PART II.

ESSAY I.

THE LITERARY LIFE OF DR. JOHNSON.

SAMUEL JOHNSON was born at Lichfield, in Staffordshire, on September the 7th, 1709. From his father, who was a native of Cubley in Derbyshire, and a bookseller at Lichfield, he inherited that morbid melancholy which so frequently embittered his existence; nor was this the only disease with which he had to struggle; from his nurse, he imbibed the distemper called the king's evil, and for the removal of which his parents, who were staunch Jacobites, presented him to Queen Anne for the royal touch. An operation, however, notwithstanding this potent remedy, became necessary, and the lower part of his face continued ever afterwards disfigured by the marks of the knife. His hearing also, and the sight of his left eye, were injured by this complaint.

In the education of Johnson no deviation from the common plan is perceptible; after acquiring the elements of his own language, he was sent to the free-school at Lichfield, where, under the care of two very able masters, he made a rapid progress in classical literature. At the age of fifteen, and in the year 1725, he resided for some months with the Rev. Cornelius Ford, his cousin; a man of licentious manners, but possessed of considerable talents and learning, and from him he received much and important On quitting the roof

assistance in his studies. of this relation, he was placed, by his direction, in a school at Stourbridge in Worcestershire, at that time conducted by Mr. Wentworth, and, having remained there rather better than a twelvemonth, he returned to his father's house.

His

During this early period of his life, many of the features which distinguished his character through life, were apparent. He was ambitious to excel, to be considered as the chieftain of his class at school, and he demanded from his companions great deference and attention. memory was peculiarly strong and retentive, and he was uncommonly inquisitive, but, at the same time, exhibited a constitutional indolence, and an aversion from regular study; what he had to perform, he would delay to execute as long as

possible, and then dispatch it with singular promp

titude and vigour.

He seldom mingled in the

common diversions of his school-fellows, but preferred sauntering in the fields, where he was usually employed in talking to himself.

At Lichfield he spent two years in a very desultory course of reading, a mode of acquiring knowledge to which he had been attached whilst a very young boy, and which was afterwards confirmed by the advice of Mr. Ford; "obtain," said he, "some general principles of every science: he who can talk only on one subject, or act only in one department, is seldom wanted, and, perhaps, never wished for; while the man of general knowledge can often benefit, and always please." Like Milton, he was passionately fond of romances; and Dr. Percy has recorded, that when a boy, and spending part of a summer at his parsonage-house in the country, he chose for his regular reading the old Spanish romance of Felixmarte of Hercania in folio, which he read quite through. During his residence at Lichfield, however, though his reading was various and without system, it did not consist of works of mere amusement; to adopt his own words, he studied ". all literature, all ancient authors," and he attempted translations from Homer, Virgil, and Horace. Of those early efforts, Mr. Boswell

has collected some specimens, of which the two versions from Horace are, by many degrees, the best. It is probable, indeed, that as he never embraced any profession, the plan, if it can be so termed, that he now pursued, and which he continued, with few exceptions, through life, was the one best calculated for the situation that he was destined to fill in the republic of letters; it was adapted, in fact, for the acquisition of uncommon and multifarious knowledge.

Owing to the poverty of his parents, it was not likely that Johnson should ever enjoy the benefits to be derived from an University; fortunately, however, when about nineteen, he was selected by Mr. Corbet, of Shropshire, to attend and assist the studies of his son at Oxford; this young man had been the school-fellow of Johnson, and on the 31st of October, 1728, they were both entered of Pembroke College: it is uncertain, however, notwithstanding a previous promise of support, whether Johnson received any pecuniary assistance from Mr. Corbet; at least, his poverty, which, during his short residence at college, was sometimes extreme, seems strongly to indicate.a. disgraceful failure on the part of his supposed friend.

His studies whilst at Oxford were, as they. had hitherto been, vigorous, but unmethodical..

What he read solidly at Oxford, he told Mr. Boswell, was Greek; not the Grecian historians, but Homer and Euripides, and now and then a little epigram; that the study of which he was the most fond was metaphysicks, but he had not read much, even in that way. What materially contributed to produce irregularity both in his manners and literary pursuits, was the insufficiency of his tutor, Mr. Jorden, who, though a man of moral worth, possessed no abilities of a superior kind; and while Johnson loved the man, he held his literature in contempt. The consequence of this was, a neglect of his stated duties and attendance, and an attempt to seduce others into the same conduct. "I have heard from some of his contemporaries," relates Dr. Percy, "that he was generally seen lounging at the college-gate, with a circle of young students round him, whom he was entertaining with wit, and keeping from their studies, if not spiriting them up to rebellion against the college discipline, which in his maturer years he so much extolled."

he was,

It must not be inferred, however, from this account, that he neglected the cultivation of his intellectual powers; in fact, during the three years which he spent at Pembroke College, an intense, though desultory reader, and stored