductive powers of
eloquence. The reader feels his mind full, though
he learns NOTHING; and when he meets it in its
new array, no longer knows the talk of his mother,
and his nurse[101].' If the conversations of Dr Johnson's
mother and his nurse were equal to Mr Pope's
verses, it is a pity the Doctor had not preserved them.
He could hardly have spent his time so well. And it
is a wonder that with so many rare opportunities
of improvement, the Doctor has never yet eclipsed
his nurse. Voltaire pronounces Pope's Essay to be
the finest didactick poem in the world, and he would
no doubt have replied to the Doctor's objections in
that tone of contempt with which the Doctor replied
to some of his—'These are the petty cavils of petty
minds[102].'
In the Essay on Man 'so little was any evil tendency
discovered, that, as innocence is unsuspicious,
many read it for a manual of piety[103];'—and will continue
to read it, when the cavils of Dr Johnson are
forgotten or despised.
'He (Pope) nursed in his mind a foolish disesteem
of Kings.' And again, 'He gratified that ambitious
petulance with which he affected to insult the
great[104].'
Dr Johnson himself is by no means remarkable for
his respect to the great. In the preface to his folio
Dictionary, he tells us, that it was written 'without
any patronage of the great,' which is a mistake; for
he had published a pamphlet, some years before,
wherein he acknowledges, that Chesterfield had patronized
him; and why the Doctor should retract his
own words, it is hard to say; for Chesterfield continued
his friend to the last; and such a man was very likely
the strongest spoke in the Doctor's wheel. But his
Lordship is now dead, and the Doctor is always and
eminently grateful.
'It has been maintained by some, who love to talk of
what they do not know, that pastoral is the most antient
poetry.' But in the next period, 'pastoral poetry
was the first employment of the human imagination[105].'
The Doctor, therefore, by his own account, is one
of those, who love to talk of (and what is yet worse, to
assert) what they do not know. In North America, the
natives have no conception of pastoral life among
themselves, and their poetry, such as it is, hath no
relation to that state of society.
Pastoral poetry 'is generally pleasing, because it
entertains the mind with representations of scenes,
familiar to almost every imagination, and of which
all can equally judge whether they are well described,
or not[106].'
This period is so closely interwoven with nonsense,
that it will take some pains to disentangle it. Rural
scenes are not familiar to almost every imagination. In
England half the people are shut up in large towns,
and such is the gross ignorance of some of them, that
an old woman in London once asked, whether potatoes
grew on trees. Neither is every man an equal judge
even of what is familiar to him. Observe how the
Rambler confounds the distinction between all, and
almost every. The whole number is in the same stile.
'At this time a long course of opposition to Sir
Robert Walpole had filled the nation with clamours
for liberty, of which no man felt the want, and
with care for liberty which was not in danger[107].'
No man was more violent than Dr Johnson in abusing
Walpole. We have already seen some of those
political definitions, which at this hour deform the
Doctor's Dictionary. His late zeal for government
could arise from self interest only. And to take his
own words, he comes under suspicion as a wretch hired
to vindicate the late measures of the Court[108]. He accuses
Milton as a tool of authority, as a forger hired
to assassinate the memory of Charles I. These charges
came with a very bad grace from the Rambler.
They are long since refuted in a separate publication,
and yet they will be reprinted in every future edition
of his book.
Will any man be the wiser, the better, or the merrier,
by reading what follows—'Lyttleton was his
(Shenstone's) neighbour, and his rival, whose empire,
spacious and opulent, looked with disdain on
the petty state that appeared behind it. For a while
the inhabitants of Hagley affected to tell their acquaintance
of the little fellow that was trying to make
himself admired; but when by degrees the Leasowes
forced themselves into notice, they took care
to defeat the curiosity which they could not suppress,
by conducting their visitants perversely to
inconvenient points of view, and introducing them
at the wrong end of a walk to detect a deception;
injuries of which Shenstone would heavily complain[109].'
The paragraph closes with a deep observation.
As the Doctor's own associates[110] have lamented
the existence of this beautiful and important passage,
I have only to say, that Poor Lyttleton (as the Doctor
calls him) patronized Fielding, and that the Rambler
patronizes William Shaw: That his Lordship was an
elegant writer: That he did not adopt Johnson's
new words: That Lexiphanes was dedicated to him:
That he was a great and an amiable man: And that
he is dead.
With all his affectation of hard words, the Doctor
becomes at once intelligible when he wishes to reprobate
a rival genius, or insult the ashes of a benefactor.
In defiance of Addison, and a thousand other shallow
fellows, he asserts that Milton 'both in prose and
verse had formed his stile by a perverse and pedantick
principle[111].'
Speaking of Mr Walmsley, he says, 'At this
man's table I enjoyed many chearful and agreeable
hours, with companions such as are not often to be
found.—I am not able to name a man of equal
knowledge. He never received my notions with
contempt.—He was one of the first friends whom literature
procured me,—and I hope that at least my
gratitude made me worthy of his notice. It may be
doubted whether a day now passes, in which I have
not some advantage from his friendship[112].' But then,
'He was a Whig with ALL the virulence and malevolence
of his party.' This is a most beautiful conclusion;
and quite in the Doctor's stile. His accusation
is incredible. A monster, such as he draws here,
can seldom deform existence.
We are told that at St. Andrews Cardinal Beaton
'was murdered by the ruffians of Reformation[113].'
And it seems to be the fashion of the day, to censure
that action. Yet it is allowed on all hands that
Wishart's doctrine, in spite of its incomprehensibilities,
was better than Popery—that Beaton, a profligate usurping
Priest, had committed every human vice—that,
without civil authority, he dragged our Apostle
to the stake—and that his avowed design was to expell
or exterminate the whole Protestant party. Had
the Cardinal been permitted to complete his plan, we
durst not at this day have disputed, 'Whether it is
better to worship a piece of rotten wood[114], or
throw it in the fire?' It is therefore evident that to
kill this tyrant was highly proper and laudable. We
may just as well censure the centurion who slew Caligula.
When a philosopher, who truly deserves that
title, was once in conversation reprobating Melvil,
he was interrupted by this, simple question, Whether
if his own antagonist had conducted him to the stake,
he would not have pardoned a pupil for avenging his
blood? 'I would most certainly,' he replied, and such
must be the real sentiments of all men, whatever they
may chuse to print. When we attempt to hide the
feelings of nature, that we may support a favourite
system, we never fail to become ridiculous. In this
age and nation, if a magistrate shall rise above the
law; if he rob us of life with the most barbarous exulation;
if his guilt equal whatever history hath recorded;
if he want nothing but the purple and the
legions to rival Domitian, the voice of nature will
be heard. The brave will reject such unmanly,
such fatal refinements of speculation. Like Hambden
and Melvil, they will stand forth in defence of
themselves, and their posterity. They will relieve
their fellow citizens from temporal perdition.
They will drive insolence and injustice from the seat
of power. They will exult in danger, and rush to
revenge or death. They will plunge their swords in
the heart of their oppressor; or they will teach him,
like Charles, to atone upon the scaffold for the tears
and the blood of his people; and while in the eyes of
their countrymen, they read their glory[115], they will
perhaps reflect with a smile, that some slavish pedant,
some pensioned traitor to the rights of mankind, is
one day to mark them out as objects of public detestation[116].
'The theatre, when it is under any other direction,
is peopled by such characters as were never
seen, conversing in a language which was never
heard, upon topics which will never arise in the
commerce of mankind.—Upon every other stage
the universal agent is love, by whose power all
good and evil is distributed, and every action quickened
or retarded. To bring a lover, a lady and a
rival into the fable; to entangle them in contradictory
obligations, perplex them with oppositions of
interest, and harrass them with violence of desires
inconsistent with each other; to make them meet in
rapture, and part in agony; to fill their mouths
with hyperbolical joy, and outrageous sorrow; to
distress them as nothing human ever was distressed;
to deliver them as nothing human ever was delivered,
is the business of a modern dramatist. For
this probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and
language is depraved[117].' The weakest of Dr Johnson's
admirers will blush in reading this passage. He
very fairly denies every degree of merit, to every dramatic
writer, of every age or nation, Shakespeare alone
excepted. What can be more ridiculous than this?
'Every man finds his mind more strongly seized
by the tragedies of Shakespeare than of any other
writer; others please us by particular speeches, but
he always makes us anxious for the event, by exciting
restless and unquenchable[118] curiosity, and compelling
him that reads his work to read it through[119].'
But the Doctor overthrows all this within a few pages,
for Shakespeare has 'perhaps not one play, which,
if it were now exhibited as the work of a cotemporary
writer, would be heard to the conclusion[120].' The
Rambler cannot always suppress his thorough contempt
for the taste of the public. He no doubt laughs
internally at their folly in admiring him.
I proceed to the Doctor's English Dictionary, and
shall begin with quoting the remarks already made
by a judicious friend, on this subject.
'Among the many foibles of the human race, we
may justly reckon this to be one, that when they
have once got any thing really useful, they apply it
in all cases, proper or improper, till at last they
make it quite ridiculous. Nothing can possibly be
more useful than a just and accurate definition, because
by this only we are able to distinguish one
thing from another. It is obvious, however, that
in definitions we ought always to define a thing less
known, by one which is more so, and those things which
are known to every body, neither can be defined, nor
ought we to attempt a definition of them at all; because
we must either explain them by themselves, or by something
less known than themselves, both of which give
our definitions the most ridiculous air imaginable.
'A certain right reverend gentleman, not many
miles from Edinburgh, and whom, out of my great
regard for the cloth, I put in the first place, gave
the following definition of a thief. "A thief," says
he, "my friends, is a man of a thievish disposition."
Now though this definition is somewhat imperfect,
for a thief also exerts that thievish disposition which
lurks in his breast, I intend to take it for my model,
on account of its great conformity to many of the
definitions given by the most celebrated authors.—I
remember to have seen in one of the Reviews a definition
of Nature, which began in the following
manner. "Nature is that innate celestial fire."—The
rest has in truth escaped my memory, though
I remember the Reviewers indecently compared it
to the following lines, which they say were a description
of a dog-fish.
