Selected Essays (Penguin Classics)

by Samuel Johnson

  3. how they hate his beams: Milton, Paradise Lost, iv. 37.

  No. 32. Saturday, 25 November 1758.

  1. levelled by Death: Claudian, De raptu Proserpinæ, ii. 302.

  2. necessity of Sleep: Plutarch, Lives, ‘Alexander’, xxii. 3–4.

  No. 36. Saturday, 23 December 1758.

  1. shortest train of intermediate propositions: Richard Cumberland (1631–1718), bishop of Peterborough, adversary of Hobbes (which no doubt recommended him to Johnson). The passage Johnson has in mind is the following: ‘such Acts which, in the shortest Method, produce the principal Effect as their chief End, are, in their own Nature, Acts strait and right, upon account of that natural Similitude which they bear to a right Line; which Line, between any two given Points, is always the shortest. These very same Acts, however, when they come afterwards to be compared with any Law (whether natural or instituted) as the Rule of Action; and, when such Acts are found to agree, and are conformable to such a Law or Rule, they then are called morally good, or exactly strait and right, i.e. they are well and exactly fitted to such a Rule. For, the Rule itself is called strait and right, because it directs and shews the shortest Way to the End proposed’ (Philosophical Enquiry into the Laws of Nature (1750), ‘Prolegomena’, sect. xvi, pp. xlv–xlvi).

  2. by stratagem: Samuel Butler, Hudibras, I. i. 125–26; Edward Young, Satires, vi. 188.

  3. which is to the west: John Petvin, Letters Concerning Mind (1750), pp. 40–41 (with some trivial deviations from Petvin’s actual words).

  No. 40. Saturday, 20 January 1759.

  1. took Dieskaw: Louis-Auguste Dieskau (1701–67), soldier, German by birth, entered into French service as the aide-de-camp of the maréchal de Saxe. He was commander of the French troops in Canada, 1755, and was taken prisoner at the Battle of Lake George, 8 September 1755.

  2. Eau de Luce: A mixture of alcohol, ammonia and amber, which was used in India as a cure for snake-bites, and in England as smelling-salts.

  No. 41. Saturday, 27 January 1759.

  1. morsque gradu: Apparently these verses were composed by Johnson himself on the death of his mother (Samuel Johnson: The Complete English Poems, ed. J. D. Fleeman (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1971), pp. 146 and 230–31). ‘But you, whoever you may be, you who thought the untimely death of an unhappy poet worthy of your tears; may this be your last time to weep, and may life and death for you flow smoothly on with an even pace.’

  2. says Tully: ‘Nemo enim est tam senex qui se annum non putet posse vivere’; Cicero, De Senectute, vii. 24.

  3. one sinner that repenteth: Luke 15:10.

  4. Immortality to light: 2 Timothy 1:10.

  5. cannot assuage it: Epicurus (341–270 BC) and Zeno of Citium (c.335–c.263 BC), both ancient Greek philosophers, of whose doctrines Johnson here supplies succinct accounts.

  6. wiped from the eyes: Revelation 21:4.

  No. 44. Saturday, 17 February 1759.

  1. art of Forgetfulness: Themistocles (c. 524–c. 460 BC), Athenian statesman and commander. Cicero, De Finibus, II. xxxii. 104.

  No. 48. Saturday, 17 March 1759.

  1. Tom Distich: A spoof name for a follower of the theatre.

  2. Malouin privateer: A pirate based in the port of St Malo, in Brittany.

  No. 49. Saturday, 24 March 1759.

  1. king of Prussia: Frederick II, or the Great (1712–86).

  2. where armies whole have sunk: Milton, Paradise Lost, ii. 592–4.

  3. Egre of the Severn: A tidal wave of unusual height, now more usually referred to when it occurs on the Severn as a ‘bore’.

  No. 50. Saturday, 31 March 1759.

  1. seven stages of life: As related by Jaques, in Shakespeare, As You Like It, II. vii. 142–66.

  2. by hermits: Raffaello Sanzio (1483–1520), Italian painter of the high Renaissance. Versailles was the lavish palace of the French monarch, built by Louis XIV just outside Paris.

  3. ejulations: Sounds of wailing or lamentation.

  No. 51. Saturday, 7 April 1759.

  1. instigation of a harlot: Alexander is said to have burnt the palace of Xerxes at Persepolis at the suggestion of Thais, a courtesan; cf. Quintus Curtius, History of Alexander, V. vii. 1–7 and VIII. i. 50–52.

