Life of Johnson
Chapter 20 : 'It is yet in the power of a great people to reward the poet whose name they boast

'It is yet in the power of a great people to reward the poet whose name they boast, and from their alliance to whose genius, they claim some kind of superiority to every other nation of the earth; that poet, whose works may possibly be read when every other monument of British greatness shall be obliterated; to reward him, not with pictures or with medals, which, if he sees, he sees with contempt, but with tokens of grat.i.tude, which he, perhaps, may even now consider as not unworthy the regard of an immortal spirit.'

[Page 231: Johnson's admiration of Milton. aetat 42.]

Surely this is inconsistent with 'enmity towards Milton,' which Sir John Hawkins[681] imputes to Johnson upon this occasion, adding,

'I could all along observe that Johnson seemed to approve not only of the design, but of the argument; and seemed to exult in a persuasion, that the reputation of Milton was likely to suffer by this discovery.

That he was not privy to the imposture, I am well persuaded; but that he wished well to the argument, may be inferred from the Preface, which indubitably was written by Johnson.'

Is it possible for any man of clear judgement to suppose that Johnson, who so n.o.bly praised the poetical excellence of Milton in a Postscript to this very 'discovery,' as he then supposed it, could, at the same time, exult in a persuasion that the great poet's reputation was likely to suffer by it? This is an inconsistency of which Johnson was incapable; nor can any thing more be fairly inferred from the Preface, than that Johnson, who was alike distinguished for ardent curiosity and love of truth, was pleased with an investigation by which both were gratified. That he was actuated by these motives, and certainly by no unworthy desire to depreciate our great epick poet, is evident from his own words; for, after mentioning the general zeal of men of genius and literature 'to advance the honour, and distinguish the beauties of _Paradise Lost_', he says,

'Among the inquiries to which this ardour of criticism has naturally given occasion, none is more obscure in itself, or more worthy of rational curiosity, than a retrospect[682] of the progress of this mighty genius in the construction of his work; a view of the fabrick gradually rising, perhaps, from small beginnings, till its foundation rests in the centre, and its turrets sparkle in the skies; to trace back the structure through all its varieties, to the simplicity of its first plan; to find what was first projected, whence the scheme was taken, how it was improved, by what a.s.sistance it was executed, and from what stores the materials were collected; whether its founder dug them from the quarries of Nature, or demolished other buildings to embellish his own.'

Is this the language of one who wished to blast the laurels of Milton[683]?

[Page 232: Mrs. Anna Williams. A.D. 1751.]

Though Johnson's circ.u.mstances were at this time far from being easy, his humane and charitable disposition was constantly exerting itself.

Mrs. Anna Williams, daughter of a very ingenious Welsh physician, and a woman of more than ordinary talents and literature, having come to London in hopes of being cured of a cataract in both her eyes, which afterwards ended in total blindness, was kindly received as a constant visitor at his house while Mrs. Johnson lived; and after her death, having come under his roof in order to have an operation upon her eyes performed with more comfort to her than in lodgings, she had an apartment from him during the rest of her life, at all times when he had a house[684].

[Page 233: Johnson's pleasure in her company. aetat 43.]

[Page 234: Death of Johnson's wife. A.D. 1752.]

1752: aeTAT. 43.--In 1752 he was almost entirely occupied with his _Dictionary_. The last paper of his _Rambler_ was published March 2[685], this year; after which, there was a cessation for some time of any exertion of his talents as an essayist. But, in the same year, Dr.

Hawkesworth, who was his warm admirer, and a studious imitator of his style[686], and then lived in great intimacy with him, began a periodical paper, ent.i.tled _The Adventurer_, in connection with other gentlemen, one of whom was Johnson's much-loved friend, Dr. Bathurst; and, without doubt, they received many valuable hints from his conversation, most of his friends having been so a.s.sisted in the course of their works.

[Page 235: Communications by dreams. aetat 43.]

