JOHNSON TO MRS. PORTER. "London, June 25. 1783. "DEAR MADAM, Since the papers have given an account of my illness, it is proper that I should give my friends some account of it myself. "Very early in the morning of the 16th' of this month I perceived my speech taken from me. When it was light I sat down and wrote such directions as appeared proper. Dr. Heberden and Dr. Brocklesby were called. Blisters were applied, and medicines given. Before night I began to speak with some freedom, which has been increasing ever since, so that I have now very little impediment in my utterance. Dr. Heberden took his leave this morning. "Since I received this stroke I have in other respects been better than I was before, and hope yet to have a comfortable summer. Let me have your "London, July 3. 1783. "DEAR SIR, Your anxiety about my health is very friendly and very agreeable with your general kindness. I have indeed had a very frightful blow. On the 17th of last month, about three in the morning, as near as I can guess, I perceived myself almost totally deprived of speech. I had no pain. My organs were so obstructed that I could say no, but could scarcely say yes. I wrote the necessary directions, for it pleased God to spare my hand, and sent for Dr. Heberden and Dr. Brocklesby. Between the time in which I discovered my own disorder, and that in which I sent for the doctors, I had, I believe, in spite of my surprise and solicitude, a little sleep, and nature began to renew its operations. They came and gave the directions which the disease required, and from that time I have been continually improving in articulation. I can now speak; but the nerves are weak, and I cannot continue discourse long; but strength, I hope, will return. The physicians consider me as cured. I was last Sunday at church. On Tuesday I took an airing to Hampstead, and dined with the Club, where Lord Palmerston was proposed, and, against my opinion, was rejected. I designed to go next week with Mr. Langton to Rochester, where I purpose to stay about ten days, and then try some other air. have many kind invitations. Your brother has very frequently inquired after me. Most of my friends have, indeed, been very attentive. Thank dear Lord Hailes for his present. I "I hope you found at your return every thing gay and prosperous, and your lady, in particular, 1 Mistake for 17th. - CROKER. 2 His lordship was soon after chosen, and is now a member of the Club. - BosWELL. 3 She soon returned, and attended him in his last illness. -CROKER, 1847. 4 During his illness Mr. Murphy visited him, and found him reading Dr. Watson's Chemistry: articulating with difficulty, he said, "From this book he who knows nothing JOHNSON TO MRS. PORTER. "London, July 5, 1763. "DEAR MADAM, - The account which you give of your health is but melancholy. May it please God to restore you. My disease affected my speech, and still continues, in some degree, to ob struct my utterance; my voice is distinct enouga for a while, but the organs being still weak are quickly weary; but in other respects I am. I think, rather better than I have lately been, and can let you know my state without the help of any other hand. In the opinion of my friends, and in my own, I am gradually mending. The physicians consider me as cured, and I had leave four days age to wash the cantharides from my head. Las Tuesday I dined at the Club. "I am going next week into Kent, and purpos to change the air frequently this summer : whether I shall wander so far as Staffordshire I cannot teal. I should be glad to come. Return my thanks to Mrs. Cobb, and Mr. Pearson, and all that have shown attention to me. Let us, my dear, pray fo one another, and consider our sufferings as notices mercifully given us to prepare ourselves for another state. "I live now but in a melancholy way. My old friend Mr. Levett is dead, who lived with me in the house, and was useful and companionable; Mrs Desmoulins is gone away; and Mrs. Williams so much decayed, that she can add little to another · gratifications. The world passes away, and we passing with it; but there is, doubtless, anotar world, which will endure for ever. Let us al ourselves for it. I am, &c., SAM. JOHNSON." Such was the general vigour of his consttution, that he recovered from this alarming and severe attack with wonderful quicknes so that in July he was able to make a visit t about a fortnight, and made little excursions Mr. Langton at Rochester, where he pass easily as at any time of his life. JOHNSON TO MRS. THRALE "London, July 2. 