He writes that 'having heard that Johnson had said that he would prefer a state of torment to that of annihilation, he told him that such a declaration, coming from him, might be productive of evil consequences. Dr. J. desired him to arrange his thoughts on the subject.' Taylor says that Johnson's entry about the serious talk refers to this matter. Gent. Mag. 1787, p. 521. I believe that Johnson meant to warn Taylor about the danger he was running of 'entering the state of torment.'
[873] Wesley, like Johnson, was a wide reader. On his journeys he read books of great variety, such as The Odyssey, Rousseau's Emile, Boswell's Corsica, Swift's Letters, Hoole's Tasso, Robertson's Charles V., Quintus Curtius, Franklin's Letters on Electricity, besides a host of theological works. Like Johnson, too, he was a great dabbler in physic and a reader of medical works. His writings covered a great range. He wrote, he says, among other works, an English, a Latin, a Greek, a Hebrew, and a French Grammar, a Treatise on Logic and another on Electricity. In the British Isles he had travelled perhaps more than any man of his time, and he had visited North America and more than one country of Europe. He had seen an almost infinite variety of characters. See ante, p. 230.
[874] The story is recorded in Wesley's Journal, ed. 1827, iv. 316. It was at Sunderland and not at Newcastle where the scene was laid. The ghost did not prophesy ill of the attorney. On the contrary, it said to the girl:--'Go to Durham, employ an attorney there, and the house will be recovered.' She went to Durham, 'and put the affair into Mr. Hugill the attorney's hands.' 'A month after,' according to the girl, 'the ghost came about eleven. I said, "Lord bless me! what has brought you here again?" He said, "Mr. Hugill has done nothing but wrote one letter."' On this Wesley writes by way of comment:--'So he [the ghost] had observed him [the attorney] narrowly, though unseen.' See post, under May 3, 1779.
[875] Johnson, with his horror of annihilation, caught at everything which strengthened his belief in the immortality of the soul. Boswell mentions ante, ii. 150, 'Johnson's elevated wish for more and more evidence for spirit,' and records the same desire, post, June 12, 1784. Southey (Life of Wesley, i. 25) says of supernatural appearances:--'With regard to the good end which they may be supposed to answer, it would be end sufficient if sometimes one of those unhappy persons, who looking through the dim glass of infidelity see nothing beyond this life, and the narrow sphere of mortal existence, should, from the established truth of one such story (trifling and objectless as it might otherwise appear), be led to a conclusion that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in their philosophy.' See ante, p. 230, and post, April 15, 1781.
[876] Miss Jane Harry. In Miss Seward's Letters, i. 97, is an account of her, which Mr. Croker shows to be inaccurate. There is, too, a long and lifeless report of the talk at this dinner.
[877] See ante, ii. 14, 105.
[878] Mrs. Knowles, not satisfied with the fame of her needlework, the 'sutile pictures' mentioned by Johnson, in which she has indeed displayed much dexterity, nay, with the fame of reasoning better than women generally do, as I have fairly shewn her to have done, communicated to me a Dialogue of considerable length, which after many years had elapsed, she wrote down as having passed between Dr. Johnson and herself at this interview. As I had not the least recollection of it, and did not find the smallest trace of it in my Record taken at the time, I could not in consistency with my firm regard to authenticity, insert it in my work. It has, however, been published in The Gent. Mag. for June, 1791. It chiefly relates to the principles of the sect called Quakers; and no doubt the Lady appears to have greatly the advantage of Dr. Johnson in argument as well as expression. From what I have now stated, and from the internal evidence of the paper itself, any one who may have the curiosity to peruse it, will judge whether it was wrong in me to reject it, however willing to gratify Mrs. Knowles. BOSWELL. Johnson mentioned the 'sutile pictures' in a letter dated May 16, 1776, describing the dinner at Messrs. Dilly's. 'And there,' he wrote, 'was Mrs. Knowles, the Quaker, that works the sutile [misprinted by Mrs. Piozzi futile] pictures. She is a Staffordshire woman, and I am to go and see her. Staffordshire is the nursery of art; here they grow up till they are transplanted to London.' Piozzi Letters, i. 326. He is pleasantly alluding to the fact that he was a Staffordshire man. In the Dialogue in The Gent. Mag. for 1791, p. 502, Mrs. Knowles says that, the wrangle ended thus:--'Mrs. K. "I hope, Doctor, thou wilt not remain unforgiving; and that you will renew your friendship, and joyfully meet at last in those bright regions where pride and prejudice can never enter." Dr. Johnson. "Meet her! I never desire to meet fools anywhere." This sarcastic turn of wit was so pleasantly received that the Doctor joined in the laugh; his spleen was dissipated, he took his coffee, and became, for the remainder of the evening, very cheerful and entertaining.' Did Miss Austen find here the title of Pride and Prejudice, for her novel?
[879] Of this day he recorded (Pr.