'And his evacuations
Were made a parte post.
A parte post! these words so hard
In Latin though I speak 'em,
Their meaning in plain English is,
He made pure Album Græcum.
'This definition rather goes a step beyond that of
the clergyman, as it explains the words a parte post
by Album Græcum, which are more obscure than the
former, and neither of which, out of my great regard
to decency, I choose to translate.—Whether
Dr Johnson composed his dictionary, after hearing
the above-mentioned clergyman's sermon, or not,
I cannot tell, but he seems very much to have taken
him for his model, even though the said clergyman
was a Presbyterian, and Dr Johnson has an
aversion at Presbyterians. Thus, when he tells
us, that short is not long, and that long is not short, he
certainly might as well have told us that a thief is a
man of a thievish disposition. I am surprised indeed
how the intellects of a human creature could be
obscured by pedantry, and the love of words, to
such a degree, as to insert this distinction in a book,
pretended to be written for the instruction and benefit
of society. Much more am I surprised how
the authors of all dictionaries of the English language
have followed the same ridiculous plan, as if
they had positively intended to make their books
as little valuable as possible. Nay, I am almost
tempted to think, that the readers have a natural
inclination to peruse nonsense, and cannot be satisfied
without a considerable quantity of that ingredient
in every book which falls into their hands.
Long and short are terms merely relative, and which
every body knows; to explain them therefore by
one another, is to explain them by themselves. But
besides this ridiculous way of explaining a thing by
itself, pedants, of whom we may justly reckon Dr
Johnson the Prince, have fallen upon a most ingenious
method of explaining the English by the Latin,
or some other language still further beyond the
reach of vulgar ken. Thus, when Dr Johnson defines
fire, he tells us it is the igneous element. To
water (the verb) he tells us, is to irrigate, by which
no doubt we are greatly edified. To do is to practise,
and to practise is to do, &c.
'But the most curious kind of definitions are these
œnigmatical ones of our author, by which he industriously
prevents the reader from knowing the
meaning of the words he explains. Thus, the hair
he tells us is one of the common teguments of the
body; but this will not distinguish it from the skin,
and shews the extreme poverty of judgment under
which the Doctor laboured, when he could not
point out the distinguishing mark between the hair
and skin. A dog is "a domestic animal remarkably
various in his species," but this does not distinguish
him, except to natural historians, from a
cow, a sheep, or a hog; for of these there are also
different breeds or species. A cat is "a domestic
animal that catches mice;" but this may be said of
an owl, or a dog; for a dog will catch mice if he
sees them, though he does not watch for them as a
cat does. Nay, if we happen to overlook the word
animal, or not to understand it, we may mistake
the cat for a mouse-trap. The earth, according to
our learned author, is "the element distinct from
fire, air, or water;" but this may be light or electricity
as well as earth.—Air is "the element encompassing
the terraqueous globe;" but an unlearned
reader would be very apt to mistake this
for the ocean, &c.
'When the Doctor comes to his learned definitions,
he outdoes, if possible, his œnigmatical ones. Network
is "any thing reticulated or decussated at equal
distances." A nose is "the prominence on the face
which is the organ of scent, and the emunctory of
the brain."—The heart is "the muscle which by
its contraction and dilatation propells the blood
through the course of circulation, and is therefore
considered as the source of vital motion."—Now
let any person consider for whom such strange definitions
can possibly be intended. To give instruction
to the ignorant they certainly are not designed;
neither can they give satisfaction to the learned,
because they are not accurate. The nose, for
instance, he says is the emunctory of the brain; but
every anatomist knows that it performs no such office,
neither hath the nose any communication with
the brain, but by means of its nerves.—Yet this
dictionary is reckoned the best English one extant.
What then must the rest be; or what shall we think
of those who mistake a book, stuffed with such stupid
assemblages of words, for a learned composition?
Definitions undoubtedly are necessary, but not
such as give us no information, or lead us astray.
Neither can any thing shew the sagacity, or strength
of judgment, which a man possesses, more clearly
than his being able to define exactly what he speaks
about; while such blundering descriptions as these,
above quoted, shew nothing but the Doctor's insignificance[121].'
That the courteous reader may be qualified to judge
for himself, I shall now insert a variety of quotations
from this wonderful, amazing, admirable, astonishing,
incomparable, immortal, and inimitable book.
Too much cannot be said in its praise. I shall however
let it speak for itself. Every page, indeed, is so
pregnant with superexcellent beauties, that in selecting
them, the critic's situation resembles that of the
schoolman's ass between two bundles of hay; his only
difficulty
is where to begin. The pious husband
of Bathsheba had asked 'What is Man?' But let it
be told in Rome, and published in the streets of Paris,
to the honour of the English nation, that her
greatest philosopher has received 300l. a-year for informing
us that—
Man is a 'Human being. 2. Not a woman. 3. Not
a boy. 4. Not a beast.' Woman. 'The female of
the human race.' Boy. '1. A male child; not
a girl. 2. One in the state of adolescence.' Girl. 'A
young woman or child.' (Female child he should
have said.) Damsel. 'A young gentlewoman; a
wench; a country lass.' Lass. 'A girl; a maid;
A young woman.' Wench. '1. A young woman.
2. A young woman in contempt. 3. A strumpet.'
Strumpet. 'A whore, a prostitute.' Whore.
'1. A woman who converses unlawfully with men;
a fornicatress; an adultress; a strumpet. 2. a prostitute;
a woman who receives men for money.'
To whore, v. n. (from the noun) 'To converse unlawfully
with the other sex.' To whore, v. a. 'To
corrupt with regard to chastity.' Whoredom, s.
(from whore) 'Fornication.' (Here follow several
other definitions on the same pure subject, which every
body understands as well as Dr Johnson.) Young.
'Being in the first part of life. Not old.' Youngster,
younker. 'A young person.' (I pass by ten other articles,
about youthful compounded of youth and full,
&c. &c. because young people are in no danger of
thinking themselves old.) Yuck, s. (jocken, Dutch.)
'Itch,' Old. 'Past the middle part of life; not
young; not new; ancient; not modern. Of old.
Long ago; from ancient times.' Hum, interj. 'A
sound implying doubt and deliberation, Shakespeare.'
Fiddlefaddle, s. (a cant word) 'Trifles.' Fiddlefaddle,
a. 'Trifling; giving trouble.'
(——His own example strengthens all his laws,
Sam is himself the true sublime he draws.)
Fiddler, s. (from fiddle) 'A musician, one that plays
upon a fiddle.' Here follow fiddlestick, compounded
of fiddle and stick, and warranted an English word
by Hudibras; and Fiddle-string, s. (Fiddle and string)
'the string of a fiddle. Arbuthnot.' Sheep's eye. 'A
modest and diffident look, such as lovers cast at their
mistresses.' Love. 'Lewdness.' And thirteen other
explanations. Lovemonger. 'One who deals in affairs
love.' (Besides about twenty other articles concerning
this subject of equal obscurity and importance.)
Sweetheart. 'A lover or mistress.' Mistress.
'A woman beloved and courted; a whore, a concubine.'
Wife. 'A woman that has a husband.'
A Runner. 'One who runs.' Husband. 'The correlative
to wife.' Shrew. 'A peevish, malignant, clamorous,
spiteful, vexatious, turbulent woman.' Scold.
'A clamorous, rude, mean, low, foul mouthed woman.'
Henpecked, a. (hen and pecked) 'Governed by the
wife.' Strap. 'A narrow long slip of cloth or leather.'
Whip. 'An instrument of correction tough
and pliant.' Cuckingstool, s. 'An engine invented
for the punishment of scolds and unquiet women.'
Cuckoldom. 'The state of a cuckold.' (Cuckold, s.
Cuckold, v. a. Cuckoldy, a. and Cuckoldmaker, s.
(compounded of cuckold, and maker) I leave out, as
the reader is, perhaps, already initiated in the mysteries
of that subject.) Arse, s. 'The buttocks' To
hang an arse. 'To be tardy, sluggish' Buttock.
'The rump, the part near the tail' Rump. '1. The
end of the backbone. 2. The buttocks.' Thimble.
'A metal cover by which women (yea and taylors
too Doctor) secure their fingers from the needle.'
Needle. 'A small instrument pointed at one end to
pierce cloth, and perforated at the other to receive
the thread.' Gunpowder. 'The powder put into
guns to be fired.' Maidenhead. Maidenhode. Maidenhood.
'Virginity, virgin purity, freedom from
contamination.' Oh, interj 'An exclamation denoting
pain, sorrow, or surprise.' Hope 'That
which gives Hope. The object of Hope.' Fear. '1.
Dread; horror; apprehension of danger. 2. Awe;
dejection of mind. 3. Anxiety, solicitude,' &c.
Impatience. 'Heat of passion; inability to suffer delay,
eagerness.' Virgin. 'A woman not a mother.'
Virginity. 'Maidenhead; unacquaintance with man.'
Fart. 'Wind from behind. Suckling' To fart. 'To
break wind behind. Swift.' Marriage. 'The
act of uniting a man and woman for life.' Repentance.
'Sorrow for any thing past.' Kiss. 'Salute given
by joining lips.' Kisser. 'One that Kisses.' To
piss, v. n. 'To make water. L'Estrange.' Piss s.
(from the verb) 'Urine; animal water. Pope.' Pissburnt,
a. 'Stained with urine.' Pedant. 'A man
vain of low knowledge.'
Of these extracts, I suppose opinion is uniform. Every
man who reads them, reads them with contempt.