17% "I have been thirteen days at Rochester, a am now just returned. I came back by water ine common boat, twenty miles for a shilling. when I landed at Billingsgate I carried my budg myself to Cornhill before I could get a coach, a was not much incommoded." "August 13. Of this world, in which you present me as delighting to live, I can say latt Since I came home I have only been to chur once to Burney's, once to Paradise's, and may learn a great deal, and he who knows will be pinuar find his knowledge recalled to his mind in a manner tə pleasing." Life, p. 121. Murphy adds, that in the of August he set out for Lichheld on a visit to Mi Porter; and in his way back paid his respects to Dr. at Oxford. But it seems certain that he did not in the terval go to Lichfield, and there is barely time far ə excursion to Oxford. — CROKER. Reynolds's. With Burney I saw Dr. Rose, his "Paradise's company, I fancy, disappointed him; I remember nobody. With Reynolds was the Archbishop of Tuam, a man coarse of voice and inelegant of language. "I am now broken with disease, without the alleviation of familiar friendship or domestic Society; I have no middle state between clamour and silence, between general conversation and selftormenting solitude. Levett is dead, and poor Williams is making haste to die: I know not if she will ever come out of her chamber. "I am now quite alone; but let me turn my thoughts another way." “August 20.—This has been a day of great emo tion; the office of the communion for the sick has been performed in poor Mrs. Williams's chamber. At home I see almost all my companions dead or dying. At Oxford I have just lost Wheeler, the man with whom I most delighted to converse. The sense of my own diseases, and the sight of the world sinking round me, oppress me perhaps too much. I hope that all these admonitions will not be vain, and that I shall learn to die as dear Williams is dying, who was very cheerful before and after this awful solemnity, and seems to resign herself with calmness and hope upon eternal mercy. "I read your last kind letter with great delight; out when I came to love and honour, what sprung n my mind? How loved, how honoured once, ivails thee not. "Heale, near Salisbury, Aug. 29. 1783. "DEAR SIR, Without appearing to want a just sense of your kind attention, I cannot omit to give an account of the day which seemed to appear in some sort perilous. I rose at five, and went out at six; and having reached Salisbury about nine, went forward a few miles in my friend's chariot. I was no more wearied with the journey, though it was a high-hung, rough coach, than I should have been forty years ago. We shall now see what air will do. The country is all a plain; and the house "I sat to Mrs. Reynolds yesterday for my pic-in which I am, so far as I can judge from my winure, perhaps the tenth time; and I sat for three ours with the patience of mortal born to bear." “August 26. — Things stand with me much as hey have done for some time. Mrs. Williams ancies now and then that she grows better, but er vital powers appear to be slowly burning out. Nobody thinks, however, that she will very soon be quite wasted; and as she suffers me to be of very ittle use to her, I have determined to pass some ime with Mr. Bowles, near Salisbury, and have aken a place for Thursday. Some benefit may be perhaps received from hange of air, some from change of company, and omne from mere change of place. It is not easy to row well in a chamber where one has long been ick, and where every thing seen, and every person peaking, revives and impresses images of pain. Though it be true that no man can run away from mself, yet he may escape from many causes of seless uneasiness. That the mind is its own place, the boast of a fallen angel that had learned to e. External locality has great effects, at least pon all embodied beings. I hope this little ourney will afford me at last some suspense of elancholy."] dow, for I write before I have left my chamber, is sufficiently pleasant. "Be so kind as to continue your attention to Mrs. Williams. It is great consolation to the well, and still greater to the sick, that they find themselves not neglected; and I know that you will be desirous of giving comfort, even where you have no great hope of giving help. Since I wrote the former part of the letter, I find that by the course of the post I cannot send it before the 31st. I am, &c., SAM. JOHNSON." "He had once conceived the design of writing the Life of Oliver Cromwell, saying that he 4 Prayers and Meditations, p. 226. B. In his letter to Miss Susannah Thrale, Sept. 9., he thus writes: "Pray show mamma this passage of a letter from Dr. Brocklesby: Mrs. Williams, from mere inanition, has at length paid the great debt to nature, about three o'clock this thought it must be highly curious