434.
[329] 'The first lines put one in mind of Casimir's Ode to Pope Urban:--
"Urbane, regum maxime, maxime Urbane vatum."
The Polish poet was probably at that time in the hands of a man who had meditated the history of the Latin poets.' Murphy's Johnson, p. 42.
[330] Cave had been grossly attacked by rival booksellers; see Gent. Mag., viii. 156. Hawkins says (Life, p. 92), 'With that sagacity which we frequently observe, but wonder at, in men of slow parts, he seemed to anticipate the advice contained in Johnson's ode, and forbore a reply, though not his revenge.' This he gratified by reprinting in his own Magazine one of the most scurrilous and foolish attacks.
[331] A translation of this Ode, by an unknown correspondent, appeared in the Magazine for the month of May following:
'Hail, URBAN! indefatigable man, Unwearied yet by all thy useful toil! Whom num'rous slanderers assault in vain; Whom no base calumny can put to foil. But still the laurel on thy learned brow Flourishes fair, and shall for ever grow.
'What mean the servile imitating crew, What their vain blust'ring, and their empty noise, Ne'er seek: but still thy noble ends pursue, Unconquer'd by the rabble's venal voice. Still to the Muse thy studious mind apply, Happy in temper as in industry.
'The senseless sneerings of an haughty tongue, Unworthy thy attention to engage, Unheeded pass: and tho' they mean thee wrong, By manly silence disappoint their rage. Assiduous diligence confounds its foes, Resistless, tho' malicious crouds opposc.
'Exert thy powers, nor slacken in the course, Thy spotless fame shall quash all false reports: Exert thy powers, nor fear a rival's force, But thou shalt smile at all his vain efforts; Thy labours shall be crown'd with large success; The Muse's aid thy Magazine shall bless.
'No page more grateful to th' harmonious nine Than that wherein thy labours we survey; Where solemn themes in fuller splendour shine, (Delightful mixture,) blended with the gay, Where in improving, various joys we find, A welcome respite to the wearied mind.
'Thus when the nymphs in some fair verdant mead, Of various flowr's a beauteous wreath compose, The lovely violet's azure-painted head Adds lustre to the crimson-blushing rosc. Thus splendid Iris, with her varied dye, Shines in the aether, and adorns the sky. BRITON.'
BOSWELL.
[332] 'I have some reason to think that at his first coming to town he frequented Slaughter's coffee-house with a view to acquire a habit of speaking French, but he never could attain to it. Lockman used the same method and succeeded, as Johnson himself once told me.' Hawkins's Johnson, p. 516. Lockman is l'ilustre Lockman mentioned post, 1780, in Mr. Langton's Collection. It was at 'Old Slaughter's Coffee-house, when a number of foreigners were talking loud about little matters, that Johnson one evening said, "Does not this confirm old Meynell's observation, For anything I see, foreigners are fools"?' post, ib.
[333] He had read Petrarch 'when but a boy;' ante, p. 57.
[334] Horace Walpole, writing of the year 1770, about libels, says: 'Their excess was shocking, and in nothing more condemnable than in the dangers they brought on the liberty of the press.' This evil was chiefly due to 'the spirit of the Court, which aimed at despotism, and the daring attempts of Lord Mansfield to stifle the liberty of the press. His innovations had given such an alarm that scarce a jury would find the rankest satire libellous.' Memoirs of the Reign of George III, iv. 167. Smollett in Humphrey Clinker (published in 1771) makes Mr. Bramble write, in his letter of June 2: 'The public papers are become the infamous vehicles of the most cruel and perfidious defamation; every rancorous knave--every desperate incendiary, that can afford to spend half-a-crown or three shillings, may skulk behind the press of a newsmonger, and have a stab at the first character in the kingdom, without running the least hazard of detection or punishment.' The scribblers who had of late shewn their petulance were not always obscure. Such scurrilous but humorous pieces as Probationary Odes for the Laureateship, The Rolliad, and Royal Recollections, which were all published while Boswell was writing The Life of Johnson, were written, there can be little doubt, by men of position. In the first of the three (p. 27) Boswell is ridiculed. He is made to say:--'I know Mulgrave is a bit of a poet as well as myself; for I dined in company once where he dined that very day twelve-month.' This evil of libelling had extended to America. Benjamin Franklin (Memoirs, i. 148), writing in 1784, says that 'libelling and personal abuse have of late years become so disgraceful to our country. Many of our printers make no scruple of gratifying the malice of individuals by false accusations of the fairest characters.'
[335] Boswell perhaps refers to a book published in 1758, called The Case of Authors by Profession. Gent. Mag.