But we may be misled perhaps by a wrong translation. The Hebrew word to bless signifies likewise to curse, and under the management of an intolerant priest good things easily run into their contraries. What follows is his taking tythes from Abraham. Nor will this serve our purpose, unless we interpret these tythes into fines for non-conformity; and then by the blessing we can easily understand absolution. We have seen much stranger things done with the Hebrew verity. If this be not allowed, I do not see how we can elicit fire and fagot from this adventure; for I think there is no inseparable connexion between tythes and persecution but in the ideas of a Quaker.--And so much for King Melchisedec. But the learned Professor, who has been hardily brought up in the keen atmosphere of WHOLESOME SEVERITIES and early taught to distinguish between de facto and de jure, thought it 'needless to enquire into facts, when he was secure of the right'.
This 'keen atmosphere of wholesome severities' reappears by the way in Mason's continuation of Gray's Ode to Vicissitude:--
'That breathes the keen yet wholesome air Of rugged penury.'
And later in the first book of Wordsworth's Excursion (ed. 1857, vi. 29):--
'The keen, the wholesome air of poverty.'
Johnson said of Warburton: 'His abilities gave him an haughty confidence, which he disdained to conceal or mollify; and his impatience of opposition disposed him to treat his adversaries with such contemptuous superiority as made his readers commonly his enemies, and excited against the advocate the wishes of some who favoured the cause. He seems to have adopted the Roman Emperour's determination, oderint dum metuant; he used no allurements of gentle language, but wished to compel rather than persuade.' Johnson's Works, viii. 288. See ante, ii. 36, and iv. 46.
* * * * *
APPENDIX B.
(Page 158.)
Johnson's Ode written in Sky was thus translated by Lord Houghton:--
'Where constant mist enshrouds the rocks, Shattered in earth's primeval shocks, And niggard Nature ever mocks The labourer's toil, I roam through clans of savage men, Untamed by arts, untaught by pen; Or cower within some squalid den O'er reeking soil.
Through paths that halt from stone to stone, Amid the din of tongues unknown, One image haunts my soul alone, Thine, gentle Thrale! Soothes she, I ask, her spouse's care? Does mother-love its charge prepare? Stores she her mind with knowledge rare, Or lively tale?
Forget me not! thy faith I claim, Holding a faith that cannot die, That fills with thy benignant name These shores of Sky.'
Hayward's Piozzi, i. 29.
* * * * *
APPENDIX C.
(Page 307.)
Johnson's use of the word big, where he says 'I wish thy books were twice as big,' enables me to explain a passage in The Life of Johnson (ante, iii. 348) which had long puzzled me. Boswell there represents him as saying:--'A man who loses at play, or who runs out his fortune at court, makes his estate less, in hopes of making it bigger.' Boswell adds in a parenthesis:--'I am sure of this word, which was often used by him.' He had been criticised by a writer in the Gent. Mag. 1785, p. 968, who quoting from the text the words 'a big book,' says:--'Mr. Boswell has made his friend (as in a few other passages) guilty of a Scotticism. An Englishman reads and writes a large book, and wears a great (not a big or bag) coat.' When Boswell came to publish The Life of Johnson, he took the opportunity to justify himself, though he did not care to refer directly to his anonymous critic. This explanation I discovered too late to insert in the text.
A JOURNEY
INTO
NORTH WALES,
IN
THE YEAR 1774.[1160]
TUESDAY, JULY 5.
We left Streatham 11 a.m. Price of four horses 2s. a mile.
JULY 6.
Barnet 1.40 p.m. On the road I read Tully's Epistles. At night at Dunstable. To Lichfield, 83 miles. To the Swan[1161].
JULY 7.
To Mrs. Porter's[1162]. To the Cathedral. To Mrs. Aston's. To Mr. Green's. Mr. Green's Museum was much admired, and Mr. Newton's china.
JULY 8.
To Mr. Newton's. To Mrs. Cobb's. Dr. Darwin's[1163]. I went again to Mrs. Aston's. She was sorry to part.
JULY 9.
Breakfasted at Mr. Garrick's. Visited Miss Vyse[1164]. Miss Seward. Went to Dr. Taylor's. I read a little on the road in Tully's Epistles and Martial. Mart. 8th, 44, 'lino pro limo[1165].'
JULY 10. Morning, at church. Company at dinner.
JULY 11.
At Ham[1166]. At Oakover. I was less pleased with Ham than when I saw it first, but my friends were much delighted.
JULY 12.
At Chatsworth. The Water willow. The cascade shot out from many spouts. The fountains[1167]. The water tree[1168]. The smooth floors in the highest rooms. Atlas, fifteen hands inch and half[1169].
River running through the park.