Macaulay's Life of Samuel Johnson, with a Selection from his Essay on Johnson

Having examined the larger divisions, we may profitably turn our attention to the parts which constitute these divisions, the paragraphs. First let us see whether he goes easily from one paragraph to the next. For example, is the first sentence of paragraph 2 a good connecting link with what precedes? In looking through the Life for these links, we should make up our minds whether they are studied or spontaneous.

Then let us test the unity of the paragraphs. Can each paragraph be summed up in a single sentence? Does a combination of the opening and the closing sentence ever serve the purpose? Does one or the other of these ever answer of itself? Has every sentence some bearing on the main thought, or might some sentences be omitted as well as not?

It will be equally profitable, at this point, to test the coherence of half a dozen paragraphs. Does each sentence lead up naturally to the next? Can the order of sentences be changed to advantage? When the sentences in a paragraph hold together firmly, we should point out the cause; when coherence is lacking, we should try to discover to what its absence is due.

Then comes the question of emphasis. Let us see whether we can find two or three paragraphs in which Macaulay succeeds particularly well in emphasizing the main point. If we find three, let us see whether he accomplishes his purpose in the same way each time.

For those of us who are still willing to learn something from Macaulay's style, it is worth while to study the sentences. Selecting two or three of the most interesting paragraphs, we may make the three tests: (1) Is each sentence a unit? (2) Is the relation of every word to the adjoining words absolutely clear? (3) Does the construction emphasize what is important?

Then there is the vocabulary. Who does not enjoy the feeling that he is enlarging his vocabulary? An easy way of doing it is to read two or three times such a paragraph as the nineteenth, and then, with the book closed, to write as much of it as possible from memory. As it is not merely a large vocabulary that we wish, but a well chosen one, we shall do well to compare our version with Macaulay's and see in how many cases his word is better than ours. Have we, for example, equaled "winning affability," or "London mud," or "inhospitable door"? Is his word more effective than ours because it is more specific, or what is the reason?

Before taking farewell of the Life of Johnson there is another use to which we may put the topics. We may use them as tests of our knowledge of the essay. If we can write or talk fully and definitely on each of the more important ones, we are sure to carry much food for thought away with us. The value of a review of this sort is evident from a glance at the following topics: Literary Life in London in Johnson's Time, Johnson's Love Affair, The Dictionary, The Turning Point in Johnson's Life, The Rambler, Rasselas, The Idler, His Shakspere, The Club [His Conversation], Boswell, The Thrales, His Fleet Street Establishment, The Lives of the Poets.

As we read Macaulay we should be particularly careful to think for ourselves. Mr. Gladstone has said: "Wherever and whenever read, he will be read with fascination, with delight, with wonder. And with copious instruction too; but also with copious reserve, with questioning scrutiny, with liberty to reject, and with much exercise of that liberty."[18 - The Quarterly Review, July, 1876.]

This means that we must follow him up, find out where he got his information, see whether in his enthusiasm he has exaggerated. Then, even if the critics do assure us that he is not one of the deep thinkers, one of the very great writers, we may go on committing his Lays to heart, studying his Essays, and admiring those wonderfully faithful pictures in his History. More than all else, as the years go by, we are likely to find ourselves indebted to him for arousing interest, for leading us to further reading.

IV. MACAULAY ON JOHNSON

Among the "hasty and imperfect articles" which Macaulay wrote for the Edinburgh Review was one on Croker's Edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson. It appeared in 1831 and gave the writer a welcome opportunity to show the inaccuracy and unreliability of Croker, one of his political opponents. Nearly one half of his space he gave to criticising the editor, and that part it seems wise to omit in this edition; for we care more about Boswell and Johnson. Twenty-five years later, in 1856, when Macaulay had ceased to write for reviews, but sent an occasional article to the Encyclopædia Britannica, he wrote what is generally called the Life of Samuel Johnson. The publisher of the encyclopædia writes that it was entirely to Macaulay's friendly feeling that he was "indebted for those literary gems, which could not have been purchased with money"; that "he made it a stipulation of his contributing that remuneration should not be so much as mentioned." The other articles referred to are those on Atterbury, Bunyan, Goldsmith, and William Pitt. One writer calls them "perfect models of artistic condensation."

It is interesting to compare the later work with the earlier: to see whether there is any evidence of improvement in Macaulay's use of English, and whether he gives us a better notion of Boswell and Johnson.