To tell us that a man is not a beast, seems to
be an insult, rather than a definition. To say, that
young is not old, and, that old is not young, of old, &c.
is to say nothing at all. There is a medium; there is
a state between these periods of life. And his definitions
convey no meaning; for a man may be not old tho'
he is not young. Many articles, such as whoring,
whoremaster, whoremonger, whorishly, &c. are as indecent,
as they are impertinent, and seem only designed
to divert school boys. Hum, Yuck, Fiddle,
Fiddler, Fiddlefaddle, s. Fiddlefaddle, a. Fiddlestick,
Fiddlestring, Thimble, Needle, Gunpowder, Hope,
O, and O—and Oh, and twenty-eight or thirty explanations
of the particle on, are left without remark
to the reader's penetration. Some are well enough
acquainted with a maidenhead, and such as are not,
will be no wiser by reading Dr Johnson: For he says,
That it is virginity, and that again is explained (like
more than half the words in his book) by the word it
explains. Neither can a maidenhead ensure freedom
from pollution; for a girl may be polluted, without
losing her maidenhead; and on the other hand, the
Doctor dare not say that a married woman is, for that
reason, polluted. Love, he calls lewdness, and he
may as well say, that light is darkness. His admirers
will answer, that he also gives the right meaning;
but let them tell, why he gave any besides the right
meaning, and why he collected such a load of blunders
into his book. Or since he did collect them,
why he did not mark them down as wrong. For in
the preface to his octavo, he tells us, that it is written
for 'explaining terms of science.' But to select
twenty barbarous misapplications of a word, is not
explaining the word, but only confusion worse confounded.
Indeed that whole preface is a piece of the
most profound nonsense, which ever insulted the common
sense of the world. A virgin, is a woman not a
mother. But many wives, and many concubines too,
have never propagated the species, though they had
(as Othello says) a thousand times committed the act
of shame. From this literary chaos, a foreigner would
be apt to imagine that they were virgins.
Corking pin. 'A pin of the largest size.' Bum.
'The part upon which we sit.' Butter. 'An unctuous
substance.' Buttertooth. 'The great broad foretooth.'
Off. prep. 'Not on.' Potato. 'An esculent
root.' Turnip. 'A white esculent root.' Parsley,
'A plant.' Parsnep. 'A plant.' Colliflower.
'Cauliflower.' Cauliflower. 'A species of cabbage.'
Cabbage. 'A plant.' Pit. 'A hole in the ground.'
Pin. 'A short wire, with a sharp point, and round
head, used by women to fasten their cloaths.' Plate.
'A small shallow vessel of metal (or of stone or wood
Doctor) on which meat is eaten.' Play. 'Not work.'
Poker. 'The iron bar with which men stir the fire.'
Pork. 'Swine's flesh unsalted.' (Here you may find
Porker, Porkeater, Porket, Porkling, with all their derivations,
definitions, and authorities.) Porridge.
'Food made by boiling meat in water.' Porridge-pot,
(porridge and pot) 'The pot in which meat is
boiled for a family.' Porringer, (from porridge) 'a
vessel in which broth is eaten.' Part. 'Some thing
less than the whole.' And thirteen other ramifications.
Pulse. 'Oscillation; vibration.' Puff. 'A quick blast
with the mouth.' Vid. in same page, Pudding, s.
from the Swedish, (which is a mistake, for it is from
the French boudin) Pudding Pie, from Pudding and
Pie, and Pudding-time, from Pudding and time. Puddle,
s. Puddle, v. a. & Puddly, &c. Shadow. 'Opacity,
darkness, Shade.' Shade. 'The cloud or
opacity made by interception of the light.' Darkness.
'Obscurity. Umbrage.' Shadiness, 'The state
of being shady; umbrageousness.' Shady. 'Full of
shade; MILDLY gloomy.'
(No light, but rather darkness visible.)
Sevenscore. 'Seven times twenty.' Shadowy.
'Dark, opake.' To yawn. 'To gape, to oscitate,'
Yawn, s. 'Oscitation, Hiatus.' Yea. 'Yes.' Yes,
'A term of affirmation, the affirmative particle opposed
to no.' See also in the same place, Yest. Year.
(12 months) Yesterday, s. The day last past, the next
day before to-day. Yesterday, ad. Yesternight, s.
Yesternight, ad. Yet, con. Yet, ad. Nine times explained.
Vent. 'A small aperture; a hole; a spiracle.'
Wind. 'A flowing wave of air; flatulence; windiness.'
Winker. 'One who winks.' To wink. 'To shut
the eyes.'
(No, Sir, unless you open them again directly.)
Window. 'An aperture in a building by which air
and light are intromitted.' N. B. Almost the whole
of the same page is daubed over with such jargon.
Said. 'Aforesaid.' Scoundrel. 'A mean rascal; a
low petty villain.' Rascal. 'A mean fellow; a
scoundrel.' Villain. 'A wicked wretch.' Wretch.
'A miserable mortal.' No, ad. 'The word of refusal.
2. The word of denial.' No, a. '1. Not any;
NONE. 2. No one; NONE: not any one.' (Had
this word none altered its meaning, before the Doctor
got to the end of the line?) Nobody. (No and body)
'No one; not any one.' (See also Nod, v. a. Nod, s.
Nodder. Noddle. Noddy, &c.) None. '1. Not
one. 2. Not any. 3. Not other.' Nothing. 'Negation
of being; not any thing,' and seventeen other
definitions. Afore. (a and fore) 'before, nearer in
place to any thing.'
'There is a certain line, beyond which, if ridicule
attempts to go, it becomes itself ridiculous, and
there is a sphere of criticism in that particular region,
in which, if the critic plays his batteries on too
contemptible objects, he must unavoidably depart
from his proper dignity, and must himself be an object
of the raillery he would convey[122].'
Music. '1. The science of harmonical sounds. 2. Instrumental,
or vocal harmony.' Harmony. 'Just
proportion of sound.' Melody. 'Music; harmony
of sound.' Tune. 'Tune is a diversity of notes put
together.' Locke, Milton, Dryden. Tenour, s. 'A
sound in music.'
One requires little skill in music to see that the
Doctor knows nothing of that science. He confounds
melody with harmony; the one consisting in a succession
of agreeable sounds, and the other arising from coexisting
sounds. His account of a tune is curious.
And we may say in his own stile, that his dictionary
is 'a diversity of words put together.' His numerous
omissions on this head will neither afflict, nor
surprise us; but we must be mortified and amazed
to reflect on the partial and injurious distribution of
fame. For his book exhibits in every page, perhaps
without a single exception, a variety of errors and
absurdities. They are clear to the darkest ignorance.
They are level to the lowest understanding, and yet
our language is exhausted in praise of their author.
Pronis animis audiendum!
Poem. 'The work of a poet; a metrical composition.'
Poet. 'An inventor; an author of fiction;
a writer of poems; one who writes in measure.'
Poetess. 'A she poet.' Poetry. 'Metrical composition;
the art or practice of writing poems. 2. Poems,
poetical pieces.' To circumscribe poetry by a
DEFINITION will only shew the narrowness of the definer[123].
Tragedy. 'A dramatic representation of a
serious action.' Comedy. 'A dramatic representation
of the lighter faults of mankind.' Eclogue. 'A pastoral
poem, so called, because Virgil called his pastorals
eclogues.' Tragic-comedy. 'A drama compounded
of merry and serious events.' Farce. 'A
dramatic representation written without regularity.'
Elegy. '1. A mournful song. 2. A funeral song. 3.
A short poem, without points or turns.' Idyl. 'A
small short poem.' Epigram. 'A short poem terminating
in a point.' Epic, a. 'Narrative; comprising
narrations, not acted, but rehearsed. It is
usually supposed to be heroic.' Epistle. 'A letter;'
and a letter again is 'an epistle.' Ode. 'A poem
written to be sung to music; a lyric poem.' Ballad.
'A song.' Song. 'A poem to be modulated by
the voice.' Catch. 'A song sung in succession.'
I believe that Dr Johnson has written better verses
than any man now alive in England. He is said to be
the first critic in that country, and therefore we had
the highest reason to expect elegant entertainment and
philosophical instruction, when the poet and critic was
to speak in his own character.
But here, as in the rest of this work, the native
vigour of his mind seems entirely to leave him. We
look around us in vain for the well known hand of
the Rambler, for the sensible and feeling historian of
Savage, the caustic and elegant imitator of Juvenal,
the man of learning, and taste, and genius. The
reader's eye is repelled from the Doctor's pages, by
their hopeless sterility, and their horrid nakedness.
Most of the definitions in this work may be divided
into three classes; the erroneous, œnigmatical, and
superfluous. And of the nineteen last quoted, every
one comes under some, or all of these heads.
A poem is said to be the work of a poet: And so
were Dryden's prefaces. Again it is a metrical composition.
No age had ever a greater profusion of rhimes
than the present. In Oxford there are two thousand
persons all of whom can occasionally make verses. Yet
in this abundance of metrical composition, we have very
few poems.
A poet is—1. 'An inventor,' but so was Tubal Cain.
2. 'An author of fiction,' but so was Des Cartes. 3. 'A
writer of poems;' but as he has not been able to point
out what a poem is, the definition goes for nothing.
4. 'One who writes in measure.' But in Cowley's
life, the Doctor himself speaks of men, who thought
they were writing poetry, when they were only writing
verses. We are still exactly where we set out.
The third definition is superfluous, and the
fourth is very clumsy. The fifth and sixth are
still worse, for comedy[124] is frequently very serious
and tender, as well as tragedy; and that again represents
the lighter faults of mankind, as well as comedy.
By the way, what are these lighter faults,
which our comedy is said to represent. In our comic
scenes, adultery, and profaneness, appear to be the
chief pulse of merriment. What the Doctor says
of a farce is not true, nor is elegy always mournful[125].
What can he mean by a poem without points or turns?
An Idyll is a small short poem. An Epigram is a
short poem; but so is an Epitaph, or a Sonnet, and
often an Ode, a Fable, &c. An Epigram terminates
in a point. Wonderful! Of the rest of these definitions,
the reader will determine whether they be not every
one of them pitiful; and if it was possible for the
Doctor, or any other man, to convey less information,
on so plain a subject.