to trace his extraordinary rise to the supreme power from so obscure a beginning. He at length laid aside his scheme, on discovering that all that can be told of him is already in print; and that it is impracticable to procure any authentic information in addition to what the world is already in possession of." 1 unseemliness, drives a man either to stammering, nonplus, or harping on that which should follos; whereas a slow speech confirmeth the memory, addeth a conceit of wisdom to the hearers, besides a seemliness of speech and countenance.' Dr Johnson's method of conversation was certainly calculated to excite attention, and to amuse and instruct (as it happened), without wearying or confusing his company. He was always most per "He had likewise projected, but at what part of his life is not known, a work to show how small a quantity of REAL FICTION there is in the world;fectly clear and perspicuous; and his language was and that the same images, with very little variation, have served all the authors who have ever written." "His thoughts in the latter part of his life were frequently employed on his deceased friends. often muttered these or such like sentences: man! and then he died.'" 6 He Poor "Speaking of a certain literary friend, He is a very pompous puzzling fellow,' said he he lent me a letter once that somebody had written to him, no matter what it was about; but he wanted to have the letter back, and expressed a mighty value for it he hoped it was to be met with again; he would not lose it for a thousand pounds. I laid my hand upon it soon afterwards, and gave it him. I believe I said I was very glad to have met with it. Oh, then he did not know that it signified any thing. So you see, when the letter was lost it was worth a thousand pounds, and when it was found it was not worth a farthing.' "The style and character of his conversation is pretty generally known: it was certainly conducted in conformity with a precept of Lord Bacon, but it is not clear, I apprehend, that this conformity was either perceived or intended by Johnson. The precept alluded to is as follows: In all kinds of speech, either pleasant, grave, severe, or ordinary, it is convenient to speak leisurely, and rather drawlingly than hastily: because hasty speech confounds the memory, and oftentimes, besides the so accurate, and his sentences so neatly constructed, that his conversation might have been all printed without any correction. At the same time, it was easy and natural; the accuracy of it had no appear ance of labour, constraint, or stiffness: be seemed more correct than others by the force of habit, and the customary exercises of his powerful mind." He spoke often in praise of French literature. The French are excellent in this,' he would say. they have a book on every subject.' From what he had seen of them he denied them the praise 1 superior politeness, and mentioned, with very visible disgust, the custom they have of spitting on the floors of their apartments. This,' said the doctar, is as gross a thing as can well be done; and us. wonders how any man, or set of men, can persist i. so offensive a practice for a whole day together one should expect that the first effort towards ent lisation would remove it even among savages." "Baxter's Reasons of the Christian Religi he thought contained the best collection of ta evidences of the divinity of the Christian system. 6 Chymistry was always an interesting purs. with Dr. Johnson. Whilst he was in Wiltshire, me attended some experiments that were made by. physician at Salisbury on the new kinds of air. 1the course of the experiments frequent menti being made of Dr. Priestley, Dr. Johnson knit as brows, and in a stern manner inquired, Why c we hear so much of Dr. Priestley?' He was very morning (Sept. 6.). She died without a struggle, retaining her faculties entire to the very last; and, as she expressed it, having set her house in order, was prepared to leave it at the last summons of nature." In his letter to Mrs. Thrale, Sept. 22., he adds: "Poor Williams has, I hope, seen the end of her afflic. tions. She acted with prudence, and she bore with fortitude. She has left me. Thou thy weary task hast done, Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages.' Had she had good-humour and prompt elocution, her universal curiosity and comprehensive knowledge would have made her the delight of all that knew her. She left her little to your charity-school."- MALONE. Mr. Malone observes, "This, however, was entirely a mistake, as appears from the Memoirs published by Mr. Noble. Had Johnson been furnished with the materials which the industry of that gentleman has procured, and with others which it is believed are yet preserved in manuscript, he would, without doubt, have produced a most valuable and curious history of Cromwell's life."