of Roberts, between whom and Johnson I have not traced any connection, except the casual one of this publication[1]. In Johnson's Life of Savage, although it must be allowed that its moral is the reverse of—'Respicere exemplar vitæ morumque jubebo[2],' a very useful lesson is inculcated, to guard men of warm passions from a too free indulgence of them; and the various incidents arc related in so clear and animated a manner, and illuminated throughout with so much philosophy, that it is one of the most interesting narratives in the English language. Sir Joshua Reynolds told me, that upon his return from Italy[3] he met with it in Devonshire, knowing nothing of its authour, and began to read it while he was standing with his arm leaning against a chimney-piece. It seized his attention so strongly, that, not being able to lay down the book till he had finished it, when he attempted to move, he found his arm totally benumbed. The rapidity with which this work was composed, is a wonderful circumstance. Johnson has been heard to say, 'I wrote forty-eight of the printed octavo pages of the Life of Savage at a sitting; but then I sat up all night[4].'
He exhibits the genius of Savage to the best advantage in the specimens of his poetry which he has selected, some of which are of uncommon merit. We, indeed, occasionally find such vigour and such point, as might make us suppose that the generous aid of Johnson had been imparted to his friend. Mr. Thomas Warton made this remark to me; and, in support of it, quoted from the poem entitled The Bastard, a line, in which the fancied superiority of one 'stamped in Nature's mint with extasy[5],' is contrasted with a regular lawful descendant of some great and ancient family:
- ↑ Roberts published in 1745 Johnson's Observations on Macbeth. See Gent. Mag. xv. 112, 224.
- ↑ Horace, Ars Poetica, i. 317.
- ↑ In the autumn of 1752. Northcote's Reynolds, i. 52.
- ↑ Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 3rd ed. p. 35 [p. 55. Aug. 19, 1773]. Boswell.
- ↑ 'mint of ecstasy:' Savage's Works (1777), ii. 91.