'In comparing this with other dictionaries of the
same kind, it will be found that the senses of each
word are more copiously enumerated, and more
clearly explained[126].'
Of his clear and copious explanations, here is an additional
specimen.
Beast. 'An animal distinguished from birds, insects,
fishes, and man.' It is also distinguished from
reptiles, though the Doctor cannot tell us how. A
Reptile is (but sometimes only) 'An animal that creeps
upon many feet.' A Snail is 'A slimy animal that
creeps upon plants.' Many animals creep on plants
besides a Snail. He dare not venture to say that a
Snail is a Reptile, for he had said that a Reptile creeps
upon many feet, and a Snail has none. Locke is
quoted to prove that a Bird is a fowl, and we are edified
by hearing that a fowl is a 'bird, or a winged
animal.' But this may be the butterfly, the bat,
or the flying fish. He should have said a feathered animal.
We are informed from Creech and Shakespeare,
that a fish is an animal that inhabits the water.
But besides amphibious animals, from the crocodile
down to the water-mouse, we have seen Erucæ Aquaticæ,
or Water Caterpillars, which are truly aquatic
animals, yet are perfectly different from all fish. Insects
are 'so called from a separation in the middle of
their bodies, whereby they they are cut into two
parts, which are joined together by a small ligature,
as we see in common flies.'
Quere. How many insects answer this description?
Dr. Johnson had certainly no great occasion to quote
Peacham and Swift before he durst tell us, (as he
does) that a Lily is a flower, and Posteriors the hinder
parts. He forgot to introduce the Dean when affirming,
that a T——d is excrement; but both Pope and
Swift (among others) are cited for P—ss and F—t.
His learning and his ignorance amaze us in every
page. Pox are, '1. Pustules; efflorescencies; exanthematous
eruptions. 2. The venereal disease.' A particular
species of it only. The first part of this clear
explanation would puzzle every old woman in England,
though most of them know more of small pox
than the Rambler himself.
Day. '1. The time between the rising and the setting
of the sun, called the artificial day. 2. The
time from noon to noon, called the natural day.'
Natural. 'What is produced by nature,' therefore as
the day from sunrise to sunset is 'produced by nature,'
that, and that only, must be the natural day.
Artificial. 'Made by art, not natural, fictitious, not
genuine.' The day from noon to noon is certainly
not natural, and of consequence, that, and that
only, must be the artificial day.
Night is, '1. The time of darkness. 2. The time
between sunset, and sunrise.' When the Doctor
acquires the first elements of geography, he will learn,
that in no climate of the world is the time between
sunset and sunrise all of it a time of darkness. Even
at the equator, night does not succeed till half an
hour after sunset. If he has ever seen the sun rise
here, he must also have seen that we have always
day light long before the sun appears. In June our
nights are never entirely dark. Neither is night,
when it really comes on, constantly the 'time of
darkness,' for the Doctor may frequently see to
read his own mistakes by moonshine. Of this profound
period, the first part contradicts the second,
and every body sees the absurdity of both. What
are we to think of such a definer of 'scientific terms,'
when his errors have not even the negative merit of
consistency.
Snowbroth, s. (snow and broth) 'very cold liquor.'
And Shakespeare is quoted; but when the poet said[127]
that the blood of an old courtier was as cold as Snowbroth,
he meant melted snow. Now it is somewhat odd
that every body can see Shakespeare's idea exactly, except
this learned commentator. Lion. 'The fiercest
and most magnanimous of four-footed beasts.' But
fierceness cannot consist with magnanimity[128]. Other
animals exceed the Lion in fierceness; and a Horse,
an Elephant, or a Dog, equal his magnanimity. This
definition contains nothing but a glaring contradiction,
of which neither end is true! Thunder 'Thunder is
a most bright flame rising on a sudden, moving with
great violence, and with a very rapid velocity,
through the air, according to any determination,
and commonly ending with a loud noise or rattling.'
Shakespeare. Milton.
It is needless to say that the learned and ingenious
Pensioner has confounded thunder with lightning.
The inelegance and tautology of this definition I pass
by; but why should he profane the names of Milton
and Shakespeare to support such monstrous nonsense?
Stone. 'Stones are bodies insipid, hard, not ductile
or malleable, nor soluble in water.' This definition
answers wood, or glass, or the bones of an animal.
One. 'Less than two; single; denoted by an unit.'
Raleigh.
Without consulting Raleigh, we know that a man
may have 'less than two' guineas in his pocket, and
yet have more than one. But still we are not sure,
that he has even a single farthing. One is single, but
we are only where we started, for single (more Lexiphanico)
is 'one, not double; not more than one.'
The matter is little mended, when he subjoins that
one is that which is expressed by an unit, for this may
be the numerator of any fraction. Take his book to
pieces, put it into the scales of common sense, and see
how it kicks the beam.
A circle is, '1. A line continued till it ends where
it began. 2. The space inclosed in a circular line.
3. A round body, an orb.'
The first of these definitions does not distinguish a
circle from a triangle, or any other plain figure. He
might have found a circle properly defined in Euclid,
and a hundred other books. What are we to think
of the rest of his mathematical definitions? Well, but
he clears up this point, for a circle is 'the space inclosed
in a circular line,' The third definition is no
less erroneous than the second, for if a man were to
mention the circle of the earth, we could not suspect
that he meant the globe itself.
Botany and the electrical fluid, are not inserted.
Electricity he terms a property in bodies. From
this expression, and from all he says on the subject,
we can ascertain his ignorance of that most curious
and important branch of natural philosophy. Electricity
in general signifies 'the operations of a very
subtile fluid, commonly invisible, but sometimes
the object of our sight and other senses. It is one of
the chief agents employed in producing the phænomena
of nature.' Its identity with lightning was
discovered in 1752, three years before the publication
of Dr. Johnson's folio dictionary. For the author then
to talk of it as 'a peculiar property, supposed once
to belong chiefly to amber,' is shameful. It shews
us the depth of his learning, and the degree of attention
which he thought proper to bestow on his
great work.
Elasticity. 'Force in bodies, by which they endeavour
to restore themselves.' To what? To their
former figure, after some external pressure? And
without adding some words like these the definition
conveys no meaning.
Of Water, we get a very long winded account,
which neither Dr. Johnson nor any body else can
comprehend, for he sinks into mere jargon. Canst
thou conceive (gentle reader) what are 'small, smooth,
hard, porous, spherical particles' of water! Water,
says Newton, 'is a fluid tasteless salt, which nature
changes by heat, into vapour, and by cold into
ice, which is a hard fusible brittle stone, and this
stone returns into water by heat[129].' Boerhaave
calls water, 'a kind of glass that melts at a heat any
thing greater than 32 degrees of Farenheit's thermometer.
The boundary between water and ice[130].'
Claw. 'The foot of a beast or bird armed with sharp
nails.' Nail. 'The talons of birds or beasts.' Talon.
'The claw of a bird of prey.' Dict. 4th edit.
Here a nail is talons; Talons are a claw; and
a claw is said to be a foot (alias a nail) armed with
nails. The quotations are literal and complete. The
words are all plain English. And if you cannot
comprehend a nail armed with nails, wait upon Dr.
Johnson, and perhaps he will explain it.
Legion. 'A body of Roman soldiers, consisting of
about five thousand.'
This is not accurate. The number of men in a
Roman legion rose by degrees from about 3200 to
about 7000.
Decemvirate. 'The dignity and office of the ten
governors of Rome.' Tribune. 'An officer of
Rome chosen by the people.' Censor. 'An officer
of Rome, who had the power of correcting manners.'
Consul. 'The chief magistrate in the Roman
republic.'
Wherein did the Decemviri differ from the King,
the Consul, the Dictator, the Triumvir, the Military
Tribune, the Cæsar, and the Emperor, for all these
were likewise 'Governors of Rome?' The Decemviri
were also an inferior set of men appointed to take
care of the Sybil's books, to conduct colonies, &c.
So that this definition is very incompleat. A Tribune
was 'chosen by the people.' But this does not distinguish
him from many other magistrates. The
Censor had 'the power of correcting manners;' but
he had other powers beside that, and every magistrate
had that power as well as he, though it
was a province more peculiarly his. The Censor is
an officer still known in Venice, and in countries
where the liberty and abuse of the press are unknown,
the licensers of books are called Censors,
though the Doctor does not give us these two explanations
of the word. A Consul is 'the chief magistrate
in the Roman republic.' He was a magistrate
long after the republic was dissolved; for Caligula
made his horse a Consul! But tho' the Consul
was commonly one of the chief magistrates in Rome,
he was never the chief, as the Doctor roundly expresses
it, for he had always a colleague. The Censor
was at least his equal, and the Dictator was by law
his superior. What we learn of the Centurion, the
Triumvir, and the Lictor, is very trifling. Innumerable
words which puzzle the plain reader of a Roman
historian are wanting, such as an Ædile, a Prætor, a
Quæstor, a Cæsar, a Military Tribune, the Hastati,
Principes, Triarii, Velites, the Labarum, or Imperial
Standard, the Balistæ, the Balearians, &c. A Maniple
is 'a small band of soldiers.' And a Cohort is
'a troop of soldiers, containing about 500 foot.' A
Cohort was in general the tenth part of the foot in a
Roman Legion, consequently their number varied,
and the Prætorian Cohort, or that to which the standard
was intrusted, contained, at least in latter ages,
many more men than any of the rest. But in the very
page where this concise author thus blunders about
a Cohort, he takes care to tell us, that Coition, is copulation;
the act of generation. That cold is 'not hot,
not warm, chill, having sense of cold, having cold
qualities.' That coldly is 'without heat.' that coldness
is 'want of heat;' and a heap of similar jargon.
Blot. 'A blur.' Blur. 'A blot.'
