The Life of Samuel Johnson - James Boswell [788]
Ossory, JohnFitzpatrick (i745-i8i8), 2nd Earl of Upper, see Upper Ossory, John Fitzpatrick, 2nd Earl of
Otway, Thomas (1652–85), playwright and poet; staunch Tory; author of the plays The History and Fall of Caius Marius (1679), The Orphan (1680) and, most famously, Venice Preserv’d (1682), regarded as the best political tragedy of the period; S.J. commented of Venice Preserv’d that ‘striking passages are in every mouth’ (Lives of the English Poets): 773
Overbury, Sir Thomas (1581–1613), poet and victim of court intrigue: 300
Ovid, Publius Ovidius Naso (43 bc–ad 18), poet; banished by Augustus on grounds of immorality; his Metamorphoses greatly influenced early modern English poetry: 40, 45, 59, 169, 206, 275, 356, 386 n. a, 529 n. a
Oxford, bishops of, see Bancroft, Dr John; Lowth, Dr Robert
Oxford, Edward Harley, 2nd Earl of (1689–1741), book collector and patron of the arts; patron of Pope, correspondent and friend of Swift; arranged for the publication of Prior’s Poems; devoted to developing his father’s collection of manuscripts into one of the most impressive private libraries of the time; collection reached 50, 000 printed books, 350, 000 printed pamphlets and 41, 000 prints by the time of his death; library eventually catalogued by S.J. and William Oldys: 11, 88
Palmer, John (1729?–90), Unitarian divine: 681 n. a
Palmer, Revd Thomas Fyshe (1747–1802), Unitarian minister and radical; dined with S.J. in London c.i781; arrested for sedition after a mistake over the authorship of a document by the Friends of Liberty (1793); among the exiled reformers who settled in New South Wales and cultivated the colony: 9, 833 and n. a
Palmerston, Henry Temple, 2nd Viscount (1739–1802), politician and traveller; seat at the Board of Trade (1765); transferred to the Board of the Admiralty (1766–77); Board of the Treasury (1777–82); travels took precedence over political career; member of the Royal Society (1776); intimate with Garrick, Reynolds and Gibbon; member of the Literary Club; father of the future prime minister: 186 n. e, 252, 890, 943
Paoli, (Filippo Antonio) Pasquale (1725–1807), politician in Corsica; general of Corsica (1755–69); exiled to Britain (1769), arriving a hero for his stand against the Genoese and the French and the lavish praise from Rousseau in The Social Contract (1762); much publicized by J.B., who edited British Essays in Favour of the Brave Corsicans (1768); met S.J. in October 1769 and circle expanded to include Garrick, Bute, Burke, Horace Walpole and Fanny Burney; hopes for an Anglo-Corsican kingdom shattered by 1795: 262, 294, 298, 3°2, 3°3, 348, 361, 377, 379, 4°°,479, 536, 544, 575, 605, 672, 673, 674,676, 698, 699, 702,723, 734, 819, 944,946
Paradise, John (1743–95), linguist; Whig and pro-American; founder member of the Essex Head Club (1783); S.J. a frequent dining guest; S.J.’s most devoted friend during his protracted illness; had fluent knowledge of at least eight languages and a prodigious ability for language acquisition: 41, 731,903, 914,966
Paradise, Peter (1704–79), British consul in Salonika, Macedonia (from 1741); returned to London in the 1760s; father of John Paradise, both of whom part of S.J.’s circle: ^66 n. a
Parker, Sackville (1707–96), Oxford bookseller: 934
Parnell, Thomas (1679–1718), poet and essayist; minor canon of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin (1704), where he became a friend of Swift; contributor to The Spectator and The Guardian; prebend of Dunlavin (1713); member of the Scriblerus Club; Poems on Several Occasions edited by Pope and published posthumously (1722): 349, 586 n. a, 606, 643, 735, 792–3 and n. a,987
Parr, Dr Samuel (1747–1825), schoolmaster; established a school at Stanmore (1771) after failing to achieve promotion to headmaster at Harrow; Stanmore became the first English school to stage a Greek play; headmaster of Norwich Grammar School (1778); reputation as a controversialist, engagements including Richard Hurd; supporter of Fox and published The Characters of Charles