and yet can discern no power more than human, is a problem indeed. Hannah More makes mention of the only atheist (poor Ayrey) she ever knew. "He was an honest, good-natured man, (this supports our theory,) which certainly," she observes, "he should not have been on his principles." Yet he was not without a belief. "He was a fatalist, and if he snuffed the candle, or stirred the fire, or took snuff, he solemnly protested he was compelled to do it." What made him believe in this necessity of things? must be our question. She adds, "He always confessed he was a coward, and had a natural fear of pain and death, though he knew he should be as if he never had been.” This was, indeed, in him, cowardly and irrational, and quite opposed in principle to the fear of death which a Christian may entertain; and which Dr. Johnson, himself, did with reason hold. However, all was well with Johnson at the last. "God's purpose shall stand," said the devout Charles Simeon; "but our liability to fall and perish is precisely the same as ever it was: our security, as far as it relates to him, consists in faith, and as far as it relates to ourselves, it consists in fear." * Johnson and Simeon were diverse in character, but in this feeling they agreed.

* Memoirs of Rev. Charles Simeon, p. 395. 3d edition.

CHAPTER III.

HIS RELIGION.

AFTER this negative proof of Johnson's religion, let us turn with more pleasure to the positive. "Christianity," he wrote, "is the highest perfection of humanity; and as no man is good, but as he wishes the good of others, no man can be good in the highest degree, who wishes not to others the largest measures of the greatest good! Thus, though the Deist may be good, and zealously wish the good of others, yet the Christian, who believes himself to be in possession of the greatest good, should be the earnest distributor of it to others: in short, how can a man be good, who keeps back from other men that which he feels to be the highest perfection of humanity?" This sentiment, which had peculiar reference to the translation of the Bible into the Gaelic language, we may well suppose capable of an universal application, and hence it binds every believer in Christianity to the duty of propagating, at home and abroad, the doctrines and tenets of that most holy religion. And before a man can effectually do this, he must himself be well versed in the doctrine, and exercised in the practice of religion; and, perhaps, few men could render a better answer for the faith that is in them than Dr. Johnson. He, like Addison, had

C

examined the matter deeply, and made up his mind with resolution; and Addison tells us, that when once we have canvassed a subject in all its bearings, and come to a just conclusion, let not objections afterward drive us from that conclusion, but let us, if we have not our arguments ready to our mind at the time, recur to that period when we did prove all things, and resolved to hold fast that which we then, after our best endeavour, accounted to be the truth. When Johnson was told that Goldsmith (and where is an instance of a man's conduct being in greater contrast with his writings, the one so careless, the other so careful?) had said, “As I take my shoes from the shoemaker, and my coat from the tailor, so I take my religion from the priest;" he answered,-" Sir, he knows nothing; he has made up his mind about nothing." Johnson was the last man, notwithstanding his reverence for the clerical character, and for the teaching of the Church, to take his religion from the priest: no, his great mind must investigate the matter, he must be convinced of the truth of Christianity, and then he would bow his head, with feelings of awe and satisfaction, before the Christian instructor, who, in accordance with Goldsmith's admiration in a more deliberate season, would not seek to maintain his sway

"By doctrines fashion'd to the varying hour."

That his faith and practice were, in all essential respects, thoroughly christian, it may seem impertinent to prove before the minds of those who are well acquainted with the opinions and character of Dr.

Johnson; but alas, some there are who, through ignorance, are ready to depreciate both the tenets and the motives of the man, and to look upon him, as others have imagined him to be in literature and in society, as a sort of bear and bigot, whose failings were so great, that his virtues need not be regarded. This is the fanaticism of inconsiderate and ignorant persons; and little do men consider the hurt that they cause to religion, when they would represent Shakspeare as an unbeliever, or Johnson as not strictly christian; that is, not orthodox according to their self-assumed notions of orthodoxy. The old hackney-coachmen of London were exposed to a penalty for not having a check-string, but no law, until some time after, was made to oblige them to take hold of such check-string. Alas! in weightier matters we have check-strings provided, but we act as the hackney-coachmen.

And what was his profession in the article of faith? He firmly believed that the death of Jesus Christ was a sacrifice for the sins of mankind. At one time, Boswell writes,* "I spoke to him of the satisfaction of Christ. He said his notion was, that it did not atone for the sins of the world: but, by satisfying divine justice, by showing that no less than the Son of God suffered for sin, it showed to men the heinousness of it, and therefore rendered it unnecessary for divine vengeance to be exercised against sinners," &c. There seems to be some confusion or contradiction here, for surely, if divine vengeance be satisfied, and God be reconciled to man by the death of Christ, then is that

In the Tour to the Hebrides.

death a satisfaction and atonement for sin. Again, Boswell writes: "I said, the great article of Christianity is the revelation of immortality. Johnson admitted it was." Here we must remark that Boswell describes himself as sounding Johnson upon particular subjects, but he gives us not Johnson's answers in Johnson's own words. Therefore Croker, the indefatigable editor of the Life of Johnson, warns us not to trust too much to Boswell's colloquial phrases on such vital points, which appear to be sanctioned by the admission of Johnson; and Boswell himself says on the former opinion quoted above,-" What Dr. Johnson now delivered was but a temporary opinion, for he afterwards was fully convinced of the propitiatory sacrifice, as I shall show at large in my future work.” And in his future work (the Life of Johnson) we find Dr. Johnson deliberately stating his opinions on original sin, and on the atonement. Let these short extracts suffice, for nothing is given contradictory to them."The great sacrifice for the sins of mankind was offered at the death of the Messiah, who is called in Scripture the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world."" Again he says, "The peculiar doctrine of Christianity is that of an universal sacrifice and perpetual propitiation. Other prophets only proclaimed the will and the threatenings of God: Christ satisfied his justice." In one of his last prayers, he beseeches the Almighty,-"Make the death of thy Son Jesus effectual to my redemption ;" and in other prayers he alludes to the satisfaction of Christ's death. It is true, that Christ brought life and immortality to light