But what ascertains[1220] my recollection of it beyond doubt, is that being accustomed to keep a journal of what passed when I was in London, which I wrote out every evening, I find the particulars of the above information, just as I have now given them, distinctly marked; and am thence enabled to fix this conversation to have passed on Friday, the 22d of April, 1763.
'I remember also distinctly, (though I have not for this the authority of my journal,) that the conversation going on concerning Mr. Pope, I took notice of a report which had been sometimes propagated that he did not understand Greek[1221]. Lord Bathurst said to me, that he knew that to be false; for that part of the Iliad was translated by Mr. Pope in his house in the country; and that in the mornings when they assembled at breakfast, Mr. Pope used frequently to repeat, with great rapture, the Greek lines which he had been translating, and then to give them his version of them, and to compare them together.
'If these circumstances can be of any use to Dr. Johnson, you have my full liberty to give them to him. I beg you will, at the same time, present to him my most respectful compliments, with best wishes for his success and fame in all his literary undertakings. I am, with great respect, my dearest Sir,
'Your most affectionate,
'And obliged humble servant,
'HUGH BLAIR.'
'Broughton Park,
'Sept. 21, 1779.'
JOHNSON. 'Depend upon it, Sir, this is too strongly stated. Pope may have had from Bolingbroke the philosophick stamina of his Essay; and admitting this to be true, Lord Bathurst did not intentionally falsify. But the thing is not true in the latitude that Blair seems to imagine; we are sure that the poetical imagery, which makes a great part of the poem, was Pope's own[1222]. It is amazing, Sir, what deviations there are from precise truth, in the account which is given of almost every thing[1223]. I told Mrs. Thrale, "You have so little anxiety about truth, that you never tax your memory with the exact thing[1224]." Now what is the use of the memory to truth, if one is careless of exactness? Lord Hailes's Annals of Scotland are very exact; but they contain mere dry particulars[1225]. They are to be considered as a Dictionary. You know such things are there; and may be looked at when you please. Robertson paints; but the misfortune is, you are sure he does not know the people whom he paints; so you cannot suppose a likeness[1226]. Characters should never be given by an historian, unless he knew the people whom he describes, or copies from those who knew them[1227].'
BOSWELL. 'Why, Sir, do people play this trick which I observe now, when I look at your grate, putting the shovel against it to make the fire burn?' JOHNSON. 'They play the trick, but it does not make the fire burn. There is a better; (setting the poker perpendicularly up at right angles with the grate.) In days of superstition they thought, as it made a cross with the bars, it would drive away the witch.'
BOSWELL. 'By associating with you, Sir, I am always getting an accession of wisdom. But perhaps a man, after knowing his own character--the limited strength of his own mind, should not be desirous of having too much wisdom, considering, quid valeant humeri[1228], how little he can carry[1229].' JOHNSON. 'Sir, be as wise as you can; let a man be aliis laetus, sapiens sibi:
"Though pleas'd to see the dolphins play, I mind my compass and my way[1230]."
You may be wise in your study in the morning, and gay in company at a tavern in the evening. Every man is to take care of his own wisdom and his own virtue, without minding too much what others think.'
He said, 'Dodsley first mentioned to me the scheme of an English Dictionary[1231]; but I had long thought of it.' BOSWELL. 'You did not know what you were undertaking.' JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir, I knew very well what I was undertaking,--and very well how to do it,--and have done it very well[1232].' BOSWELL. 'An excellent climax! and it has availed you. In your Preface you say, "What would it avail me in this gloom of solitude[1233]?" You have been agreeably mistaken.'
In his Life of Milton[1234] he observes, 'I cannot but remark a kind of respect, perhaps unconsciously, paid to this great man by his biographers: every house in which he resided is historically mentioned, as if it were an injury to neglect naming any place that he honoured by his presence.' I had, before I read this observation, been desirous of shewing that respect to Johnson, by various inquiries. Finding him this evening in a very good humour, I prevailed on him to give me an exact list of his places of residence, since he entered the metropolis as an authour, which I subjoin in a note[1235].
I mentioned to him a dispute between a friend of mine and his lady, concerning conjugal infidelity, which my friend had maintained was by no means so bad in the husband, as in the wife. JOHNSON. 'Your friend was in the right, Sir. Between a man and his Maker it is a different question: but between a man and his wife, a husband's infidelity is nothing.