- BOSWELL. I may add, that, had Johnson given us a Life of Cromwell, we should not have been disgusted in numberless instances with "My Lord Protector" and "My Lady PROTECTRESS;" and certainly the brutal ruffian who presided in the bloody assembly that murdered their sovereign would have been characterised by very different epithets than those which are applied to him in this work, where we find him described as "the BOLD and DETERMINED Bradshaw."- MALONE. 2 Hints for Civil Conversation. - Bacon's Works, 4to. vol. i. p. 571.- MALONE. 3 I do not wonder at Johnson's displeasure when the name of Dr. Priestley was mentioned; for I know no writer who has been suffered to publish more pernicious doctrines. 1 shall instance only three. First, Materialism; by which mind is denied to human nature; which, if believed, deprive us of every elevated principle Secondly, New or the doctrine that every action, whether good ar bal a included in an unchangeable and unavoidable syst notion utterly subversive of moral government Tari that we have no reason to think that the future world h as he is pleased to inform us, will be adapted to cur improved nature) will be materially different from så which, if believed, would sink wretched mortals Ttɔ een=" as they could no longer hope for the rest that rema for the people of God," or "for that happiness which am vealed to us as something beyond our present concrytaxtbut would feel themselves doomed to a continuation of the uneasy state under which they now groan. I say nothing the petulant intemperance with which he dares to urxel 2 venerable establishments of his country. As a spe: 220m his writings, I shall quote the following passage, w appears to me equally absurd and impious, and which mari have been retorted upon him by the men who were prom cuted for burning his house. "I cannot," says he, necessarian [meaning necessitarian], hate any man, bec I consider him as being, in all respects, just what God bus made him to be; and also as doing, with respect to war, n căm. but what he was expressly designed and appointed to do being the only cause, and men nothing more than the e ments in his hands to execute all his pleasure” – Kun tions of Philosophical Necessity, p.111. The Reverend DParr, in a late tract, appears to suppose that Dr. Jakuum mo only endured, but almost solicited, an interace eD Priestley. In justice to Dr Johnson, I declare my đơm tele that he never did. My illustrious friend was pertama resolute in not giving countenance to men whose evrings we considered as pernicious to society. I was prevent at Org'ond when Dr. Price, even before he had rendered hmania generally obnoxious by his zeal for the French revolucha, came into a company where Johnson was, who tastandly hơ the room. Much more would he have reprubated D "A friend was one day, about two years before his death, struck with some instance of Dr. Johnson's great candour. Well, Sir,' said he, I will always say that you are a very candid man.' Will you?' replied the doctor; I doubt then you will be very singular. But, indeed, Sir,' continued he, I look upon myself to be a man very much misunderstood. I am not an uncandid, nor am I a severe man. I sometimes say more than I mean, in jest; and people are apt to believe me serious: however, I am more candid than I was when I was younger. As I know more of mankind, I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good man upon easier terms than I was formerly.'" [JOHNSON TO BARBER.' "Heale, Sept. 16. 1783. “DEAR FRANCIS,—I rather wonder that you have never written; but that is now not necessary, for I purpose to be with [you] on Thursday before dinner. As Thursday is my birth-day, I would have a little dinner got, and would have you invite Mrs. Desmoulins, Mrs. Davis that was about Mrs Williams, and Mr. Allen and Mrs. Gardiner. I am, yours, &c., SAM. JOHNSON."] -Harwood MSS. alleviated the sufferings of a woman of great merit, both intellectual and moral. Her curiosity was universal, her knowledge was very extensive, and she sustained forty years of misery with steady fortitude. Thirty years and more she had been my companion, and her death has left me very desolate. "That I have not written sooner, you may im. pute to absence, to ill health, to any thing rather than want of regard to the benefactress of my departed friend. I am, Madam, your most humble servant, SAM. JOHNSON."] - Montagu MSS. His fortitude and patience met with severe trials during this year. The stroke of the palsy has been related