  2. subjection to his wife: John Churchill (1650–1722), first duke of Marlborough, the greatest military commander of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. He was never forgiven by some for his desertion of James II in 1688, and the charges of avarice and domination by his wife Sarah (1660–1744), through whom he enjoyed the favour of Queen Anne, were in large measure the creation of his Jacobite and Tory enemies.

  3. that he was a Man: Juvenal, x. 41–2.

  No. 59. Saturday, 2 June 1759.

  1. the Poem of Hudibras: A satire by Samuel Butler (1613–80), published in three parts between 1663 and 1680. One of its main targets was religious dissent.

  No. 60. Saturday, 9 June 1759.

  1. kept nine years: Horace, Ars Poetica, 1. 388.

  2. His opinion was: There follows a series of critical commonplaces.

  3. Johnson: Ben Jonson.

  4. Otway: Thomas Otway (1652–85), playwright.

  5. Southern: Thomas Southern (1659–1746), playwright.

  6. Rowe: Nicholas Rowe (1674–1718), a playwright whose translation of Lucan was praised by Johnson as ‘one of the greatest productions of English poetry’.

  7. Congreve: William Congreve (1670–1729), dramatist and Whig statesman.

  8. Addison: Joseph Addison (1672–1719), Whig statesman, poet and man of letters; together with Richard Steele, responsible for the Spectator (1711–12), and hence an arbiter of taste in the early eighteenth century.

  9. Prior: Matthew Prior (1664–1721), poet, essayist and diplomat.

  10. Swift: Jonathan Swift (1667–1745), poet and man of letters; member of the Scriblerus Club and friend of Pope, Gay and Arbuthnot.

  11. Pope: Alexander Pope (1688–1744), the most accomplished poet, critic and translator of the early Hanoverian period.

  12. Phædra and Hippolitus: Edmund Smith, Phaedra and Hippolitus (1707).

  13. rest of the world together. Cf. The Adventurer No. 84 (25 August 1753), note 2.

  14. Barbarossa: John Brown, Barbarossa (1754).

  15. the author of Cleone: Robert Dodsley (1758).

  16. an Echo to the Sense: Pope, Essay on Criticism, 1. 365.

  17. instead of a stick: Butler, Hudibras, I. i. 11–12.

  18. find out why: Butler, Hudibras, II. ii. 385–8.

  No. 61. Saturday, 16 June 1759.

  1. some tribunal: The project for a British Academy, in emulation of the French Academy established by Cardinal de Richelieu, was frequently discussed after the Restoration, although it seems never to have enjoyed the support of Johnson, who in his ‘Life’ of Roscommon wrote that ‘such a society might perhaps without much difficulty be collected; but that it would produce what is expected from it may be doubted’ (Lives of the English Poets, ed. G. B. Hill, 3 vols. (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1905), i, p. 232).

  2. ornamental luxuriance: An echo perhaps of the critical views of John Dennis (1657–1734), whose pungently Whiggish outlook would have done little to recommend him to Johnson.

  3. monkish barbarity of rhyme: Cf. Milton, Paradise Lost, ‘Preface’.

  4. perpetual variation of the numbers: Cf. Rambler Nos. 88 and 90, in which Johnson praises Milton’s versification in similar terms.

  5. th’ effect of fire: Milton, Paradise Lost, ii. 594–5.

  6. quench’d these orbs: Milton, Paradise Lost, iii. 25.

  No. 65. Saturday, 14 July 1759.

  1. Sequel of Clarendon’s History: Johnson refers to The Life of Edward, Earl of Clarendon… Being a Continuation of the History of the Grand Rebellion (1759).

  2. whole winter’s fuel: Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Pieresc (1580–1637), antiquarian, philologist, astronomer. On account of both his humane learning and his wealth, he was accounted the Maecenas of hi
s age. The anecdote is related by Gilles Ménage, Ménagiana (1693).

  3. Bishop Lloyd: William Lloyd (1627–1717), bishop of St Asaph, Lichfield and Coventry, and Worcester. An opponent of Charles II and upholder of Revolution Principles after 1688, he was eventually driven insane by his remorseless study of the Book of Revelation.

  4. will easily conceive: Cf. Gilbert Burnet, Life and Death of Sir Matthew Hale, kt. (1682).

  5. never given: The Bodleian copy of the 1734 first edition of the second volume of this work (O.2.8 Jur.) bears the following inscription on the reverse of the title page: ‘The Original Manuscript of both Volumes of this History will be deposited in the Cotton Library by T Burnett’.