The Doctor's admirers will answer, that in so large
a work there was no room for full definitions. I reply,
that his account of Whipgrafting, of Will-with-a-Wisp,
of a Wood-louse, and of the Stool of Repentance,
are very full; that if he was to say no
more of a Roman Consul, he should have said nothing
at all; but that there are other books of the same kind,
and of half the price too, which find room for copious
and useful definitions. Pardon's dictionary is not much
less than the Doctor's octavo, though its price is only
six shillings; (7th edition) and of many useful articles,
such as the Roman Legion, there is a very clear
and full explanation. Besides which, it contains a
description of the counties, the cities, and the market
towns in England; and in the end of the book
there is inserted a list of near 7000 proper names,
none of which are to be found in the Doctor's dictionary.
With what then has Dr. Johnson filled his
book? With words of his own coining, with roots,
and authorities often ridiculous, and always useless;
or with definitions impertinent and erroneous. A
Bashaw he calls 'the viceroy of a province;' and he
might as well have said that every man in England is
six feet high. A Condoler is 'one who compliments
another upon his misfortunes.'
From the Rambler's accurate and profound knowledge
of anatomy, we must form very high expectations
as to his knowledge of medicine, and we are
not disappointed; for Arthritis is 'the Gout' and
the Gout is 'Arthritis; a periodical disease attended
with great pain.' The first part of this definition
is not true; and the second will not distinguish the
Gout from the Gravel, the Tooth-ach, &c. &c. Gravel
is 'sandy matter concreted in the kidneys,' and
as often in the bladder too. His account of a Gonnorhœa
is no less incomplete. A Headach is 'a pain
in the head.' Jaundice is 'a distemper from obstructions
of the glands of the liver, which prevent
the gall being duly separated from the blood.' The
Doctor seems to have borrowed his system of anatomy
from the antients; for the moderns have discovered
that the liver (which he ingeniously calls 'one
of the entrails') is itself an indivisible gland. The
Jaundice arises from an obstruction in the biliary ducts.
Tympany is 'a kind of obstructed flatulence, that
swells the body like a drum.' Flatulence is not inserted;
but Flatulency is said to be 'windiness; fulness
of wind.' And what does he mean by an obstructed
fullness of wind, or by his elegant simile of
a drum? His descriptions of the Rickets, Rupture,
Rheumatism, Scrophula, Dropsy, Scurvy, &c. are
equally perspicuous and perfect. The Doctor had no
great occasion to attest, that 'the English dictionary
was written with little assistance of the learned[131].'
For in almost every department of learning, from astronomy
down to the first principles of grammar, his
ignorance seems amazing. His book is a mass of
words without ideas. Through the whole there runs
a radical corruption of truth and common sense. It
is most astonishing that the Idler has hardly ever been
attacked in this quarter by any of his innumerable invidious
and inveterate enemies.
I anticipate the answer of his admirers, viz. That
'the nature of his work did not admit of a copious explanation
for every word.' But let them first tell why
he gave such a strange jumble of quotations, to support
a word of which he himself knows not the meaning,
and are we to be told that the nature of any work
whatever, can entitle its author to write nonsense, or
to write on a subject of which he knows nothing.
Indeed the Doctor himself has repeatedly declared,
that his book is deformed by a profusion of errors,
and those who decline to credit my assertion, ought,
PERHAPS, to credit his own. He says, 'I cannot
hope, in the warmest moments to preserve so much
caution through so long a work, as not OFTEN to
sink into negligence, or to obtain so much knowledge
of all its parts as not FREQUENTLY to fail by ignorance.
I expect that sometimes the desire of accuracy
will urge me to superfluities, and sometimes
the fear of prolixity betray me to omissions; that in
the extent of such variety, I shall be OFTEN bewildered,
and in the mazes of such intricacy[132], be frequently
entangled, &c.[133]' Here is a beautiful confession,
which he afterwards recants: for 'despondency
has never so far prevailed, as to depress me
to negligence,' &c.[134] But his recantation is in effect
immediately re-recanted, and we are informed, 'That
a few wild blunders, and RISIBLE absurdities, from
which no work of such multiplicity was ever free,
may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden
ignorance into contempt[135].' That this distrust
of his own merit did not arise from want of pride or
vanity we discover within a few lines: For 'in this
work' (the English dictionary, as its author modestly
terms it) 'when it shall be found that much is
omitted, let it not be forgotten that much likewise is
performed. If our language is not here fully displayed,
I have only failed in an attempt, which no human
powers have hitherto completed.—I may surely
be contented without the praise of perfection,
which if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude'
(London, or its neighbourhood) 'what would it avail
me[136]?' And again, 'I have devoted this book, the
labour of years, to the honour of my country[137].'
Item. 'I cannot but have some degree of parental
fondness.' But after all this parental fondness, this
zeal for the honour of his country, the Doctor's extraordinary
preface concludes in perhaps the most
extraordinary language that ever flowed from an author's
pen. 'Success and miscarriage are empty sounds,
I therefore dismiss it' (his dictionary) 'with frigid
tranquillity, having little to fear or hope from censure,
or from praise.' All this is surely despicable.
The booksellers had paid their workman on the nail,
or the Doctor would have had something to hope and
fear. But an honest and sensible tradesman, though
paid before-hand, will always wish and endeavour to
please his employers. From this writer's own words,
it would appear that he is incapable of a sentiment so
generous.
Bawd 'A Procurer, or Procuress.' To bawd, v.
n. 'To procure.' Bawdily (from bawdy) 'obscenely.'
Bawdiness (from bawdy) 'obsceneness.' Bawdry,
s. '1. A wicked practise of procuring and bringing
whores and rogues together. 2. Obscenity.'
Bawdy, a. (from bawdy) 'Obscene, unchaste.' Bawdyhouse.
'A house where traffic is made by wickedness
and debauchery.' Baggage. 'A worthless woman.'
Bitch. '1. The female of the canine kind.
2. A name of reproach for a woman.' Blackguard[138].
'A dirty fellow.' Block. 'A Blockhead.' Blockhead.
'A stupid fellow; a dolt; a man without
parts,' Blunderer. 'A blockhead.' Blockhead 'A
stupid fellow' Bloodletter. 'A Phlebotomist.' Suds.
'A Lixivium of soap and water.' Sun. 'The luminary
that makes the day.'
The English dictionary is prodigiously defective—Nervi
desunt. It has no force of thought. This wilderness
of words displays a mind, patient, but almost
incapable of reasoning; ignorant, but oppressed by
a load of frivolous ideas; proud of its own powers,
but languishing in the last stage of hopeless debility.
We have long extolled it with the wildest luxuriance
of adulation, and we pretend to despise the worshippers
of the golden calf.
No man has done more honour to England, than
Mr Locke. What would he have said or thought,
had Dr Johnson's dictionary been published in his
days? We can easily determine his opinion from several
passages in his works. I select the following,
because it is both short and decisive; and he who
feels any respect for Mr Locke will retain little for
the author of the Rambler. His words are these: 'If
any one asks what this solidity is[139], I send him to
his senses to inform him. Let him put a flint, or
a football between his hands, and then endeavour
to join them and he will know. If he thinks this not
a sufficient explication of solidity, what it is, and
wherein it consists, I promise to tell him, what it
is, and wherein it consists, when he tells me, what
thinking is, or wherein it consists, or explains to me
what extension or motion is, which perhaps seems much
easier. The simple ideas we have are such as experience
teaches them us; but if, beyond that, we endeavour
by words to make them clearer in the mind, we
shall succeed no better, than if we went about to
clear up the darkness of a blind man's mind by
talking, and discourse into him the ideas of light
and colours[140].'
In the title page of his octavo, we learn, that 'the
words are deduced from their originals.' And in
the preface, he adds, that 'the etymologies and derivations,
whether from foreign languages or native
roots, are more diligently traced, and more
distinctly noted, than in other dictionaries of the
same kind.' Mr Whitaker assures us that in this
single article the Doctor has committed upwards of
three thousand errors: And the historical pioneer produces
abundant evidence in support of his assertion[141].
But independent of this curious circumstance, let us
ask the Doctor what he means by crouding such trifles
into an abstract, which is, he says, intended for
those who are 'to gain degrees of knowledge suitable
to lower characters, or necessary to the common
business of life.' To tell such people, that the word
porridgepot is compounded of porridge, and pot, is to
insult their understandings; and of his Greek and
Saxon roots, not one individual in a thousand can
read even a single letter. The preface commences with
a pitiful untruth. Having mentioned the publication
of his folio dictionary, he subjoins, 'it has since
been considered that works of that kind are by no
means necessary for the bulk of readers.' Here he
would insinuate that the abstract was an after-thought:
But every body sees, that its publication was delayed,
only to accelerate the sale of his folio dictionary.
There is not room now left, to dissect every sentence
in the preface to his octavo. I shall therefore conclude
that subject with one particular, wherein the Doctor's
taste, learning, and genius, blaze in their meridian.
In the title page to his octavo dictionary, we are informed,
that the words are 'authorised by the names
of the writers in whose works they are found.' And
this tale is repeated at greater length in the preface,
where 'it will be found that truth requires him to
say less[142]': For under letter A only, there are between
four and five hundred words, for which the
Idler has not assigned any authority—and of these one
hundred and eighty are to be found in no language
under heaven. He boasts indeed that his dictionary
'contains many words not to be found in any other.'
But it also contains many words, not to be found at
all in any other book. If we compute that letter A
has a thirteenth part of these recruits, we shall find
that the whole number scattered through his compilation
exceeds two thousand. A purchaser of his abstract
has a title to ask the Doctor, why the work is
loaded with such a profusion of trash, which serves only
to testify the folly of him who collected or created
it. Men of eminent learning have been consulted,
who disown all acquaintance (in English) with most
articles in the following list:
Abacus, Abandonement, Abarticulation, Abcedarian,
Abcedary, Aberrant, Aberuncate, Abject, v. a.
