The Life of Samuel Johnson - James Boswell [916]
122. a Bibliotheque: That is to say, a review or literary journal.
123. in luminis oras: ‘Into the bright coasts of light’ – Lucretius, i.23.
124. De tristitia… ante captionem ejus: Of the passion, weariness, fear, and prayer of Christ before his arrest.
125. De resignatione… Morum: Of Sir Thomas More’s resignation of the Great Seal into the King’s hands.
126. Mori Defensio Morice: More’s Defence of Folly.
127. His definition of Network: ‘Any thing reticulated or decussated, at equal distances, with interstices between the intersections’.
128. his Tory… Oats: Tory: ‘One who adheres to the antient constitution of the state, and the apostolical hierarchy of the church of England, opposed to a whig’. Whig: ‘The name of a faction’. Pension: ‘An allowance made to any one without an equivalent. In England it is generally understood to mean pay given to a state hireling for treason to his country.’ Oats: ‘A grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people’.
129. the great parliamentary reward: In 1714 Parliament offered a reward of £20,000 for the discovery of a reliable method of determining the precise longitude at sea, essential for reliable navigation. The problem was eventually solved in 1759, when John Harrison (1693–1776) invented the marine chronometer.
130. making provision… over him: In the Preface to his Dictionary, Johnson wrote, ‘much of my life has been lost under the pressure of disease; much has been trifled away; and much has always been spent in provision for the day that was passing over me’ (2nd edn, 2 vols. (1755-6), I, sig. b/}v).
131. the Militia Bill: See n. 7.
132. Treaties with… the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel: See n. 8.
133. Admiral Byng: See n. 9.
134. con amore: With love, zeal or delight (OED).
135. Iste tulit… feretur: ‘Losing he wins, because his name will be | Ennobled by defeat who durst contend with me’ – Ovid, Metamorphoses, xiii.19–20.
136. pour encourager les autres: To put heart in the others.
137. Antigallican: Opposed to what is French (OED).
138. expedition to Rochfort: See n. 10.
139. honores mutant mores: ‘Honours change manners’ – cf. Suetonius, ‘Tiberius’, lxvii.4.
140. Thee… I woo: John Milton, ‘Il Penseroso’ (composed? i63i, first published 1645), ll. 63-4.
141. Quamvis… Sibylles: ‘Though I regret the departure of my old friend, I commend his resolve to settle at Cumae, and to present one citizen to the Sibyl’ – Juvenal, Satires, iii.1-3.
142. Sibyl: The name given by the Greeks and Romans to a prophetess inspired by a deity.
143. a poem by Blacklock: Thomas Blacklock (1721–91), ‘On Punch: An Epigram’.
144. a very accomplished lady: Possibly Mrs Boswell.
145. a Turkish lady: Mlle Emetulla.
146. Ma foi… circule: ‘Believe me, monsieur, our happiness depends on how our blood is flowing.’
147. Apres tout… passable: ‘When all is said and done, it’s a satisfactory world.’ Cf. the conclusion of Voltaire’s Le Monde comme il va (1748), where Ituriel resolves ‘de laisser aller le monde comme il va “car, dit-il, si tout n’est pas bien, tout est passable” ‘(‘to let the world alone, “for, he said, even though everything isn’t good, everything is fairly good”’).
148. Where ignorance… wise: Thomas Gray, Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College (ij^j), ll. 99–100.
149. la theorie des sensations agreables: Boswell alludes to Louis Jean Levesque de Pouilly’s Theorie des sentimens agreables (1743), which was translated into English anonymously as The Theory of Agreeable Sensations (1749).
150. ∗∗∗: perhaps ‘Van’ – i.e. Robert Vansittart.
151. manes: In Roman religion, the deified soul of the dead.
152. cater-cousins: Good friends (OED).
153. Blackfriars-bridge: Seen. 11.
154. sesquioctave… sesquinonal: Ratios of respectively one and a half to eight, and one and a half to nine.
155. placido lumine: ‘With kindly glance’ – Horace, Odes, IV.iii.2
156. Quicquid agunt homines: Whatever men do.
157. the French Prisoners: See n. 12.
158. a learned divine: Dr Archibald Maclaine.