[2] In 1792, Miss Burney, after recording that Boswell told some of his Johnsonian stories, continues:--'Mr. Langton told some stories in imitation of Dr. Johnson; but they became him less than Mr. Boswell, and only reminded me of what Dr. Johnson himself once said to me--"Every man has some time in his life an ambition to be a wag."' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, v. 307.
[3] Stephanorum Historia, vitas ipsorum ac libros complectens. London, 1709.
[4] Senilia was published in 1742. The line to which Johnson refers is, 'Mel, nervos, fulgur, Carteret, unus, habes,' p. 101. In another line, the poet celebrates Colley Cibber's Muse--the Musa Cibberi: 'Multa Cibberum levat aura.' p. 50. See Macaulay's Essays, ed. 1843, i. 367.
[5] Graecae Linguae Dialecti in Scholae Westmonast. usum, 1738.
[6] Giannone, an Italian historian, born 1676, died 1748. When he published his History of the Kingdom of Naples, a friend congratulating him on its success, said:--'Mon ami, vous vous etes mis une couronne sur la tete, mais une couronne d'epines.' His attacks on the Church led to persecution, in the end he made a retractation, but nevertheless he died in prison. Nouv. Biog. Gen. xx. 422.
[7] See ante, ii. 119.
[8] 'There is no kind of impertinence more justly censurable than his who is always labouring to level thoughts to intellects higher than his own; who apologises for every word which his own narrowness of converse inclines him to think unusual; keeps the exuberance of his faculties under visible restraint; is solicitous to anticipate inquiries by needless explanations; and endeavours to shade his own abilities lest weak eyes should be dazzled with their lustre.' The Rambler, No. 173.
[9] Johnson, in his Dictionary, defines Anfractuousness as Fulness of windings and turnings. Anfractuosity is not given. Lord Macaulay, in the last sentence in his Biography of Johnson, alludes to this passage.
[10] See ante, iii. 149, note 2.
[11] 'My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I might not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries might have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution, but when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration, when my memory supplied me from late books with an example that was wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited admission for a favourite name.' Johnson's Works, v. 39. He cites himself under important, Mrs. Lennox under talent, Garrick under giggler; from Richardson's Clarissa, he makes frequent quotations. In the fourth edition, published in 1773 (ante, ii. 203), he often quotes Reynolds; for instance, under vulgarism, which word is not in the previous editions. Beattie he quotes under weak, and Gray under bosom. He introduces also many quotations from Law, and Young. In the earlier editions, in his quotations from Clarissa, he very rarely gives the author's name; in the fourth edition I have found it rarely omitted.
[12] In one of his Hypochondriacks (London Mag. 1782, p. 233) Boswell writes:--'I have heard it remarked by one, of whom more remarks deserve to be remembered than of any person I ever knew, that a man is often as narrow as he is prodigal for want of counting.'
[13] 'Sept. 1778. We began talking of Irene, and Mrs. Thrale made Dr. Johnson read some passages which I had been remarking as uncommonly applicable to the present time. He read several speeches, and told us he had not ever read so much of it before since it was first printed.' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, i. 96. 'I was told,' wrote Sir Walter Scott, 'that a gentleman called Pot, or some such name, was introduced to him as a particular admirer of his. The Doctor growled and took no further notice. "He admires in especial your Irene as the finest tragedy modern times;" to which the Doctor replied, "If Pot says so, Pot lies!" and relapsed into his reverie.' Croker Corres. ii. 32.
[14] Scrupulosity was a word that Boswell had caught up from Johnson. Sir W. Jones (Life, i. 177) wrote in 1776:--'You will be able to examine with the minutest scrupulosity, as Johnson would call it.' Johnson describes Addison's prose as 'pure without scrupulosity.' Works, vii. 472. 'Swift,' he says, 'washed himself with oriental scrupulosity.' Ib. viii. 222. Boswell (Hebrides, Aug. 15) writes of 'scrupulosity of conscience.'
[15]
'When thou didst not, savage, Know thine own meaning, but wouldst gabble like A thing most brutish, I endow'd thy purposes With words that made them known.' The Tempest, act i. sc. 2.
[16] Secretary to the British Herring Fishery, remarkable for an extraordinary number of occasional verses, not of eminent merit. BOSWELL. See ante, i. 115, note i. Lockman was known in France as the translator of Voltaire's La Henriade. See Marmontel's Preface. Voltaire's Works, ed. 1819, viii. 18.
[17] Luke vii. 50. BOSWELL.
[18] Miss Burney, describing him in 1783, says:--'He looks unformed in his manners and awkward in his gestures.