circumstantially; but he was also afflicted with the gout, and was besides troubled with a complaint which not only was attended with immediate inconvenience, but threatened him with a chirurgical operation, from which most men would shrink. The complaint was a sarcocele, which Johnson bore with uncommon firmness, and was not at all frightened while he looked forward to amputation. He was attended by Mr. Pott and Mr. Cruikshank. I have before me a letter of the 30th of July, this year, to Mr. Cruikshank, in which he says, "I am going to put myself into your hands: and another, accompanying a set of his "Lives of the Poets,' in which he says, "I beg your acceptance of On his return from Heale he wrote to Dr. these volumes, as an acknowledgment of the ! Burney: "I came home on the 18th of September, at noon, to a very disconsolate house. You and I have lost our friends; but you have more friends at home. My domestic companion is taken from me. She is much missed, for her acquisitions were many, and her curiosity universal; so that she partook of every conversation. I am not well enough to go much out; and to sit, and eat or fast alone, is very wearisome. I always mean to send my compli ments to all the ladies." [JOHNSON TO MRS. MONTAGU. "September 22. 1783. "MADAM,That respect which is always due to beneficence makes it fit that you should be informed, otherwise than by the papers, that, on the 6th of this month, died your pensioner, Anna Williams, of whom it may be truly said, that she received your bounty with gratitude, and enjoyed it with propriety. You perhaps have still her prayers. You have, Madam, the satisfaction of having Priestley. Whoever wishes to see a perfect delineation of this Literary Jack of all Trades may find it in an ingenious tract, entitled "A Small Whole-Length of Dr. Priestley," printed for Rivingtons, in St. Paul's Churchyard. -BoSWELL. The foregoing note produced a reply from Dr. Parr (Gent. Mag March, 1795). in which he endeavoured to support his assertion by evidence, which, however, really contradicted m. For instead of Johnson's having solicited an interview which was the point in dispute), Dr. Parr is obliged to mimit that the meeting was at Mr. Paradise's dinner-table, that Dr. Johnson did not solicit the interview, but was aware that Dr. Priestley was invited, and that he behaved to him with civility: and then Dr. Parr concludes, in a way that does attle credit either to his accuracy or his candour, "Should Mr Boswell be pleased to maintain that Dr. Johnson rather consented to the interview, than almost solicited it, I shall great favours which you have bestowed on, Sir, your most obliged and most humble servant." I have in my possession several more letters from him to Mr. Cruikshank, and also to Dr. Mudge at Plymouth, which it would be improper to insert, as they are filled with unpleasing technical details. I shall, however, extract from his letters to Dr. Mudge such passages as show either a felicity of expression, or the undaunted state of his mind. My conviction of your skill, and my belief of your friendship, determine me to entreat your opinion and advice. In this state I with great earnestness desire you to tell me what is to be done. Excision is doubtless necessary to the cure, and I know not any means of palliation. The operation is doubtless painful; but is it dangerous? The pain I hope to endure with decency; but I am loath to put life into much hazard. By representing the gout as an antagonist to the palsy, you have said enough to make it welcome. This is not strictly the first fit, but I hope it is as good as the first; not object to the change of expression "— the mode of expression being a disingenuous surrender of the whole question, leaving Dr. Parr without a shadow of excuse for his misrepresentation. - CROKER. 1 I have thought it worth while to preserve this note (not included in my former edition), to show that Johnson had now overcome the reluctance to keeping his birthday (ontè, p. 634. n. 1), or at least could indulge his more intimate friends with that celebration.- CROKER, 1847. 2 As Miss Williams enjoyed a pension from Mrs. Montagu, Johnson thought himself bound to acquaint her with the death of the object of her charity. This pension was in truth an indirect benefaction to Johnson himself, and was probably so meant by the delicate and courteous charity of that excellent lady. — CROKER, 1831-47. for it is the second that ever confined me; and the first was ten years ago, much less fierce and fiery than this. Write, dear Sir, what you can to inform or encourage me. The operation is not delayed by any fears or objections of mine." JOHNSON TO LANGTON. "London, Sept. 29. 