'Obtain,' says Ford, 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'.' This advice Johnson seems to have pursued with a good inclination. His reading was always desultory, seldom resting on any particular author, but rambling from one book to another, and, by hasty snatches, hoarding up a variety of knowledge. It may be proper in this place to mention another general rule laid down by Ford for Johnson's future conduct : 'You will make your way the more easily in the world, as you are contented to dispute no man's claim to conversation-excellence they will, therefore, more willingly allow your pretensions as a writer.' 'But,' says Mrs. Piozzi, 'the features of peculiarity, which mark a character to all succeeding generations, are slow in coming to their growth.' That ingenious lady adds, with her usual vivacity, 'Can one, on such an occasion, forbear recollecting the predictions of Boileau's father, who said, stroking the head of the young satirist, "this little man has too much wit, but he will never speak ill of any one” 3 ? '

On Johnson's return from Cornelius Ford, Mr. Hunter, then Master of the Free-school at Lichfield, refused to receive him again on that foundation. At this distance of time, what his reasons were, it is vain to enquire: but to refuse assistance to a lad of promising genius must be pronounced harsh and illiberal. It did not, however, stop the progress of the young student's education. He was placed at another school, at Stourbridge in Worcestershire, under the care of Mr. Wentworth 5. Having gone through the rudiments of classic literature, he returned to his father's house, and was probably intended for the trade of a bookseller. He has been heard to say that he could bind

a book'. At the end of two years, being then about nineteen, he went to assist the studies of a young gentleman, of the name of Corbet, to the University of Oxford; and on the 31st of October, 1728, both were entered of Pembroke College; Corbet as a gentleman-commoner, and Johnson as a commoner'. The college tutor, Mr. Jordan, was a man of no genius; and Johnson, it seems, shewed an early contempt of mean abilities, in one or two instances behaving with insolence to that gentleman 3. Of his general conduct at the university there are no particulars that merit attention, except the translation of Pope's Messiah, which was a college exercise imposed upon him as a task by Mr. Jordan. Corbet left the university in about two years, and Johnson's salary ceased 5. He was, by consequence, straitened in his circumstances; but he still remained at college. Mr. Jordan, the tutor, went off to a living; and was succeeded by Dr. Adams, who afterwards became head of the college, and was esteemed through life for his learning, his talents, and his amiable character. Johnson grew more regular in his attendance. Ethics, theology, and classic literature were his favourite studies. He

Life, i. 56, n. 2; Letters, ii. 89.

2 Corbet had entered the year before. Life, i. 58, n. 1.

3 Ante, p. 164. 'He had a love and respect for Jorden, not for his literature, but for his worth. Whenever (said he) a young man becomes Jorden's pupil, he becomes his son." Life, i. 61.

4 Boswell recorded in his notebook in March 1776:-' Mr. Hector told me that the Master of Pembroke used to see him idling away his time in the quadrangle, and that he set him a task to turn Pope's Messiah into Latin (wrong, he was asked very civilly by Jorden to do it) upon which Mr. Johnson produced his admirable version of that poem.' Morrison Autographs, 2nd Series, i. 368. See Life, i. 61.

5 Murphy gets this statement from Hawkins, p. 9. Dr. Taylor told

Boswell that though Corbet's father had promised to support Johnson at Oxford 'in the character of his son's companion, in fact he never received any assistance whatever from that gentleman.' Life, i. 58.

Corbet, as the books of the College show, entered in 1727. In October, 1728, his charges became irregular, and ceased altogether in the following December, when no doubt he left College. Johnson, as I have shown, was only fourteen months in College, leaving in December, 1729. Ib. i. 78, n. 2. Adams was only 'his nominal tutor.' Ib. p. 79. 6 Hawkins, p. II. 'He told me what he read solidly at Oxford was Greek ... that the study of which he was the most fond was Metaphysicks, but he had not read much even in that way.' Life, i. 70.

discovered,

6

discovered, notwithstanding, early symptoms of that wandering disposition of mind which adhered to him to the end of his life. His reading was by fits and starts, undirected to any particular science'. General philology, agreeably to his cousin Ford's advice, was the object of his ambition. He received, at that time, an early impression of piety, and a taste for the best authors ancient and modern. It may, notwithstanding, be questioned whether, except his Bible, he ever read a book entirely through. Late in life, if any man praised a book in his presence, he was sure to ask, Did you read it through?' If the answer was in the affirmative, he did not seem willing to believe it 3. He continued at the university till the want of pecuniary supplies obliged him to quit the place. He obtained, however, the assistance of a friend, and returning in a short time was able to complete a residence of three years. The history of his exploits at Oxford, he used to say, was best known to Dr. Taylor and Dr. Adams 5. Wonders are told of his memory, and, indeed, all who knew him late in life can witness that he retained that faculty in the greatest vigour 6.

From the university Johnson returned to Lichfield. His father died soon after, December 1731; and the whole receipt out of his effects, as appeared by a memorandum in the son's hand-writing, dated 15th June, 1732, was no more than twenty pounds'. In

this exigence, determined that poverty should neither depress his spirit nor warp his integrity, he became under-master of a Grammar-school at Market Bosworth in Leicestershire. That resource, however, did not last long. Disgusted by the pride of Sir Wolstan Dixie, the patron of that little seminary, he left the place in discontent, and ever after spoke of it with abhorrence 1. In 1733 he went on a visit to Mr. Hector, who had been his school-fellow, and was then a surgeon at Birmingham, lodging at the house of Warren, a bookseller 2. At that place Johnson

translated a Voyage to Abyssinia, written by Jerome Lobo, a Portugueze missionary. This was the first literary work from the pen of Dr. Johnson. His friend Hector was occasionally his amanuensis. The work was, probably, undertaken at the desire of Warren, the bookseller, and was printed at Birmingham; but it appears in the Literary Magazine, or History of the Works of the Learned, for March, 1735, that it was published by Bettesworth and Hitch, Pater-noster-row '. . .

Having finished this work, Johnson returned in February, 1734, to his native city, and, in the month of August following, published Proposals for printing by subscription, the Latin Poems of Politian, with the History of Latin Poetry, from the Era of Petrarch to the time of Politian; and also the Life of Politian, to be added by the Editor, Samuel Johnson 2. The book to be printed in thirty octavo sheets price five shillings. It is to be regretted that this project failed for want of encouragement. Johnson, it seems, differed from Boileau, Voltaire, and D'Alembert, who have taken upon them to proscribe all modern efforts to write with elegance in a dead language3. For a decision, pronounced in so high a tone, no good reason can be assigned. The interests of learning require, that the diction of

scholar of the present age would dream of writing the history of this late period of Latin poetry?

3

Johnson in his last work shows his fondness for modern Latin poetry. He says: Pope had sought for images and sentiments in a region not known to have been explored by many other of the English writers; he had consulted the modern writers of Latin poetry, a class of authors whom Boileau endeavoured to bring into contempt, and who are too generally neglected.' Works, viii. 299.

Boileau ridicules them in a Fragment de Dialogue, where the Interlocuteurs are 'Apollon, Horace, des Muses, des Poètes.' Euvres, ed. 1747, iii. 55.

Greece