Ablactate, Ablactation, Ablation, Ablegate, Ablegation,
Ablepsy, Abluent, Abrasion, Abscissa, Absinthiated,
Abitention, Absterge, Accessariness, Accidentalness,
Accipient, Acclivious, Accolent, Accompanable,
Accroach, Accustomarily, Acroamatical, Acronycal,
Acroters, or Acroteria, Acuate, Aculerate,
Addulce, Addenography, Ademption, Adiaphory,
Adjectitious, Adition, Abstergent, Acceptilation, Adjugate,
Adjument, Adjunction, Adjunctive, Adjutor,
Adjutory, Adjuvant, Adjuvate, Admensuration,
Adminicle, Adminicular, Admix, Admonishment,
Admurmuration, Adscititious, Adstriction, Advesperate,
Adulator, Adulterant, Adulterine, Adumbrant,
Advolation, Advolution, Adustible, Aerology, Aeromancy,
Aerometry, Aeroscopy, Affabrous, Affectuous,
Affixion, Afflation, Afflatus, Agglomerate,
Agnation, Agnition, Agreeingness, Alate, Abb, Alegar,
Alligate, Alligation, Allocution, Amalgmate,
Amandation, Ambidexterity, Ambilogy, Ambiloquous,
Ambry, Ambustion, Amende, Amercer, Amethodical,
Amphibological, Amphibologically, Amphisch,
Amplificate, Amygdalate, Amygdaline, Anacamptick,
Anacampticks, Anaclacticks, Anadiplosis, Anagogetical,
Anagrammatize, Anamorphosis, Anaphora, Anastomosis,
Anastrope, Anathematical, Androgynal,
Androgynally, Androgynus, Anemography, Anemometer,
Anfractuousness, Angelicalness, Angiomonospermous,
Angularity, Angularness, Anhelation, Aniented,
Anileness, Anility, Animative, Annumerate,
Annumeration, Annunciate, Anomalously, Ansated,
Antaphroditick, Antapoplectick, Antarthritick,
Antasthmatick, Anteact, Auscultation, Antemundane,
Antepenult, Antepredicament, Anthology,
Anthroposophy, Anthypnotick, Antichristianity, Auxiliation,
Antinephritick, Antinomy, Antiquatedness,
Apert, Apertly, Aphilanthrophy, Aphrodisiacal, Aphrodosiack,
Apocope, Apocryphalness, Apomecometry,
Appellatory, Apsis, Aptate, Aptote, Aqua, Aquatile,
Aqueousness, Aquose, Aquosity, Araignee,
Aratory, Arbuscle, Archchanter, Archaiology, Archailogick,
Archeus, Arcuation, Arenose, Arenulous,
Argil, Argillaceous, Argute, Arietate, Aristocraticallness,
Armental, Armentine, Armigerous,
Armillary, Armipotence, Arrentation, Arreptitious,
Arrison, Authentickness, Arrosion, Articular, Articulateness,
Austral, Arundinaceous, Arundineous,
Asbestine, Ascriptitious, Asinary, Asperation, Asperifolious,
Aspirate, v. a. Assassinator, Assumptive, Astonishingness,
Astrography, Attiguous, Attinge, Aucupation,
Avowee.
Of these words about forty only are proper, yet
though they are so, and though they are frequently
to be found in the best authors, yet the Doctor has not
given any authority for them. His reading therefore
must have been very circumscribed, or his negligence
very great. Is the word Avowee, for instance, one of
those which 'are however, to be yet considered as
resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries[143].'
Besides these forty, there are under letter A, some
hundreds of the most common words, for which no
author's name is quoted. A gross omission according
to the plan which he lays down.
Let us put the case, that a foreigner sits down to
compose a page of English, by the help of Dr Johnson's
work. The strange combinations of letters (for I dare
not call them words) which swell his book to
its present bloated size, are not marked with an asterisk,
to distinguish them as barbarous: The novice
would therefore adopt a stile unknown to any native
of England. Here is a short specimen of what he
would say.
'An Admurmuration has long wandered about the
world, that the pensioner's political principles are
anfractuous. Their anfractuousness, their insipience,
and their turpitude, are no longer amphibological.
His nefarious repercussion of obloquy must contaminate,
and obumbrate, and who can tell but it may even
aberuncate his feculent and excrementitious celebrity.
His perspicacity will see without comity, or hilarity,
that his character as an author and a gentleman, requires
resuscitation, for it is neither immane nor immarcessible.
This is a homogeneous truth[144]. Let him
distend, like the flaccid sides of a football[145], his sal,
his sapience, and his powers of ratiocination. The
mellifluous and numerose cadence of equiponderant periods
cannot ensure him from a luxation, a laceration,
and a resiliency of his adminicular concatenation with
the rugged mercantile race[146]. The loss of this adscititious
adminicle would make the sage's impeccable,
but lugubrious bosom vibrate with the horrors of
dilution and dereliction. His organs of vision would
gush with salsamentarious torrents of spherical particles,
of equal diameters, and of equal specific gravities,
as Dr Cheyne observes—their smoothness—their
sphericity—their frictions, and their hardness,'[147]
&c.
To the last edition (the 4th) of the folio dictionary,
there is prefixed an advertisement, from which I have
extracted a few lines: 'Finding my dictionary about
to be reprinted, I have endeavoured by a revisal to
make it less reprehensible. I will not deny that I
found many parts requiring emendation, and many
more capable of improvement. Many faults I have corrected,
some superfluities I have taken away, and
some deficiencies I have supplied. I have methodised
some parts that were disordered, and illuminated
some that were obscure. Yet the changes or additions
bear a very small proportion to the whole.'
That his improvements, bear a very small proportion
to the quantity of errors still in his book is true, for
after a long and painful search, I have only been able
to trace out ONE alteration. The word Gazetteer is now
defined without that insolent scurrility formerly quoted.
But in this correct edition, thunder continues
to be a most bright flame. Whig is still the name of a
faction; and a Tory is said to be an adherent to the
antient constitution of England. Oats, Excise, Monarch,
&c. are all in the same stile. Nowise, n. s.
'(no and wise: this is commonly spoken and written
by IGNORANT BARBARIANS, noways). Not in any
manner, or degree.' Theorem, n. s. 'A position
laid down as an acknowledged truth.'
Here a schoolboy can detect the Doctor's ignorance,
for every body knows that this word has the opposite
meaning, which is indeed evident from the quotations
that are intended to exemplify it.
'Having found this the head theorem of all their
discourses, we hold it necessary that the proofs thereof
be weighed.' Hooker. 'Here are three theorems, that
from thence we may draw some conclusions[148].' Dryden.
No words can paint the Doctor's want of attention.
To piss, v. n. (pisser Fr. pissen Dutch) 'To make
water. I charge the pissing conduit run nothing
but claret. Shakespeare. One ass pisses, the rest piss
for company. L'Estrange. The wanton boys piss
upon your grave. Dryden.' Whoredom, n. s. (from
whore) 'Fornication. Some let go whoredom as an
indifferent matter. Hale.' Whorish, a. (from
whore) 'Unchaste, incontinent. By means of a
whorish woman a man is brought to a piece of
bread. Proverbs. I had as lief you should tell me
of a mess of porridge[149].'
The reader has seen what a profusion of low, and
even blackguard expressions are to be met with in
the Doctor's celebrated work. I shall now give an
additional specimen of his great work; and if, like
some American savages, we cannot count our fingers,
Dr Johnson himself will teach us how to do it; for he
tells us, on Shakespeare's authority, that two is, 'one and
one,' Pope and Creech are quoted to prove, that
three is, 'two and one.' Four is, 'two and two;'
and, if you have the least doubt that 'four and one'
make five, or that five is, 'the half of ten,' you will
be silenced by the name of Dryden. Six is, 'twice
three, one more than five.' Seven is, 'four and
three, one more than six.' Eight is, 'twice four,
a word of number.' Nine is, 'one more than
eight.' Ninth is, 'that which precedes the tenth.'
Ten is, 'the decimal number, twice five.' Tenth is,
'first after the ninth, the ordinal of ten.' Eleven is,
'ten and one.' Eleventh is, 'the next in order to
the tenth, and is derived from eleven.' Twelve is,
'two and ten;' and twelfth, 'second after the tenth,
the ordinal of twelve.' Thirteen is, 'ten and three.'
Fourteen is, 'four and ten.' Fifteen is, 'five and
ten.' Fifteen, 'the ordinal of fifteen, the fifth
after the tenth;' and, if you entertain any suspicion
as to the verity of these definitions, read over
Boyle, Brown, Dryden, Moses, Raleigh, Sandys,
Shakespeare, and Bacon. Thirdly is, in the 'third
place.' Thrice, 'three times,' threefold, 'thrice
repeated, consisting of three.' Threepence, (three
and pence) 'a small silver coin, valued at thrice a
penny.' Threescore, a. (three and score) 'thrice
twenty, sixty.' Pope, Raleigh, Wiseman, Shakespeare,
Brown, Dryden, and Spencer, are cited to
convince you, that these explanations are accurate.
And the other articles of numeration, with all their
derivations, definitions, and the passages which are
quoted to support them, would fill a sixpenny pamphlet.
And this is one recipe for making a book
worth four guineas!
A farthing is, 'the fourth part of a penny, and a
penny is, a small coin[150], of which twelve make a
shilling.' A shilling is 'now twelve pence.' A
Pound is, 'the sum of twenty shillings;' and, if thou
hast forgot the worth of a Guinea, know that it is 'a
gold coin, valued at one and twenty shillings;' for
Dryden, Locke, and Cocker, have said all this. A
Punk is, 'a whore, a common prostitute;' and a
Puppy is, 'a whelp, the progeny of a bitch, a name
of contemptuous reproach to a man.' To Mew is,
'to cry as a cat.' To Kaw is, 'to cry as a Raven,
Crow, or Rook; and the cry of a Raven or Crow
(and he might have added, of a Jack Daw too) is
kaw.'