That there should be a suspension of his literary labours during a part of the year 1752, will not seem strange, when it is considered that soon after closing his _Rambler_, he suffered a loss which, there can be no doubt, affected him with the deepest distress[687]. For on the 17th of March, O.S., his wife died. Why Sir John Hawkins should unwarrantably take upon him even to _suppose_ that Johnson's fondness for her was _dissembled_ (meaning simulated or a.s.sumed,) and to a.s.sert, that if it was not the case, 'it was a lesson he had learned by rote[688],' I cannot conceive; unless it proceeded from a want of similar feelings in his own breast. To argue from her being much older than Johnson, or any other circ.u.mstances, that he could not really love her, is absurd; for love is not a subject of reasoning, but of feeling, and therefore there are no common principles upon which one can persuade another concerning it.

Every man feels for himself, and knows how he is affected by particular qualities in the person he admires, the impressions of which are too minute and delicate to be substantiated in language.

The following very solemn and affecting prayer was found after Dr.

Johnson's decease, by his servant, Mr. Francis Barber, who delivered it to my worthy friend the Reverend Mr. Strahan[689], Vicar of Islington, who at my earnest request has obligingly favoured me with a copy of it, which he and I compared with the original. I present it to the world as an undoubted proof of a circ.u.mstance in the character of my ill.u.s.trious friend, which though some whose hard minds I never shall envy, may attack as superst.i.tious, will I am sure endear him more to numbers of good men[690]. I have an additional, and that a personal motive for presenting it, because it sanctions what I myself have always maintained and am fond to indulge.

'April 26, 1752, being after 12 at Night of the 25th.

'O Lord! Governour of heaven and earth, in whose hands are embodied and departed Spirits, if thou hast ordained the Souls of the Dead to minister to the Living, and appointed my departed Wife to have care of me, grant that I may enjoy the good effects of her attention and ministration, whether exercised by appearance, impulses, dreams[691] or in any other manner agreeable to thy Government. Forgive my presumption, enlighten my ignorance, and however meaner agents are employed, grant me the blessed influences of thy holy Spirit, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.'

[Page 236: Johnson's love for his wife. A.D. 1752.]

What actually followed upon this most interesting piece of devotion by Johnson, we are not informed; but I, whom it has pleased G.o.d to afflict in a similar manner to that which occasioned it, have certain experience of benignant communication by dreams[692].

That his love for his wife was of the most ardent kind, and, during the long period of fifty years, was unimpaired by the lapse of time, is evident from various pa.s.sages in the series of his _Prayers and Meditations_, published by the Reverend Mr. Strahan, as well as from other memorials, two of which I select, as strongly marking the tenderness and sensibility of his mind.

'March 28, 1753. I kept this day[693] as the anniversary of my Tetty's death[694], with prayer and tears in the morning. In the evening I prayed for her conditionally, if it were lawful.'

[Page 237: Her wedding-ring. aetat 43.]

'April 23, 1753. I know not whether I do not too much indulge the vain longings of affection; but I hope they intenerate my heart, and that when I die like my Tetty, this affection will be acknowledged in a happy interview, and that in the mean time I am incited by it to piety. I will, however, not deviate too much from common and received methods of devotion.'

Her wedding-ring, when she became his wife, was, after her death, preserved by him, as long as he lived, with an affectionate care, in a little round wooden box, in the inside of which he pasted a slip of paper, thus inscribed by him in fair characters, as follows:

'Eheu!

Eliz. Johnson, Nupta Jul. 9 1736, Mortua, eheu!

Mart. 17 1752[695].

After his death, Mr. Francis Barber, his faithful servant and residuary legatee, offered this memorial of tenderness to Mrs. Lucy Porter, Mrs.

Johnson's daughter; but she having declined to accept of it, he had it enamelled as a mourning ring for his old master, and presented it to his wife, Mrs. Barber, who now has it.

The state of mind in which a man must be upon the death of a woman whom he sincerely loves, had been in his contemplation many years before. In his _Irene_, we find the following fervent and tender speech of Demetrius, addressed to his Aspasia:

'From those bright regions of eternal day, Where now thou s.h.i.+n'st amongst thy fellow saints, Array'd in purer light, look down on me!

In pleasing visions and delusive dreams, O! sooth my soul, and teach me how to lose thee[696].'

[Page 238: The shock of separation. A.D. 1752.]

