mention, that while talking, or even musing as he sat in his chair, he commonly held his head to one side towards his right shoulder, and shook it in a tremulous manner, moving his body backwards and forwards, and rubbing his left knee in the same direction with the palm of his hand. In the intervals of articulating he made various sounds with his mouth, sometimes as if ruminating, or what is called chewing the cud, sometimes giving a half whistle, sometimes making his tongue play backwards from the roof of his mouth, as if clucking like a hen, and sometimes protruding it against his upper gums in front, as if pronouncing quickly, under his breath, too, too, too; all this accompanied with a thoughtful look, but more frequently with a smile. Generally, when he had concluded a period in the course of a dispute, by which time he was a good deal exhausted by violence and vociferation, he used to blow out his breath like a whale. This, I suppose, was a relief to his lungs, and seemed in him to be a contemptuous mode of expression, as if he had made the arguments of his opponent fly like chaff before the wind.-Boswell, 165.

JOHNSON was much pleased with a small Milton of mine published in the author's lifetime, and with the Greek epigram on his own effigy, of its being the picture, not of him, but of a bad painter.-Dr. John Sharp, 167.

LET me not be prejudiced hereafter against the appearance of piety in mean persons, who, with indeterminate notions, and perverse or inelegant conversation, perhaps are doing all they can.-Johnson.

TRINITY College, Dublin, at this time (July 1765) surprised Johnson with a spontaneous compliment of the highest academical honours, by creating him Doctor of Laws. [Hawkins and Murphy thought that Johnson's attachment to Oxford prevented him from assuming the title which it conferred. The fact is true; but it is still more remarkable that he never used the title of Doctor before his name, even after his Oxford degree.-Croker]. He called himself Mr. Johnson, as appears from many of his cards or notes to myself, and Í have seen many from him to other persons, in which he uniformly takes that designation. I once observed on his table a letter directed to him with the addition of Esquire, and objected to it as being a designation inferior to that of doctor; but he checked me, and seemed pleased with it, because, as I conjectured, he liked to be sometimes taken out of the class of literary men, and to be merely genteel-un gentilhomme comme un autre.-Boswell, 168.

HE that claims, either in himself or for another, the honours of perfection, will surely injure the reputation which he designs to assist.-Johnson, 172.

A PEASANT and a philosopher may be equally satisfied, but not equally happy.-174.

A YOUTHFUL passion for abstracted devotion should not be encouraged.175.

Do NOT accustom yourself to enchain your volatility by Vows.-179.

ALL the importunities and perplexities of business are softness and luxury, compared with the incessant cravings of vacancy, and the unsatisfactory expedients of idleness.

To OMIT for a year, or for a day, the most efficacious method of advancing Christianity, in compliance with any purposes that terminate on this side of the grave, is a crime of which I know not that the world has yet had an example, except in the practice of the planters of America, a race of mortals whom, I suppose, no other man wishes to resemble.-181.

I AM not very willing that any language should be totally extinguished. The similitude and derivation of languages afford the most indubitable proof of the traduction of nations, and the genealogy of mankind. They add often physical certainty to historical evidence; and often supply the only evidence of ancient emigrations, and of the revolutions of ages which left no written monuments behind them. With men of letters I would not unwillingly compound, by wishing the continuance of every language, however narrow in its extent, or however incommodious for common purposes, till it is reposited in some version of a known book, that it may be always hereafter examined and compared with other languages, and then permitting its disuse.-182.

KNOWLEDGE always desires increase; it is like fire, which must first be kindled by some external agent, but which will afterwards propagate itself.

THE efficacy of ignorance has long been tried, and has not produced the consequence expected. Let knowledge, therefore, take its turn; and let the patrons of privation stand awhile aside, and admit the operation of positive principles.

HERE Johnson comes,-unblest with outward grace,
His rigid morals stamp'd upon his face;
While strong conceptions struggle in his brain;
(For even wit is brought to bed with pain):

To view him, porters with their loads would rest,
And babes cling frighted to the nurse's breast.
With looks convulsed he roars in pompous strain,
And, like an angry lion, shakes his mane.

The Nine, with terror struck, who ne'er had seen
Aught human with so terrible a mien,
Debating whether they should stay or run,
Virtue steps forth, and claims him for her son.
With gentle speech she warns him now to yield,
Nor stain his glories in the doubtful field;
But, wrapt in conscious worth, content sit down,
Since fame, resolved his various pleas to crown,
Though forced his present claim to disavow,
Had long reserved a chaplet for his brow.
He bows, obeys; for Time shall first expire,
Ere Johnson stay, when Virtue bids retire.

-Mr. Cuthbert Shaw, 183. Johnson said, he thought he had already (1767) done his part as a writer. "I should have thought so too," said the king, "if you had not written so well." Johnson observed to me, upon this, that "no man could have paid a handsomer compliment; and it was fit for a king to pay. It was decisive." When asked by another friend, at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, whether he made any reply to this high compliment, he answered, "No, sir. When the king had said it, it was to be so. It was not for me to bandy civilities with my sovereign." Perhaps no man who had spent his whole life in courts could have shown a more nice and dignified sense of true politeness than Johnson did in this instance.-Boswell, 185.

