(ii. 141) is a letter dated March 4, 1776, from (to use Garrick's own words) 'that worst of bad women, Mrs. Abington, to ask my playing for her benefit.' It is endorsed by Garrick:--'A copy of Mother Abington's Letter about leaving the stage.'
[973] Twenty years earlier he had recommended to Miss Boothby as a remedy for indigestion dried orange-peel finely powdered, taken in a glass of hot red port. 'I would not,' he adds, 'have you offer it to the Doctor as my medicine. Physicians do not love intruders.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 397. See post, April 18, 1783.
[974] The misprint of Chancellor for Gentlemen is found in both the second and third editions. It is not in the first.
[975] Extracted from the Convocation Register, Oxford. BOSWELL.
[976] The original is in my possession. He shewed me the Diploma, and allowed me to read it, but would not consent to my taking a copy of it, fearing perhaps that I should blaze it abroad in his life-time. His objection to this appears from his 99th letter to Mrs. Thrale, whom in that letter he thus scolds for the grossness of her flattery of him:--'The other Oxford news is, that they have sent me a degree of Doctor of Laws, with such praises in the Diploma as perhaps ought to make me ashamed: they are very like your praises. I wonder whether I shall ever shew it [them in the original] to you.'
It is remarkable that he never, so far as I know, assumed his title of Doctor, but called himself Mr. Johnson, as appears from many of his cards or notes to myself; and I have seen many from him to other persons, in which he uniformly takes that designation. I once observed on his table a letter directed to him with the addition of Esquire, and objected to it as being a designation inferiour to that of Doctor; but he checked me, and seemed pleased with it, because, as I conjectured, he liked to be sometimes taken out of the class of literary men, and to be merely genteel,--un gentilhomme comme un autre. Boswell. See post, March 30, 1781, where Johnson applies the title to himself in speaking, and April 13, 1784, where he does in writing, and Boswell's Hebrides, Aug. 15, 1773, note.
[977] 'To make a man pleased with himself, let me tell you, is doing a very great thing.' Post, April 28, 1778.
[978] 'The original is in the hands of Dr. Forthergril, then Vice-Chancellor, who made this transcript.' T. WARTON--BOSWELL.
[979] Bruce, the Abyssinian traveller, as is shewn by Piozzi Letters, i. 213.
[980] 'That the design [of the Dunciad] was moral, whatever the author might tell either his readers or himself, I am not convinced. The first motive was the desire of revenging the contempt with which Theobald had treated his Shakespeare and regaining the honour which he had lost, by crushing his opponent.' Johnson's Works, viii. 338.
[981]
'Daughter of Chaos and old Night, Cimmerian Muse, all hail! That wrapt in never-twinkling gloom canst write, And shadowest meaning with thy dusky veil! What Poet sings and strikes the strings? It was the mighty Theban spoke. He from the ever-living lyre With magic hand elicits fire. Heard ye the din of modern rhymers bray? It was cool M-n; or warm G-y, Involv'd in tenfold smoke.'
Colman's Prose on Several Occasions, ii. 273.
[982] 'These Odes,' writes Colman, 'were a piece of boys' play with my schoolfellow Lloyd, with whom they were written in concert.' Ib i. xi. In the Connoisseur (ante, i. 420) they had also written in concert. 'Their humour and their talents were well adapted to what they had undertaken; and Beaumont and Fletcher present what is probably the only parallel instance of literary co-operation so complete, that the portions written by the respective parties are undistinguishable.' Southey's Cowper, i. 47.
[983] Ante, i. 402.
[984] Boswell writing to Temple two days later, recalled the time 'when you and I sat up all night at Cambridge and read Gray with a noble enthusiasm; when we first used to read Mason's Elfrida, and when we talked of that elegant knot of worthies, Gray, Mason, Walpole, &c.' Letters of Boswell, p. 185.
[985] 'I have heard Mr. Johnson relate how he used to sit in some coffee-house at Oxford, and turn M----'s C-r-ct-u-s into ridicule for the diversion of himself and of chance comers-in. "The Elf--da," says he, "was too exquisitely pretty; I could make no fun out of that."' Piozzi's Anec. p. 37. I doubt whether Johnson used the word fun, which he describes in his Dictionary as 'a low cant [slang] word.'
[986] See post, March 26, 1779, and Boswell's Hebrides, Oct. 1, and under Nov. 11, 1773. According to Dr. T. Campbell (Diary, p. 36), Johnson, on March 16, had said that Taxation no Tyranny did not sell.
[987] Six days later he wrote to Dr. Taylor:--'The patriots pelt me with answers. Four pamphlets, I think, already, besides newspapers and reviews, have been discharged against me. I have tried to read two of them, but did not go through them.' Notes and Queries, 6th S., v. 422.
[988] 'Mrs. Macaulay,' says Mr. Croker, who quotes Johnson's Works, vi.