Addison, I cannot determine; but when she saw any of the company very warm in a wrong opinion, she was more inclined to confirm them in it than oppose them. The excuse she commonly gave, when her friends asked the reason, was, "That it prevented noise and saved time." Swift's Works, xiv. 254.
[670] In the Appendix to Blair's Critical Dissertation on the Poems of Ossian Macqueen is mentioned as one of his authorities for his statements.
[671] See ante, iv. 262, note.
[672] I think it but justice to say, that I believe Dr. Johnson meant to ascribe Mr. M'Queen's conduct to inaccuracy and enthusiasm, and did not mean any severe imputation against him. BOSWELL.
[673] In Baretti's trial (ante, ii. 97, note I) he seems to have given his evidence clearly. What he had to say, however, was not much.
[674] Boswell had spoken before to Johnson about this omission. Ante, ii. 92.
[675] It has been triumphantly asked, 'Had not the plays of Shakspeare lain dormant for many years before the appearance of Mr. Garrick? Did he not exhibit the most excellent of them frequently for thirty years together, and render them extremely popular by his own inimitable performance?' He undoubtedly did. But Dr. Johnson's assertion has been misunderstood. Knowing as well as the objectors what has been just stated, he must necessarily have meant, that 'Mr. Garrick did not as a critick make Shakspeare better known; he did not illustrate any one passage in any of his plays by acuteness of disquisition, or sagacity of conjecture: and what had been done with any degree of excellence in that way was the proper and immediate subject of his preface. I may add in support of this explanation the following anecdote, related to me by one of the ablest commentators on Shakspeare, who knew much of Dr. Johnson: 'Now I have quitted the theatre, cries Garrick, I will sit down and read Shakspeare.' ''Tis time you should, exclaimed Johnson, for I much doubt if you ever examined one of his plays from the first scene to the last.' BOSWELL. According to Davies (Life of Garrick, i. 120) during the twenty years' management of Drury Lane by Booth, Wilks and Cibber (about 1712-1732) not more than eight or nine of Shakspeare's plays were acted, whereas Garrick annually gave the public seventeen or eighteen. Romeo and Juliet had lain neglected near 80 years, when in 1748-9 Garrick brought it out, or rather a hash of it. 'Otway had made some alteration in the catastrophe, which Mr. Garrick greatly improved by the addition of a scene, which was written with a spirit not unworthy of Shakespeare himself.' Ib. p. 125. Murphy (Life of Garrick, p. 100), writing of this alteration, says:--'The catastrophe, as it now stands, is the most affecting in the whole compass of the drama.' Davies says (p. 20) that shortly before Garrick's time 'a taste for Shakespeare had been revived. The ladies had formed themselves into a society under the title of The Shakespeare Club. They bespoke every week some favourite play of his.' This revival was shown in the increasing number of readers of Shakespeare. It was in 1741 that Garrick began to act. In the previous sixteen years there had been published four editions of Pope's Shakespeare and two of Theobald's. In the next ten years were published five editions of Hanmer's Shakespeare, and two of Warburton's, besides Johnson's Observations on Macbeth. Lowndes's Bibl. Man. ed. 1871, p. 2270.
[676] In her foolish Essay on Shakespeare, p. 15. See ante, ii. 88.
[677] No man has less inclination to controversy than I have, particularly with a lady. But as I have claimed, and am conscious of being entitled to credit for the strictest fidelity, my respect for the publick obliges me to take notice of an insinuation which tends to impeach it.
Mrs. Piozzi (late Mrs. Thrale), to her Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson, added the following postscript:--
'Naples, Feb. 10, 1786.
'Since the foregoing went to the press, having seen a passage from Mr. Boswell's Tour to the Hebrides, in which it is said, that I could not get through Mrs. Montague's "Essay on Shakspeare," I do not delay a moment to declare, that, on the contrary, I have always commended it myself, and heard it commended by every one else; and few things would give me more concern than to be thought incapable of tasting, or unwilling to testify my opinion of its excellence.'
It is remarkable that this postscript is so expressed, as not to point out the person who said that Mrs. Thrale could not get through Mrs. Montague's book; and therefore I think it necessary to remind Mrs. Piozzi, that the assertion concerning her was Dr. Johnson's, and not mine. The second observation that I shall make on this postscript is, that it does not deny the fact asserted, though I must acknowledge from the praise it bestows on Mrs. Montague's book, it may have been designed to convey that meaning.
What Mrs. Thrale's opinion is or was, or what she may or may not have said to Dr. Johnson concerning Mrs. Montague's book, it is not necessary for me to enquire.