"You do not think, then, Dr. Johnson, that there was much argument in the case?" (the controversy between Warburton and Lowth). Johnson said he did not think there was. "Why, truly," said the king, "when once it comes to calling names, argument is pretty well at an end."

SOLITUDE excludes pleasure, and does not always secure peace. Some communication of sentiments is commonly necessary to give vent to the imagination, and discharge the mind of its own flatulencies.-Johnson, 188.

JOHNSON. "Hume would never have written history had not Voltaire written it before him. He is an echo of Voltaire."Boswell. "But, sir, we have Lord Kames."-Johnson. "You have Lord Kames. Keep him; ha, ha, ha!" (Speaking of Robertson he said) "Sir, I love Robertson, and I won't talk of his book " ("History of Scotland ").—Boswell, 191.

MANY qualities contribute to domestic happiness, upon which poetry has no colours to bestow.—Johnson, 192.

JOHNSON, to be sure, has a roughness in his manner; but no man alive has a more tender heart. He has nothing of the bear but his skin. [It was drolly said, in reference to the pensions granted to Drs. Shebbeare and Johnson, that the king had pensioned a She-bear and a He-bear.-Croker.] -Goldsmith, 195.

I HAVE been told that scarcely a village of Italy wants its historian. Johnson, 196.

WHOEVER loads life with unnecessary scruples provokes the attention of others on his conduct, and incurs the censure of singularity without reaping the reward of superior virtue. -199.

Oн, let us not be found, when our Master calls us, ripping the lace off our waistcoats, but the spirit of contention from our souls and tongues! Let us all conform in outward customs, which are of no consequence, to the manners of those whom we live among, and despise such paltry distinctions. Alas! a man who cannot get to heaven in a green coat, will not find his way thither the sooner in a grey one.-200.

FEAR is one of the passions of human nature, of which it is impossible to divest it. You (General Paoli) remember that the Emperor Charles V. when he read upon the tombstone of a Spanish nobleman, "Here lies one who never knew fear," wittily said, "Then he never snuffed a candle with his fingers."-202.

PERFECT good breeding consists in having no particular mark of any profession, but a general elegance of manners.-203. THERE is no arguing with Johnson; for when his pistol misses fire, he knocks you down with the but-end of it.— Goldsmith, 208.

PROVIDENCE has wisely ordered that the more numerous men are, the more difficult it is for them to agree in anything, and so they are governed.-Johnson, 209.

THOUGH the most accessible and communicative man alive, yet when Johnson suspected he was invited to be exhibited, he constantly spurned the invitation.-Dr. Marwell, 216.

On my observing to Johnson, that a certain gentleman had remained silent the whole evening, in the midst of a very brilliant and learned society, "Sir," said he, "the conversation overflowed and drowned him.”—217.

WANT of tenderness, Johnson always alleged, was want of parts, and was no less a proof of stupidity than depravity.

WHATEVER might be thought of some Methodist teachers, Johnson said he could scarcely doubt the sincerity of that man, who travelled 900 miles in a month, and preached twelve times in a week; for no adequate reward, merely temporal, could be given for such indefatigable labour.-218.

IN a discourse by Sir William Jones, addressed to the Asiatic Society, Feb. 24, 1785, is the following passage:"One of the most sagacious men in this age, who continues, I hope, to improve and adorn it, Samuel Johnson, remarked in my hearing, that if Newton had flourished in ancient Greece, he would have been worshipped as a divinity."-Malone.

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SPEAKING of the inward light, to which some Methodists pretended, Johnson said, it was a principle utterly incompatible with social or civil security. "If a man," said he, tends to a principle of action of which I can know nothing, nay, not so much as that he has it, but only that he pretends to it, how can I tell what that person may be prompted to do? When a person professes to be governed by a written ascertained law, I can then know where to find him."-Dr. Maxwell, 219.

SPEAKING of a dull, tiresome fellow whom he (Johnson) chanced to meet, he said, "That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one."

JOHNSON observed that a man of sense and education should seek a suitable companion in a wife. It was a miserable thing when the conversation could only be such as whether the mutton should be boiled or roasted, and probably a dispute about that.

ADVENTITIOUS accomplishments may be possessed by all ranks; but one may easily distinguish the born gentlewoman. -Johnson, 220.

GENTLEMEN of education are pretty much the same in all countries; the condition of the lower orders, the poor especially, is the true mark of national discrimination.

USHER was the great luminary of the Irish Church; and a greater no Church could boast of; at least in modern times. -221.

WHATEVER philosophy may determine of material nature, it is certainly true of intellectual nature, that it abhors a vacuum: our minds cannot be empty; and evil will break in upon them if they are not preoccupied by good.-224.

OF our friend Goldsmith he said, "Sir, he is so much afraid of being unnoticed, that he often talks merely lest you should forget that he is in the company."-Boswell. "Yes, he stands