'There are men (says Dr Johnson) who claim the
name of authors, merely to disgrace it, and fill the
world with volumes, only to bury letters in their
own rubbish. The traveller who tells, in a pompous
Folio, that he saw the Pantheon at Rome, and
the Medicean Venus at Florence; the natural historian,
who, describing the productions of a narrow island,
recounts all that it has in common with every other
part of the world; the collector of antiquities, that
accounts every thing a curiosity, which the ruins
of Herculaneum happen to emit, though an instrument
already shown in a thousand repositories, or a
cup common to the antients, the moderns, and all
mankind, may be justly censured as the persecutors
of students, and the thieves of that time, which never
can be restored[151].'
The traveller who visits Rome and Florence, and
gives an account of what he saw to the world, without
describing the Pantheon and the Medicean Venus,
will, very properly, be censured as an ignorant
and tasteless wanderer. The historian who describes
an island, whether wide or narrow, ought to begin
by telling if it produces water, grass, wood, and corn.
A sword, a bow, and a dagger, are common to the
antients, the moderns, and almost all mankind; yet,
if any Roman military weapon were discovered in the
ruins of Herculaneum, it would deservedly be the
object of curiosity, and a collector of antiquities might
describe it without being censured, in Dr Johnson's
polite style, as a thief of time. Of this passage, however,
the leading idea is just; and, had the Doctor
been able to express himself with precision, it would
have served, in an admirable manner, to delineate the
character of the author of those passages which we
have just now been reading from his Dictionary.
A Puppy is said to be, 'the progeny of a bitch,'
but so is the bitch herself. Repleviable is, 'what
may be replevined.' Repair is, 'reparation;' and
reparation is, 'the act of repairing.' A Republican
is, 'one who thinks a commonwealth, without monarchy,
the best government.' But this is only
half a definition; for every subject of a republic, is a
republican, whether he think it the best government
or not. Republican, a. (from republic) is, 'placing
the government in the people.' Is Venice under
the government of the people? It is curious enough
to hear such an author as Ben Johnson cited to prove
what a republic is. The reader will compute what
title the Doctor has to the character given him by a late
writer, viz. that 'his great learning and genius render
him one of the most shining ornaments of the
present age.' A Looking-glass is, 'a glass which
shews forms reflected;' but so will a common glass
bottle; though we never term it a looking-glass. He
says it is compounded of look and glass; but, if the
reader happens to think it is derived from looking and
glass, the Doctor cannot confute him. A knave is,
'a petty rascal, a scoundrel.' A Loon is, 'a sorry
fellow, a scoundrel.' A Looby is, 'a lubber, a clumsy
clown.' A Lubber is, 'a sturdy drone, an idle,
fat, bulky losel, a booby.' A Losel is, 'a scoundrel,
a sorry worthless fellow.' A Lubbard is, 'a lazy
sturdy fellow.' A Booby is—but you must know
what it is, while you read, in these elegant definitions,
the taste and genius of Dr Johnson. He says,
that Bone is, 'the solid parts of the body of an animal.'
Are not the fat and the muscles also solid? A
Volume is, 'something rolled or convolved;' and so
is a barrel, a foot-ball, and a blanket. But a volume
is likewise 'as much as seems convolved at once;' an
expression hardly intelligible; and it is a book. A
Book, we are told, is, 'a volume, in which we read
or write;' and whether we read and write in it or
not.
'V has two powers expressed in English by two
characters, v, consonant, and u, vowel.' One would
think these were two different letters, as much as any
others in the alphabet. The same remark applies
to letters I and J, which the Doctor has blended. It
is remarkable that this English Dictionary begins with
a Latin word; and the Doctor has inserted it without
giving an authority.
A Ketch is, 'a heavy ship;' and a Junk is, 'a small
ship of China.' A Sloop is, 'a small ship;' and a
Brigantine is, 'a light vessel;' but, it would have required
little learning or ingenuity to have said, that,
in our marine, a sloop has only one mast, except sloops
of war, which have three; and, that a brigantine is a
merchant ship with two. A brig, a lugger, a hooker,
a schooner, a galliot, a galleon, a proa, a punt, a xebeque,
and a snow, are not inserted in this compleat
English Dictionary; but a Cutter is, 'a nimble boat
that cuts the water.' Did we ever hear of a boat
that did not cut the water? This explanation, like
that of at least twenty thousand others, is defective;
because, besides a man of war's boat, the word Cutter
is applied to a small vessel with one mast, rigged
as a sloop, that sails very near the wind; from which
peculiarity, its appellation is derived.
A Cannon is, 'a gun larger than can be managed by
the hand.' Cannon-ball and Cannon shot are, 'the
balls which are shot from great guns.' Mr Locke
is cited to shew, that cannot is compounded of can
and not. Menstruous is, 'having the catamenia;'
and this last word is wanting, a frequent mode of
definition in this book. The Eye is, 'the organ of
vision.' Eye-drop, (eye and drop) 'tear.' See also
Eye-ball, Eye-brow, Eye-glance, Eye-glass, Eyeless,
Eye-lid, Eye-sight, Eye-sore, Eye-tooth, Eye-wink,
Eye-witness. Eye-string is, 'the string of the eye[152].'
The following names are cited to support the explanations:
Dryden, Spencer, Newton, Milton, Garth,
Bacon, Samuel, Peter, and Shakespeare four times.
The man who can make such a pedantic parade of erudition,
must be a mere quack in the business of
book-building; and the reader who thinks himself edified
by hearing, that an eye-wink is, 'a wink as a
hint or token,' must be an object of pity. But there
is no such reader. Quere. Do we never wink but as
a hint or token? Achor is, 'a species of the Herpes;'
and Hey, 'an expression of joy.' A Mocker is,'one
who mocks;' and a Laughing-stock, (laugh and
stock) a 'butt, an object of ridicule.' Iron, a. is,
'made of iron;' and Iron, s. is said to be, 'a metal
common to all parts of the world;' which is not
the fact.
Numskull, s. (numb and skull) 'a Dullard; a dunce;
a dolt; a blockhead.' Numskulled, a. (from Numskull)
'dull; stupid; doltish.' Nun, s. 'a woman
dedicated to the severer duties of religion, secluded
in a cloister from the world.' The Nuns of London
were not employed in the severer duties of religion,
which has nothing to do with severity. The
institution of nunneries is the most atrocious insult
upon human feelings, that ever disgraced the selfish and
brutal policy of the Roman priesthood, and its consequences
are the most shocking and criminal. The man
who would palliate such an outrage on Christianity,
deserves no quarter[153]. From this sample of his good
sense and piety, one would hardly rank the Rambler
above 'a domestic animal, that catches mice.'
Jack is, '1. The diminutive of John. 2. The name
of instruments, which supply the place of a boy, as
an instrument to pull off boots.' Bronchocele, s. 'a
tumor of that part of the aspera tertia, called the
Bronchos,' and this last word is wanting. Broom
is 'a shrub;' and Brogue 'a kind of shoe.' See also
Broomstaff, Broomy, Broth, Brothel, and Brothelhouse.
Bubo, 'the groin from the bending of the
thigh to the scrotum;' but the scrotum is not explained.
Snot. 'The mucus of the nose.' Nose. 'The prominence
on the face, which is the organ of scent,
and the emunctory of the brain.'
He should have said the organ of smell, for we do
not say the sense of scenting. But from what he says
of them, it appears that he is ignorant of the distinction
between these two words. If the nose were the
emunctory of the brain (which every surgeon's apprentice
knows that it is not), in that case snot could
not be the mucus of the nose, but the mucus of the
brain. It belongs to neither. It is entirely, or principally
formed in the glands of the throat, as we see
every day in coughing. To contradict such inconsistencies,
would be below the dignity of any writer, if
they were found in a book less famous than the English
Dictionary.
Rust. 'The red Desquamation of old iron.' Desquamation.
'The act of scaling foul bones.' Sinew.
'1. A tendon; the ligaments by which the joints are
moved. 2. Muscle or nerve!' Other metals rust as
well as iron, and rust is not always red; that of copper
for instance is blue or green. It is not quite clear
why the word Desquamation is introduced. But his
account of sinew exceeds every thing of the kind.
Highflier. 'One that carries his opinion to extravagance.'
The word relates to a particular set of men
in this country, and to them only. A Dervise, a
Friar, and a Bramin, profess extravagant opinions;
but an English writer would not call them Highfliers,
nor would he be understood if he did.
Chervill. 'An umbelliferous plant.' Periwig. 'Adscititious
hair.' Chemist, and Chemistry are omitted,
but Chymistry is, 'philosophy by FIRE;' and
Chymist, 'a philosopher by FIRE!' With what inexpressible
contempt would the youngest of Dr Black's
audience hear these definitions? The folly of the
man, who can scribble such jargon is eclipsed by the
superlative ignorance of those who vindicate and admire
him. Dr Johnson asserts, that Shakespeare 'has
corrupted language by every mode of depravation[154].'
The remark applies to himself. And his advocates must
allow, that 'they endure in him what they should
in another loath and despise[155].' Indeed I can very
well believe the Doctor, when he says, that his book
was composed while he was in a state of Distraction[156].
For the honour of his veracity, we may hope,
that he was likewise distracted when he observed of
the social, facetious, and celebrated John Wilkes,
Esq; that 'Lampoon would disdain to speak ill of
him, of whom no man speaks well[157].'
Part of his book has merit; but take it altogether,
and perhaps it is the strangest farrago which pedantry
ever produced. It will be said that these are partial specimens,
but we have traced him through various ramifications
of learning, and found his ignorance extreme.
A sensible reader will try his own abilities, in judging
of the Doctor's great performance. Nor will he throw
down this pamphlet without a candid perusal, because,
by some unaccountable infatuation, the dictionary
has for twenty seven years been admired
by thousands and ten thousands, who have never seen
it. Let us exert that courage of thought, and that
contempt of quackery, which to feel, and to display,
is the privilege and the pride of a Briton. In a country
where no man fears his king, can any man fear
the sound of a celebrated name, or crouch behind the
the banner of Dullness, because it is born by Samuel
Johnson, A. M. & LL.D.?