  6. two lowest of all human beings: I.e. John Oldmixon (1673–1742) and George Duckett (d. 1732).

  7. as he laid it in: Burnet’s character of Lloyd is as follows: ‘He was so exact in every thing he set about, that he never gave over any part of study, till he had quite mastered it. But when that was done, he went to another subject, and did not lay out his learning with the diligence with which he laid it in’ (Gilbert Burnet, History of his Own Time, 2 vols. (1724, 1734), i. 190).

  8. could never be perfected: Thomas Baker (1656–1740), author and antiquary, non-juror, friend of Matthew Prior.

  No. 66. Saturday, 21 July 1759.

  1. Alexandrian library… Palatine repositories: Both great libraries of antiquity. The Alexandrian library was founded by Ptolemy I. At the time of Callimachus (b. 310 BC) it held 400,000 volumes, and by the first century AD had expanded to 700,000 volumes. Ptolemy III is said to have deposited in the library the official, Athenian, copy of the works of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. It was for long thought that the library had been burnt in 642 by Amrou, the general of the caliph Omar, but this is now discredited. The Palatine is the hill in Rome on which the imperial palace of the Caesars was constructed.

  2. Sophocles and Euripides… Menander: Sophocles (496–406 BC), Greek tragedian, was said to be the author of some 120 plays, only 7 of which have survived. Euripides (480–406 BC), Greek tragedian, was said to have written some 80 or 90 plays, 19 of which have survived (although one, ‘Rhesus’, is of doubtful authenticity). Menander (c. 342–292 BC), comic playwright, was said to have written in the region of 100 plays, of which substantial fragments of four plays, and shorter fragments of many more, have survived.

  3. direct our endeavours: Here, for once at least, Johnson was of one mind with Gibbon, who in chapter fifty-one of The Decline and Fall chose also to lay the emphasis on how much of antiquity has survived, rather than on that portion which has perished: ‘I sincerely regret the more valuable libraries which have been involved in the ruin of the Roman empire; but when I seriously compute the lapse of ages, the waste of ignorance, and the calamities of war, our treasures, rather than our losses, are the object of my surprise. Many curious and interesting facts are buried in oblivion; the three great historians of Rome have been transmitted to our hands in a mutilated state, and we are deprived of many pleasing compositions of the lyric, iambic, and dramatic poetry of the Greeks. Yet we should gratefully remember, that the mischances of time and accident have spared the classic works to which the suffrage of antiquity had adjudged the first place of genius and glory: the teachers of ancient knowledge, who are still extant, had perused and compared the writings of their predecessors; nor can it fairly be presumed that any important truth, any useful discovery in art or nature, has been snatched away from the curiosity of modern ages’ (Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. D. J. Womersley (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1994), iii. 286).

  4. Malbranche and Locke: Nicolas Malebranche (1638–1715), French philosopher. John Locke (1632–1704), English philosopher.

  No. 72. Saturday, 1 September 1759.

  1. Themistocles: Themistocles (c. 524–c. 460 BC), Athenian politician and naval strategist; victor of the Battle of Salamis (480 BC).

  2. art of Forgetfulness: Cf. Idler No. 44.

  No. 81. Saturday, 3 November 1759.

  1. towards Quebec: Quebec had been taken by the English on 13 September 1759.

  No. 84. Saturday, 24 November 1759.

  1. servants of his chamber: Usually attributed to Louis II de Bourbon, prince de Condé (1621–86), French soldier, statesman and patron of the arts.

  No. 88. Saturday, 22 December 1759.

  1. a real Character: A reference to the title of the celebrated work by John Wilkins (1614–72), whose An Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language (1668) was an attempt to overcome the deficiencies of natural languages.

  2. with Applause: Suetonius, ‘Divus Augustus’, xcix.

  No. 103. Saturday, 5 April 1760.

  1. ultima vitæ: Juvenal, x. 275.

  2. that solemn week: I.e. Easter.

  MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS

  A Compleat Vindication of the Licensers of the Stage.

  1. BY AN IMPARTIAL HAND: The Compleat Vindication was published in May 1739, in response to the refusal of the Lord Chamberlain to grant a licence to Henry Brooke’s play Gustavus Vasa, presumably because in its depiction of a corrupt prime minister it was thought to reflect too closely upon Robert Walpole.

  2. at Court: That is, in the administration.

  3. L—and P—: George Lyttelton (1709–73), first baron Lyttelton, prominent politician and opponent of Sir Robert Walpole. William Pitt (1708–78), first earl of Chatham, Whig statesman and orator.