I have, indeed, been told by Mrs. Desmoulins, who, before her marriage, lived for some time with Mrs. Johnson at Hampstead[697], that she indulged herself in country air and nice living, at an unsuitable expense[698], while her husband was drudging in the smoke of London, and that she by no means treated him with that complacency which is the most engaging quality in a wife. But all this is perfectly compatible with his fondness for her, especially when it is remembered that he had a high opinion of her understanding, and that the impressions which her beauty, real or imaginary, had originally made upon his fancy, being continued by habit, had not been effaced, though she herself was doubtless much altered for the worse. The dreadful shock of separation took place in the night; and he immediately dispatched a letter to his friend, the Reverend Dr. Taylor, which, as Taylor told me, expressed grief in the strongest manner he had ever read; so that it is much to be regretted it has not been preserved[699]. The letter was brought to Dr. Taylor, at his house in the Cloisters, Westminster, about three in the morning; and as it signified an earnest desire to see him, he got up, and went to Johnson as soon as he was dressed, and found him in tears and in extreme agitation. After being a little while together, Johnson requested him to join with him in prayer. He then prayed extempore, as did Dr. Taylor; and thus, by means of that piety which was ever his primary object, his troubled mind was, in some degree, soothed and composed.

The next day he wrote as follows:

'To The Revernd Dr. Taylor.

Dear Sir,

'Let me have your company and instruction. Do not live away from me. My distress is great.

'Pray desire Mrs. Taylor to inform me what mourning I should buy for my mother and Miss Porter, and bring a note in writing with you.

'Remember me in your prayers, for vain is the help of man.

'I am, dear Sir, &c.

'SAM. JOHNSON.'

'March 18, 1752.'

[Page 239: Francis Barber. aetat 43.]

[Page 240: Prayers for the dead. A.D. 1752.]

That his sufferings upon the death of his wife were severe, beyond what are commonly endured, I have no doubt, from the information of many who were then about him, to none of whom I give more credit than to Mr.

Francis Barber, his faithful negro servant[700], who came into his family about a fortnight after the dismal event. These sufferings were aggravated by the melancholy inherent in his const.i.tution; and although he probably was not oftener in the wrong than she was, in the little disagreements which sometimes troubled his married state[701], during which, he owned to me, that the gloomy irritability of his existence was more painful to him than ever, he might very naturally, after her death, be tenderly disposed to charge himself with slight omissions and offences, the sense of which would give him much uneasiness[702].

Accordingly we find, about a year after her decease, that he thus addressed the Supreme Being: 'O LORD, who givest the grace of repentance, and hearest the prayers of the penitent, grant that by true contrition I may obtain forgiveness of all the sins committed, and of all duties neglected in my union with the wife whom thou hast taken from me; for the neglect of joint devotion, patient exhortation, and mild instruction[703].' The kindness of his heart, notwithstanding the impetuosity of his temper, is well known to his friends; and I cannot trace the smallest foundation for the following dark and uncharitable a.s.sertion by Sir John Hawkins: 'The apparition of his departed wife was altogether of the terrifick kind, and hardly afforded him a hope that she was in a state of happiness[704].' That he, in conformity with the opinion of many of the most able, learned, and pious Christians in all ages, supposed that there was a middle state after death, previous to the time at which departed souls are finally received to eternal felicity, appears, I think, unquestionably from his devotions[705]: 'And, O LORD, so far as it may be lawful in me[706], I commend to thy fatherly goodness _the soul of my departed wife_; beseeching thee to grant her whatever is best in her _present state_, and _finally to receive her to eternal happiness_[707].' But this state has not been looked upon with horrour, but only as less gracious.

[Page 241: The funeral sermon on Mrs. Johnson. aetat 43.]

He deposited the remains of Mrs. Johnson in the church of Bromley, in Kent[708], to which he was probably led by the residence of his friend Hawkesworth at that place. The funeral sermon which he composed for her, which was never preached, but having been given to Dr. Taylor, has been published since his death[709], is a performance of uncommon excellence, and full of rational and pious comfort to such as are depressed by that severe affliction which Johnson felt when he wrote it. When it is considered that it was written in such an agitation of mind, and in the short interval between her death and burial, it cannot be read without wonder[710].