I shall now take leave of this enormous compilation,
and return, for a few pages, to the rest of his works.
Speaking of Pope's edition of Shakespeare, Dr
Johnson observes, 'That on this undertaking, to
which Pope was induced by a reward of two hundred
and seventeen pounds, twelve shillings, he
seems never to have reflected afterwards without vexation[158].'
The Doctor ought never to reflect 'without
vexation' on his own edition of Shakespeare.
He published his proposals in 1756, but the work itself
did not appear till 1768, and then, though the
world was warmly prejudiced in his favour, and tho'
he had plundered every thing which he thought valuable,
from all his predecessors, yet his performance
was received with general disregard. His preface was
the particular butt of censure; his deficiencies were
detected 'with all the insolence of victory;' and the
public were, for once, inclined to say of him, what
he says of Mr Theobald, viz. that he was 'a man of
heavy diligence, with very slender powers[159].'
Indeed the Doctor persecutes the name of Theobald
with the most rancorous spirit of revenge. In
his proposals for printing Shakespeare, he tells us,
'that Mr Theobald, if fame be just to his memory,
considered his learning only as an instrument of
gain, and made no farther enquiry after his authour's
meaning, when once he had notes sufficient
to embellish his page with the expected decorations.'
If Theobald was poor, he was certainly prudent in
considering his learning as an instrument of gain.
In this point, he has been exactly copied by no less a
personage than Dr Johnson himself. But the Doctor
has not ventured to say that Theobald was a venal
prostituted dabbler in politics; that he insulted his
King, till he received a pension; and that when he had
received his pension, he insulted his country. No.
'The old books, the cold pedantry, and sluggish
pertinacity of Theobald,' never excited the serious
contempt or indignation of mankind. Dr Johnson
asserts, 'That when Theobald published Shakespeare
in opposition to Pope, the best notes were supplied
by Warburton[160].' This is an assertion without a
proof, and merits no regard; for his veracity keeps
pace with his candour.
The admirers of Pope will be sensible of the good
nature and honesty of Dr Johnson, from the following
unqualified assertion: 'The great object of his
(Pope's) ridicule is poverty; the crimes with which
he reproaches his antagonists are their debts, their
habitation in the mint, and their want of a dinner.
He seems to be of an opinion, not very uncommon
in the world, that to want money is to want every
thing[161].' The crimes with which Pope reproaches
the Duncenian heroes are slander and forgery[162], most
of them were not only bad writers, but bad men;
and it is only in the latter point of view, that the poet
considered them as fair objects of ridicule. Had Pope
been capable of insulting honest indigence, his reputation
and his glory must have been for ever blasted.
The humanity of Englishmen would have rejected,
with horror, such impious wit. The last part of this
malicious paragraph is, after a few pages, contradicted
by Dr Johnson himself. Had Pope been of opinion,
that to want money is to want every thing, he
would not have assisted Dodsley 'with a hundred
pounds that he might open a shop—of the subscription
of forty pounds a-year that he raised for Savage,
TWENTY were paid by himself. He was accused
of loving money, but his love was eagerness
to gain, not solicitude to keep it. In the duties of
friendship, he was zealous and constant. It does not
appear that he lost a single friend by coldness, or by
injury; those who loved him once, continued their
kindness[163].' This cannot be the picture of a man
who insulted innocent misery.
The Doctor is perpetually giving us strokes of his
own character. Thus, of Mr Thomson we are informed,
'that he was "more fat than bard beseems,"
of a dull countenance, and a gross, unanimated, uninviting
appearance.' This is the Rambler's portrait,
but when applied to the author of the Seasons,
it is not true, for Mr Murdoch assures us, 'that his
worst appearance was, when you saw him walking
alone, in a thoughtful mood; but let a friend accost
him, and enter into conversation, he would
instantly brighten into a most amiable aspect, his features
no longer the same, and his eye darting a peculiar
animated fire. His looks always announced,
and half expressed what he was about to say[164].'
The Doctor fills up several pages with blotted variations
from Pope's manuscript translation of the Iliad.
He exults in this precious production, and foresees
that the wisest of his readers will wish for more.
Having perused a few lines of it only, I cannot pretend
to rate the value of this commodity: But a
plain reader will be apt to suspect that the Doctor has
on this, as on former occasions, adopted the prudent
proverb, multum scribere, multum solvere. If Lexiphanes
overflows with Greek, he may, by comparing Pope
with Homer, afford much entertainment.
'Wives and husbands are, indeed, incessantly complaining
of each other[165].'—Not unless both are fools,
nor always then. For the credit of its author, I suppress
the sequel of this unhappy period.
Dr Johnson observes, that Mr Addison, 'by a serious
display of the beauties of Chevy Chace, exposed
himself to the ridicule of Wagstaff.—In Chevy
Chace there is not much of either bombast or affectation,
but there is chill and lifeless imbecility.
The story cannot possibly be told in a manner that
shall make less impression on the mind[166].' This is a
most scandalous criticism; no man who ever heard
the ballad, will hear it with patience. The Doctor's
pious intention seems to have been to lessen the reputation
of Addison. Let him who falsifies without
shame, be chastised without mercy[167].
Though Dr Johnson long acted as Reviewer of
books for the Gentleman's Magazine, and though he
often exercised his pen in that capacity with the most
grovelling insolence, yet he cannot speak with patience
of his rivals in that branch of trade. 'We have now,'
says he, 'among other disturbers of human quiet, a
numerous body of Reviewers and Remarkers[168].'
He is angry with Lord Lyttleton, for having once condescended
to correspond with the Critical Reviewers.
He observes, that the Critical Reviewers, 'can satisfy
their hunger only by devouring their brethren.
I am far from imagining that they are naturally
more ravenous or blood-thirsty,
than those on whom they fall with so much violence and fury; but they
are hungry, and hunger must be satisfied; and these
Savages, when their bellies are full, will fawn on
those whom they now bite[169].' They have lately[170]
celebrated the Doctor's great candour, of which this
passage is the best evidence that 'will easily be found.'
I finish this essay by reciting the circumstance which
gave it birth.
In 1778, Mr William Shaw published an Analysis
of the Gaelic language. He quoted specimens of Gaelic
poetry, and harangued on its beauties, with the
aukward elocution of one who did not understand
them. A few months ago, he printed a pamphlet.
He traduced decent characters. He denied the existence
of Gaelic poetry, and his name was echoed in
the newspapers as a miracle of candour. Is there in
the annals of Grubæan impudence any parallel to
this? Is there any nation in the world except one,
perpetually deluded by a succession of impostors? Are
these the blessed fruits of that freedom which patriots
perish to defend? If there be no pillory, no whipping
post for such accumulated guilt, we may truly say
with Shakespeare, that 'Liberty plucks Justice by the
nose.' This incomparable bookbuilder, who writes
a dictionary before he can write grammar, had previously
boasted what a harvest he would reap from
English credulity. He was not deceived. The bait
was caught; and the voice of truth was for some time
drowned in the clamours of the rabble. Mr Shaw
wants only money. He thinks only how to get it,
and with a courage that is respectable, avowed his intentions.
But better things might have been expected
from the moral and majestic author of the Rambler.
He must have seen the Analysis of the Gaelic
language, for Shaw mentions him as the patron of that
work. He must have seen the specimens of Celtic
poetry there inserted. That he is likewise the patron
of this poor scribble, no man, I suppose, will offer
to deny. From this single circumstance, Dr Johnson
stands convicted of an illiberal intention to deceive.
Candour can hardly hesitate to sum up his character
in the vulgar but expressive pollysyllable.
It will be demanded, why a private individual,
without interest or connections, presumes to interfere
in the quarrels of the learned? But when the
most shameless of mankind, is hired to abuse the characters
of his countrymen, to blast the reputations of
the living and the dead; when such a tool is employed
for such a purpose, that those who are insulted
cannot with propriety stoop to a reply,—Then the
highest degree of goodness may degenerate into the
lowest degree of weakness, silence becomes approbation,
and tenderness and delicacy deserve different
names. He is unfit to be the friend of virtue who
cannot defend her dignity; who dares not execute
her vengeance. In this shameful affair, one circumstance
does honour to Dr Johnson. His friendship is
not exhausted in a compliment. He does not excite expectation
merely to disappoint it. He resembles not
some perfidious wretches, whom his intrepid eloquence
hath so properly pointed out to public indignation.
Exerting the generosity which often ennobles the
character of an Englishman, he engages not his dependant
in a performance for which he scruples to pay.
To glean the tithe of this man's absurdities cannot
be of peculiar consequence to me: But the world is
long since weary of his arrogant pedantry, his officious
malice, his detested assiduity to undermine his superiors,
and overbear his equals. Reformation is never
quite hopeless, and by submitting to make a catalogue
of his errors, there is a chance to humble and
reform him. Perhaps indeed, like 'The drudges of
sedition, HE will hear in sullen silence, HE will feel
conviction without shame, and be confounded, but
not abashed[171].' I have not arrested a few careless
expressions, which, in the glow of composition, will
sometimes escape, but by fair, and copious quotations
from Dr Johnson's ponderous abortions, have attempted
to illustrate his covetous and shameless prolixity;
his corruptions of our language; his very limited
literature; his entire want of general learning;
his antipathy to rival merit; his paralytick reasoning;
his solemn trifling pedantry; his narrow views
of human life; his adherence to contradictions; his
defiance of decency; and his contempt of truth. I
have not been sporting in the mere wantonness of assertion.
I have produced such various, such invincible,
such damning proofs, that the Doctor himself must
feel a burst of conviction. To collect every particle
of inanity which may be found in our patriot's works
is infinitely beyond the limits of an eighteen-pence
pamphlet. I stop at present here, but the subject
seems inexhaustible[172]!