  4. special Jury: A jury consisting of persons who occupied a comparatively elevated station in life, such as that of banker or merchant, or who owned real property above a certain rateable value; cf. Samuel Johnson, London, 1. 252.

  5. the most inexorable Enemies: An allusion to the notorious indifference of Walpole to literary culture. Scholarly treatments of this subject include Bertrand Goldgar, Walpole and the Wits: The Relation of Politics to Literature, 1722–1742 (Lincoln, Nebr.: University of Nebraska Press, 1976) and Christine Gerrard, The Patriot Opposition to Walpole: Politics, Poetry, and National Myth 1725–1742 (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1994).

  6. through every Age: Henry Brooke, Gustavus Vasa (1739), I i. 22.

  7. the two Houses: I.e. the House of Commons and the House of Lords.

  8. ampliare suam auctoritatem: ‘It is the sign of a good judge that he should augment his authority’; a traditional legal maxim.

  9. a Standing Army: The maintenance of a standing army was a frequent topic amongst those suspicious of the motives of the ministry.

  10. th’ unletter’d Mind: Gustavus Vasa, ‘Prologue’.

  11. Anderson: A character in Gustavus Vasa.

  12. save thee: Gustavus Vasa, I i. 116.

  13. fettered in their Fears.—: Gustavus Vasa, I. ii. 80.

  14. my Country’s Freedom: Gustavus Vasa, I iii. 31.

  15. the Poet Laureat: At this time, Colley Cibber (1671–1757), the dramatist, actor and theatrical impresario.

  16. Imprimatur: Literally, ‘let it be published’; by extension, the permission to print something.

  17. the Gazetteer: The Daily Gazetteer, the newspaper of the ministry.

  An Essay on Epitaphs.

  1. ESSAY on EPITAPHS: Published in The Gentleman’s Magazine, September 1740, x, pp. 593–6.

  2. Sir ISAAC NEWTON: Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727), Master of the Royal Mint, PRS, pre-eminent mathematician and scientist, whose work on in particular optics and celestial mechanics exerted great influence over the imaginative world of the eighteenth century.

  3. forsan et Antipodes: ‘Here lies Pico della Mirandola: the Tagus, the Ganges, even the Antipodes, know the rest.’

  4. Illyricus: The suffix ‘-icus’ indicates ‘conqueror of or ‘slayer of’.

  5. hic quiescit: ‘Having searched out the laws of nature, Isaac Newton rests here.’

  6. Fragrance or of Beauty: Minutius (or Minucius) Felix (fl. second–third century AD), advocate, and early Latin Christian apologist. Johnson is thinkin
g of the following passage from the dialogue Octavius, in which Christian belief and conduct are defended against the charges of the pagans: ‘Nec mortuos coronamus. Ego vos in hoc magis miror, quemadmodum tribuatis exanimi aut [non] sentienti facem aut non sentienti coronam, cum et beatus non egeat et miser non gaudeat floribus’; ‘Nor do we garland the dead with flowers; I’m astonished by you, when you bestow a garland on a corpse, as if we assumed they could sense it: they are as happy in not needing flowers as they are unhappy in being unable to take pleasure in them’ (Octavius, xxxviii. 3).

  7. immobile Saxum: Abraham Cowley (1618–67), Royalist poet. The epitaph translates as follows: ‘O divine poet, while your golden writings fly far and wide throughout the globe and you live perpetually in fame, may you lie here in peaceful rest. May aged faith guard your urn, and may the muses keep watch over you with their inextinguishable torch. May this place be sacred, and let no one be so rash as to dare disturb this venerable bust with sacrilegious hand. May Cowley’s dust rest undisturbed, rest through sweet ages, and may his tombstone be unmoved.’

  8. Angelo: Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564), Florentine painter, sculptor, architect and poet. Johnson refers to the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (which he had himself not seen).

  9. Sannazarius: Jacopo Sannazzaro (1458–1530), Neapolitan poet and celebrant of rural life. The statues of Apollo and Minerva on either side of his tomb in the church of Santa Maria del Parto in Naples were renamed David and Judith.

  10. dole regum vices: Jean Passerat (1534–1602), French man of letters, pupil of Cujas, successor to Ramus in the chair of rhetoric at the Collège de France. The epitaph translates as follows: ‘Pause, traveller, and commiserate the fate of kings. Beneath this marble is laid the heart of a king who gave laws equally to the French and to the Poles. A murderer hidden beneath a cowl killed him. Pass on, traveller, and commiserate the fate of kings.’