Open to all, true only to thyself, Thou know'st those arts which blast with envious praise, Which aggravate a fault with feigned excuses, And drive discountenanced virtue from the throne;That leave blame of rigour to the prince, And of his every gift usurp the merit;That hide in seeming zeal a wicked purpose, And only build upon another's ruin."These characters Dr. Johnson, however, did not delight in reading, or in hearing of: he always maintained that the world was not half so wicked as it was represented; and he might very well continue in that opinion, as he resolutely drove from him every story that could make him change it; and when Mr. Bickerstaff's flight confirmed the report of his guilt, and my husband said, in answer to Johnson's astonishment, that he had long been a suspected man: "By those who look close to the ground, dirt will be seen, sir," was the lofty reply. "I hope I see things from a greater distance."His desire to go abroad, particularly to see Italy, was very great; and he had a longing wish, too, to leave some Latin verses at the Grand Chartreux.
He loved, indeed, the very act of travelling, and I cannot tell how far one might have taken him in a carriage before he would have wished for refreshment. He was therefore in some respects an admirable companion on the road, as he piqued himself upon feeling no inconvenience, and on despising no accommodations. On the other hand, however, he expected no one else to feel any, and felt exceedingly inflamed with anger if any one complained of the rain, the sun, or the dust. "How," said he, "do other people bear them?" As for general uneasiness, or complaints of lone confinement in a carriage, he considered all lamentations on their account as proofs of an empty head, and a tongue desirous to talk without materials of conversation. "A mill that goes without grist," said he, "is as good a companion as such creatures."I pitied a friend before him, who had a whining wife that found everything painful to her, and nothing pleasing. "He does not know that she whimpers," says Johnson; "when a door has creaked for a fortnight together, you may observe--the master will scarcely give sixpence to get it oiled."Of another lady, more insipid than offensive, I once heard him say, "She has some softness indeed, but so has a pillow." And when one observed, in reply, that her husband's fidelity and attachment were exemplary, notwithstanding this low account at which her perfections were rated--"Why, sir," cries the Doctor, "being married to those sleepy-souled women is just like playing at cards for nothing: no passion is excited, and the time is filled up. I do not, however, envy a fellow one of those honeysuckle wives for my part, as they are but CREEPERS at best, and commonly destroy the tree they so tenderly cling about."For a lady of quality, since dead, who received us at her husband's seat in Wales with less attention than he had long been accustomed to, he had a rougher denunciation. "That woman," cries Johnson, "is like sour small-beer, the beverage of her table, and produce of the wretched country she lives in: like that, she could never have been a good thing, and even that bad thing is spoiled." This was in the same vein of asperity, and I believe with something like the same provocation, that he observed of a Scotch lady, "that she resembled a dead nettle; were she alive," said he, "she would sting."Mr. Johnson's hatred of the Scotch is so well known, and so many of his bons mots expressive of that hatred have been already repeated in so many books and pamphlets, that 'tis perhaps scarcely worth while to write down the conversation between him and a friend of that nation who always resides in London, and who at his return from the Hebrides asked him, with a firm tone of voice, "What he thought of his country?" "That it is a very vile country, to be sure, sir," returned for answer Dr. Johnson. "Well, sir!"replies the other, somewhat mortified, "God made it." "Certainly He did,"answers Mr. Johnson again, "but we must always remember that He made it for Scotchmen, and comparisons are odious, Mr. S----; but God made hell."Dr. Johnson did not, I think, much delight in that kind of conversation which consists in telling stories. "Everybody," said he, "tells stories of me, and I tell stories of nobody. I do not recollect," added he, "that I have ever told YOU, that have been always favourites, above three stories;but I hope I do not play the Old Fool, and force people to hear uninteresting narratives, only because I once was diverted with them myself." He was, however, no enemy to that sort of talk from the famous Mr. Foote, "whose happiness of manner in relating was such," he said, "as subdued arrogance and roused stupidity. HIS stories were truly like those of Biron in Love's Labour's Lost, so VERY attractive--'That aged ears played truant with his tales, And younger hearings were quite ravished, So sweet and voluble was his discourse.'