V. REFERENCE BOOKS

The book to which we naturally turn first to see whether Macaulay knows his subject is Boswell's Life of Johnson; not the edition in six volumes by Dr. George B. Hill, scholarly as it is, but some such edition as Mr. Mowbray Morris's, published by the Macmillan Company in one volume. When we read Boswell the first time, to get his conception of his hero, we do not care to loiter on every page for notes, interesting and instructive as they may be after the first rapid reading. This single volume is so cheap that no one need hesitate to buy it; then he may mark it up as much as he pleases and enjoy his own book. The conscientious student need not feel obliged to read every word of every episode, but may feel perfectly free to skip whatever does not appeal to him, perfectly certain that before he has turned ten pages he will stumble on something worth while.

The book which will do more than all others to illuminate the life and character of Macaulay is The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, written by his nephew, G. Otto Trevelyan. Harper & Brothers, the publishers, have bound the two volumes in one which is so inexpensive that every school library may easily afford it. Some critics think this Life ranks with Boswell's Johnson. It certainly is one of the most readable biographies in the English language. Other useful books are numerous, but among them all Carlyle's essay in reply to Macaulay's Essay on Boswell's Life of Johnson stands out first.

Boswell

Arblay, Madame D'. Memoirs of Dr. Burney. (Contains "the most vivid account of Boswell's manner when in company with Dr. Johnson.")

Boswelliana: the Commonplace Book of James Boswell. London, 1874.

Carlyle, Thomas. Boswell's Life of Johnson.

Fitzgerald, Percy, M.A., F.S.A. Life of James Boswell with four portraits. 2 vols. London: 1891.

Leask, W. Keith. James Boswell. (Famous Scots Series.) Edinburgh: 1897.

Stephen, Leslie. James Boswell (in the Dictionary of National Biography).

Johnson

Birrell, A. Dr. Johnson (in Obiter Dicta, Second Series).

Boswell, James. Life of Johnson including Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, etc., edited by George Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L., Pembroke College, Oxford, in six volumes. Oxford, 1897. ("Boswell's famous book has never before been annotated with equal enthusiasm, learning, and industry."—Austin Dobson.)

The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., including a Journal of his Tour to the Hebrides, by James Boswell, Esq. New edition, with numerous additions and notes, by The Right Hon. John Wilson Croker, M.P., to which are added … 50 engraved illustrations. In ten volumes. London: 1839.

The Life of Johnson edited by Alexander Napier, M.A., London, 1884, also has several engravings.

Dr. Henry Morley's edition of Boswell's work is illustrated with portraits by Sir Joshua Reynolds. George Routledge & Sons, London, 1885.

Brougham, Henry, Lord, F.R.S. Lives of Men of Letters of the Time of George III. London: 1856.

Gardiner, S. R. A Student's History of England.

Gosse, Edmund W. History of Eighteenth Century Literature.

Green, J. R. A Short History of the English People.

Hill, George Birkbeck, D.C.L. Dr. Johnson, His Friends and His Critics. London: 1878.

Hoste, J. W. Johnson and His Circle. London: Jarrold & Sons.

Johnson's Chief Lives of the Poets, Being those of Milton, Dryden, Swift, Addison, Pope, Gray, and Macaulay's Life of Johnson, with a Preface by Matthew Arnold, to which are appended Macaulay's and Carlyle's Essays on Boswell's Life of Johnson. Henry Holt & Company, New York, 1879.

Johnson Club Papers by Various Hands. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1899.

Johnsoniana: Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D., by Mrs. Piozzi, Bishop Percy, and others, together with the Diary of Dr. Campbell and extracts from that of Madame D' Arblay, newly collected and edited by Robina Napier. (Engravings and various autographs.) George Bell and Sons, London, 1884.

Johnson, Samuel. The Idler. In the series of British Essayists.

Lives of the Poets. A New Edition, with Notes and Introduction by Arthur Waugh, in six volumes. Scribner's Sons, 1896.

London. In Hales's Longer English Poems.

The Rambler. In the series of British Essayists.

Rasselas. Leach, Shewell & Sanborn, or Henry Holt & Co.

The Vanity of Human Wishes. In Hales's Longer English Poems and Syle's From Milton to Tennyson.

The Works of Samuel Johnson. In nine volumes. Oxford.

Lecky, W. E. H. History of England in the Eighteenth Century.

Piozzi, Mrs. Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson during the Last Twenty Years of his Life. 1786.

Same, in the cheap National Series. The Cassell Company.

Letters to and from the Late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. 1788.

Stephen, Leslie. History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century.

Dr. Johnson's Writings (in Hours in a Library, Vol. II).