He also persevered in his wild allegation,that he questioned if there was a tree between Edinburgh and the English border older than himself.I assured him he was mistaken,and suggested that the proper punishment would be that he should receive a stripe at every tree above a hundred years old,that was found within that space.He laughed,and said,'I believe I might submit to it for a BAUBEE!'
The doubts which,in my correspondence with him,I had ventured to state as to the justice and wisdom of the conduct of Great-Britain towards the American colonies,while I at the same time requested that he would enable me to inform myself upon that momentous subject,he had altogether disregarded;and had recently published a pamphlet,entitled,Taxation no Tyranny;an answer to the Resolutions and Address of the American Congress.
He had long before indulged most unfavourable sentiments of our fellow-subjects in America.For,as early as 1769,I was told by Dr.John Campbell,that he had said of them,'Sir,they are a race of convicts,and ought to be thankful for any thing we allow them short of hanging.'
Of this performance I avoided to talk with him;for I had now formed a clear and settled opinion,that the people of America were well warranted to resist a claim that their fellow-subjects in the mother-country should have the entire command of their fortunes,by taxing them without their own consent;and the extreme violence which it breathed,appeared to me so unsuitable to the mildness of a christian philosopher,and so directly opposite to the principles of peace which he had so beautifully recommended in his pamphlet respecting Falkland's Islands,that I was sorry to see him appear in so unfavourable a light.
On Friday,March 24,I met him at the LITERARY CLUB,where were Mr.
Beauclerk,Mr.Langton,Mr.Colman,Dr.Percy,Mr.Vesey,Sir Charles Bunbury,Dr.George Fordyce,Mr.Steevens,and Mr.Charles Fox.Before he came in,we talked of his Journey to the Western Islands,and of his coming away 'willing to believe the second sight,'which seemed to excite some ridicule.I was then so impressed with the truth of many of the stories of it which I had been told,that I avowed my conviction,saying,'He is only WILLINGto believe:I DO believe.The evidence is enough for me,though not for his great mind.What will not fill a quart bottle will fill a pint bottle.I am filled with belief.''Are you?(said Colman,)then cork it up.'
I found his Journey the common topick of conversation in London at this time,wherever I happened to be.At one of Lord Mansfield's formal Sunday evening conversations,strangely called Levees,his Lordship addressed me,'We have all been reading your travels,Mr.
Boswell.'I answered,'I was but the humble attendant of Dr.
Johnson.'The Chief Justice replied,with that air and manner which none,who ever saw and heard him,can forget,'He speaks ill of nobody but Ossian.'
Johnson was in high spirits this evening at the club,and talked with great animation and success.He attacked Swift,as he used to do upon all occasions.The Tale of a Tub is so much superiour to his other writings,that one can hardly believe he was the authour of it:'there is in it such a vigour of mind,such a swarm of thoughts,so much of nature,and art,and life.'I wondered to hear him say of Gulliver's Travels,'When once you have thought of big men and little men,it is very easy to do all the rest.'Iendeavoured to make a stand for Swift,and tried to rouse those who were much more able to defend him;but in vain.Johnson at last,of his own accord,allowed very great merit to the inventory of articles found in the pocket of the Man Mountain,particularly the deion of his watch,which it was conjectured was his God;as he consulted it upon all occasions.He observed,that 'Swift put his name to but two things,(after he had a name to put,)The Plan for the Improvement of the English Language,and the last Drapier's Letter.'
From Swift,there was an easy transition to Mr.Thomas Sheridan--JOHNSON.'Sheridan is a wonderful admirer of the tragedy of Douglas,and presented its authour with a gold medal.Some years ago,at a coffee-house in Oxford,I called to him,"Mr.Sheridan,Mr.Sheridan,how came you to give a gold medal to Home,for writing that foolish play?"This you see,was wanton and insolent;but I MEANT to be wanton and insolent.A medal has no value but as a stamp of merit.And was Sheridan to assume to himself the right of giving that stamp?If Sheridan was magnificent enough to bestow a gold medal as an honorary reward of dramatick excellence,he should have requested one of the Universities to choose the person on whom it should be conferred.Sheridan had no right to give a stamp of merit:it was counterfeiting Apollo's coin.'
On Monday,March 27,I breakfasted with him at Mr Strahan's.He told us,that he was engaged to go that evening to Mrs.Abington's benefit.'She was visiting some ladies whom I was visiting,and begged that I would come to her benefit.I told her I could not hear:but she insisted so much on my coming,that it would have been brutal to have refused her.'This was a speech quite characteristical.He loved to bring forward his having been in the gay circles of life;and he was,perhaps,a little vain of the solicitations of this elegant and fashionable actress.He told us,the play was to be the The Hypocrite,altered from Cibber's Nonjuror,so as to satirize the Methodists.'I do not think (said he,)the character of The Hypocrite justly applicable to the Methodists,but it was very applicable to the Nonjurors.'
Mr.Strahan had taken a poor boy from the country as an apprentice,upon Johnson's recommendation.Johnson having enquired after him,said,'Mr.Strahan,let me have five guineas on account,and I'll give this boy one.Nay if a man recommends a boy,and does nothing for him,it is sad work.Call him down.'