THE

L I F F E

OF

SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL. D.

COMPREHENDING

AN'ACCOUNT OF HIS STUDIES,

AND NUMEROUS WORKS,

IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER;

A SERIES OF HIS EPISTOLARY CORRESPONDENCE

AND CONVERSATIONS WITH MANY EMINENT PERSONS;

AND

VARIOUS ORIGINAL PIECES OF HIS COMPOSITION,

NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED:

THE WHOLE EXHIBITING A VIEW OF LITERATURE AND LITERARY
MEN IN GREAT-BRITAIN, FOR NEAR HALF A CENTURY

DURING WHICH HE FLOURISHED.

LONDON:
PRINTED FOR T. CADELL AND W. DAVIES, IN THE STRAND,

MDCCCIV.

THE

L I F E

OF

SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL. D.

was

a

Having left Ashburne in the evening, we stopped to change horses at Derby, and availed ourselves of a moment to enjoy the conversation of my countryman, Dr. Butter, then physician there. He in

great indignation because Lord Mountstuart's bill for a Scotch militia had been lost. Dr. Johnson was as violent against it. “I am glad, (said he,) ) that Parliament has had the spirit to throw it out.

You wanted to take advantage of the timidity of our - scoundrels ; (meaning, I suppose, the ministry.) It · may be observed, that he used the epithet scoundrel very commonly not quite in the sense in which it is generally understood, but as a strong term of disapprobation; as when he abruptly answered Mrs. Thrale, who had asked him how he did, “ Ready to become a scoundrel, Madam ; with a little more spoiling you will, I think, make me 2 complete rascal :”-he meant, easy to become a