1783. "DEAR SIR, You may very reasonably charge me with insensibility of your kindness and that of Lady Rothes, since I have suffered so much time to pass without paying any acknowledgment. I now, at last, return my thanks; and why I did it not sooner I ought to tell you. I went into Wiltshire as soon as I well could, and was there much employed in palliating my own malady. Disease produces much selfishness. A man in pain is looking after ease, and lets most other things go as chance shall dispose of them. In the mean time I have lost a companion (Mrs. Williams), to whom I have had recourse for domestic amusement for thirty years, and whose variety of knowledge never was exhausted; and now return to a habitation vacant and desolate. I carry about a very troublesome and dangerous complaint, which admits no cure but by the chirurgical knife. Let me have your prayers. I am, &c., "SAM. JOHNSON." Happily the complaint abated without his being put to the torture of amputation. But we must surely admire the manly resolution which he discovered while it hung over him. In a letter to the same gentleman he writes, "The gout has within these four days come upon me with a violence which I never experienced before. It made me helpless as an infant." And in another, having mentioned Mrs. Williams, he says, "whose death following that of Levett has now made my house a solitude. She left her little substance to a charity-school.' She is, I hope, where there is neither darkness 2, nor want, nor sorrow.' I wrote to him, begging to know the state of his health, and mentioned that "Baxter's Anacreon, which is in the library at Auchinleck, was, I find, collated by my father in 1727 with the MS. belonging to the University of Leyden, and he has made a number of notes upon it. Would you advise me to publish a new edition of it?" His answer was dated September 30. "You should not make your letters such rarities, when you know, or might know, the uniform state of my health. It is very long since I heard from you; and that I have not answered is a very insufficient reason for the silence of a friend. Your Anacreon is a very uncommon book: neither Lon To the "Ladies' Charity School," in King Street, Snow Hill, instituted in 1702, and where Mrs. Williams's portrait is still to be seen, with the notice of her benefactions thus recorded on the walls: 1783. Mrs. Anna Williams, by gift in the 3 per cent. Stock, 2001. 1784. Also by her will, in cash, &c.," 1577. 148.P. CUNNINGHAM. 2 In allusion to her blindness. CHOKER. The last line of an epigrammatic distich of an Italian the Duke of Modena's running away from a comet. don nor Cambridge can supply a copy of that edition. Whether it should be reprinted, you cannot do better than consult Lord Hailes. Besides my constant and radical disease, I have been for these ten days much harassed with the gout; but that has now remitted. I hope God will yet grant me a little longer life, and make me less unfit to appear before him " [JOHNSON TO MISS REYNOLDS. “DEAR MADAM,—I am very ill indeed, and to my former illness is superadded the gout. I am now without shoes, and I have been lately almost motionless. "I yet sit without shoes, with my foot upon a pillow, but my pain and weakness are much abated, and I am no longer crawling upon two sticks. To the gout my mind is reconciled by another letter from Mr. Mudge, in which he vehemently urges the excision, and tells me that the gout will secure me from every thing paralytic. If this be true, ! am ready to say to the arthritic pains, Deh! reih ogni di, durate un anno.3 "My physician in ordinary is Dr. Brocklesby, who comes almost every day; my surgeon, in Mr. Pott's absence, is Mr. Cruikshank, the prescit reader in Dr. Hunter's school. Neither of them. however, do much more than look and talk. The general health of my body is as good as you have ever known it- almost as good as I can remember. The carriage which you supposed made rough by my weakness was the common Salisbury stage. high hung, and driven to Salisbury in a day. "I was not fatigued. see him soon, and will then tell you something of "Mr. Pott has been out of town, but I expect to the main affair, of which there seems now to be a better prospect. "This afternoon I have given [tea] to M Cholmondeley, Mrs. Way Lady Sheffield's reletion, Mr. Kindersley' the describer of Indian man ners, and another anonymous lady. "As Mrs. Williams received a pension from Mrs. Montagu, it was fit to notify her death. The ac count has brought me a letter not only civil bast tender; so I hope peace is proclaimed." [p. 575. } "October 9. Two nights ago Mr. Burke sat wat me a long time. He seems much pleased with ham |