Adams suggested that God was infinitely good.JOHNSON. "That he is infinitely good, as far as the perfection of his nature will allow, I certainly believe; but it is necessary for good upon the whole, that individuals should be punished. As to an individual therefore he is not infinitely good; and as I cannot be sure that I have fulfilled the conditions on which salvation is granted, I am afraid I may be one of those who shall be damned."-DR. ADAMS. "What do you mean by damned?"-J. (passionately and loudly) "Sent to Hell, Sir, and punished everlastingly." Dr. A. " I don't believe that doctrine.”—J." Hold, Sir; do you believe that some will be punished at all?"-Dr. A. “ Being excluded from Heaven will be a punishment; yet there may be no great positive suffering."J. "Well, Sir; but if you admit any degree of punishment, there is an end of your argument for infinite goodness simply considered; for infinite goodness would inflict no punishment whatever. There is not infinite goodness physically considered; morally there is."-BOSWELL. "But may not a man attain to such a degree of hope as not to be uneasy from the fear of death?" -J. "A man may have such a degree of hope as to keep him quiet. You see I am not quiet, from the vehemence with which I talk; but I do not despair."-MRS. ADAMS. "You seem, Sir,

to forget the merits of our Redeemer."-J. "Madam, I do not forget the merits of my Redeemer; but my Redeemer has said, that he will set some on his right hand and some on his left." He was in gloomy agitation, and said, “I'll have no more on't." If what has now been stated should be urged by the enemies of Christianity, as if its influence on the mind were not benignant, let it be remembered, that Johnson's temperament was melancholy, of which such direful apprehensions of futurity are often a common effect. When he approached nearer to his awful change, we have seen that his mind became tranquil, and he exhibited as much fortitude as becomes a thinking man in that situation.

From the subject of death they passed to discourse of life, whether it was upon the whole more happy or miserable. Johnson was decidedly for the balance of misery.

They then talked of the recent expulsion of six students from the University at Oxford, who were methodists, and would not desist from publickly praying and exhorting. Johnson said, "Sir, that expulsion was extremely just and proper. What have they to do at an University who are not willing to be taught, but will presume to teach? Where is religion to be learnt but at an University? Sir, they were examined, and

found to be mighty ignorant fellows."-BosWELL. "But was it not hard, Sir, to expel them, for I am told they were good beings?"— JOHNSON. "Sir, I believe they might be good beings; but they were not fit to be in the University of Oxford. A cow is a very good animal in the field; but we turn her out of a garden." This was an uncommonly happy illustration.

Of preaching, and of the great success which those called Methodists have, Johnson said, "It is owing to their expressing themselves in a plain and familiar manner, which is the only way to do. good to the common people, and which clergymen of genius and learning ought to do from a principle of duty, when it is suited to their congregations; a practice for which they will be praised by men of sense. To insist against drunkenness as a crime, because it debases Reason, the noblest faculty of man, would be of no service to the common people; but to tell them that they may die in a fit of drunkenness, and shew them how dreadful that would be, cannot fail to make a deep impression. When the Scotch clergy shall give up their homely manner, religion will soon decay in that country."

He at another time repeated, that the established Clergy in general did not preach plain

enough; and that polished periods and glittering sentences flew over the heads of the cominon people, without any impression upon their hearts. Something might be necessary, he observed, to excite the affections of the common people, who were sunk in languor and lethargy, and therefore he supposed that the new concomitants of methodism might probably produce so desirable an effect. The mind, like the body, he observed, delighted in change and novelty, and even in religion itself courted new appearances and modifications. Whatever might be thought of some methodist teachers, he said, he could scarcely doubt the sincerity of that man who travelled nine hundred miles in a month, and preached twelve times a week; for no adequate reward, merely temporal, could be given for such indefatigable labour.

Mr. Boswell once told him, that having objected to keeping company with a notorious infidel, a friend of his said to him, "I do not think that men who live laxly in the world, as you and I do, can with propriety assume such an authority. Dr. Johnson may, who is uniformly exemplary in his conduct. But it is not very consistent to shun an infidel to-day, and get drunk to morrow."-JOHNSON. "Nay, Sir, this is sad reasoning. Because a man cannot be

right in all things, is he to be right in nothing? Because a man sometimes gets drunk, is he therefore to steal? This doctrine would very soon bring a man to the gallows."

After all, however, Mr. Boswell seems to think it a difficult question how far sincere Christians should associate with the avowed enemies of religion; for, in the first place, almost every man's mind may be more or less corrupted by evil communications;' secondly, the world may very naturally suppose that they are not really in earnest in religion, who can easily bear its opponents; and thirdly, if the profane find themselves quite well received by the pious, one of the checks upon an open declaration of their infidelity, and one of the probable chances of obliging them seriously to reflect, which their being shunned would do, is removed.

A gentleman one day said, that in his opinion the character of an infidel was more detestable than that of a man notoriously guilty of an atrocious crime. Another differed from him, because we are surer of the odiousness of the one, than of the error of the other.-JOHNSON. "Sir,

I

agree with him; for the infidel would be guilty of any crime, if he were inclined to it."-A general Officer asked him, what he thought of the spirit of infidelity, which was so prevalent.-J. "Sir, this gloom of infidelity, I hope, is only a tran