The Life of Samuel Johnson - James Boswell [125]
It must undoubtedly seem strange, that the conclusion of his Preface should be expressed in terms so desponding, when it is considered that the authour was then only in his forty-sixth year. But we must ascribe its gloom to that miserable dejection of spirits to which he was Constitutionally subject, and which was aggravated by the death of his wife two years before. I have heard it ingeniously observed by a lady of rank and elegance, that ‘his melancholy was then at its meridian.’ It pleased God to grant him almost thirty years of life after this time; and once, when he was in a placid frame of mind, he was obliged to own to me that he had enjoyed happier days, and had had many more friends, since that gloomy hour than before.
It is a sad saying, that ‘most of those whom he wished to please had sunk into the grave;’ and his case at forty-five was singularly unhappy, unless the circle of his friends was very narrow. I have often thought, that as longevity is generally desired, and, I believe, generally expected, it would be wise to be continually adding to the number of our friends, that the loss of some may be supplied by others. Friendship, ‘the wine of life,’ should, like a well-stocked cellar, be thus continually renewed; and it is consolatory to think, that although we can seldom add what will equal the generous first-growths of our youth, yet friendship becomes insensibly old in much less time than is commonly imagined, and not many years are required to make it very mellow and pleasant. Warmth will, no doubt, make a considerable difference. Men of affectionate temper and bright fancy will coalesce a great deal sooner than those who are cold and dull.
The proposition which I have now endeavoured to illustrate was, at a subsequent period of his life, the opinion of Johnson himself. He said to Sir Joshua Reynolds, ‘If a man does not make new acquaintance as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, Sir, should keep his friendship in constant repair.’
The celebrated Mr. Wilkes, whose notions and habits of life were very opposite to his, but who was ever eminent for literature and vivacity, sallied forth with a little Jeu d’Esprit upon the following passage in his Grammar of the English Tongue, prefixed to the Dictionary: ‘H seldom, perhaps never, begins any but the first syllable.’ In an Essay printed in The Publick Advertiser, this lively writer enumerated many instances in opposition to this remark; for example, ‘The authour of this observation must be a man of a quick appre-hension, and of a most compre-hensive genius.’ The position is undoubtedly expressed with too much latitude.
This light sally, we may suppose, made no great impression on our Lexicographer; for we find that he did not alter the passage till many years afterwards.a
He had the pleasure of being treated in a very different manner by his old pupil Mr. Garrick, in the following complimentary Epigram:
‘On JOHNSON’S DICTIONARY.
‘Talk of war with a Briton, he’ll boldly advance,
That one English soldier will beat ten of France;
Would we alter the boast from the sword to the pen,
Our odds are still greater, still greater our men:
In the deep mines of science though Frenchmen may toil,
Can their strength be compar’d to Locke, Newton, and Boyle?
Let them rally their heroes, send forth all their pow’rs,
Their verse-men and prose-men, then match them with ours!
First Shakspeare and Milton, like gods in the fight,
Have put their whole drama and epick to flight;
In satires, epistles, and odes, would they cope,
Their numbers retreat before Dryden and Pope;
And Johnson, well arm’d like a hero of yore,
Has beat forty French,b and will beat forty more!’
Johnson this year gave at once a proof