I told you how much he was troubled with scrofula. There was a superstition in those days, that if any one afflicted by this disease could be touched by the royal hand of a king, a cure would speedily follow. Many persons, who had a great reputation for wisdom, were foolish enough to believe this. Sam’s mother, therefore, may be excused, for what, in other circumstances, would have been called “a woman’s whim.” At any rate, up to London she went with little Sam. Queen Anne was king then, if you’ll pardon an Irish-ism; and Sam’s childish recollection of her was a solemn lady in diamonds, with a long, black hood. Did she cure him? Of course not; though his kind mother, I’ve no doubt, always felt better satisfied with herself for having tried it. Sam still continued to go to school, however, and one old lady to whom he went, had such an affection for him, that, years after, when he was a young man, just about to enter college, she came to bid him good by, bringing with her a big, motherly piece of gingerbread, as a token of her affection, adding that “he was the best scholar she ever had.” Sam didn’t make fun of it behind her back, as would many young men; he had sense enough to understand the great compliment conveyed in that piece of cake.
The Latin and other masters who succeeded the old lady, did not admire young Sam as much as she did; instead of “gingerbread,” he got tremendous whippings, one of the masters saying, benevolently, while he “laid it on,” “And this I do, to save you from the gallows.” I myself have more faith in the gingerbread than in the whipping system, which, I believe, has as often driven boys to the gallows, as “from” it. But it seems Samuel owed them no grudge; for being asked, later in life, how he came to have such an accurate knowledge of Latin, replied, “My master whipt me very well;” and all his life long, he insisted and persisted, that only by the rod was learning ever introduced into a boy’s head. Still, to my eye, “birches” look best in the woods. I can’t help thinking that the gentle sway of the old lady would have carried him safe through his Latin too, had she but known enough to teach it.
In all schools, the boy who knows the most, rules the rest. So it was with Sam; who, if he helped them into difficulty with his roguish pranks, helped them also with their lessons, when they came to a standstill for want of his quick comprehension. They all looked up to him with great deference, and so far did this carry them, that they carried him! actually and really. Three boys used to call at his lodgings every morning, as humble attendants, to bear him to school. One, in the middle, stooped, while he sat on his back; while one on each side supported him; and thus the great, lazy Sam was borne along in triumph!
There is one thing which I believe to be true of the childhood and youth of all persons distinguished for true knowledge. It is this: they never rest satisfied with ignorance on any point, which, by any possibility, can be explained or made clear. It was so with Samuel; also, he never forgot what he thus heard, or had read. I know well that a young person who is “inquisitive” is much more troublesome than one who never thinks, and only rests satisfied with just what is put into the ear, and desires no more; and parents and teachers, too, are too apt to silence the inquisitive mind with “don’t ask questions!” or “don’t be so troublesome!” or, if they answer, do it in a careless, lazy way, that only surrounds the questioner with new difficulty, instead of helping him out of it; never reflecting that it is by this self-educating process that the child arrives at the best half of what he will ever know. Don’t misunderstand me; don’t think I mean that a child, or a young person, is impertinently to interrupt the conversation of his elders, and clamor for an immediate answer. I don’t mean so, any more than I think it right to snub him back into ignorance with that harrowing “little pitcher” proverb, which used to make me tear my hair out, at being forced to “be seen,” while I was not allowed “to be heard.”
It is my private belief, spite of my admiration of the great Sam, that he was physically—lazy. Riding boy-back to school gave me the first glimmering of it. Afterward, the fact that his favorite, indeed, only diversion in winter was, being drawn on the ice by a barefooted boy, who pulled him along by a garter fixed around him—no easy job for the shivering barefooter, as Sam was not only “great” intellectually, but physically. His defective sight prevented him from enjoying the common sports of boys, if this is any excuse for what would seem to be a piece of selfishness on his part. Perhaps to his inability for active sports, we may ascribe his appetite for romances in his leisure hours—a practice which he afterward deeply regretted, because, as he declared, it unsettled his mind, and stood very much in the way of his decision upon any profession in life.
At the age of twenty, Samuel’s disease took the form of an overpowering melancholy, which, I am sorry to say, never wholly left him during his life. In every possible way the poor fellow struggled against it, by study, by reading, by going into company, by sitting up late at night, till he was sure of losing himself in sleep. This melancholy took the form of great fear of death. He could not bear to hear the word “death” mentioned in his presence. I think, however, it was “dying” he feared, not “death.” I think he feared physical pain and suffering, not another state of existence; for all his ideas of that were pleasant and happy, like those of a child going home to its parent, whom, though he may have sinned against, he tenderly loves, and constantly implores forgiveness from. A more kind-hearted man than Samuel Johnson never lived, with all his bluntness, which, after all, is much preferable to the smooth tongue which rolls deceit, like a sweet morsel, in honeyed words. He had also this noble trait: he was quick to ask forgiveness where his blunt words had wounded. He did not think either his dignity or his manliness compromised by confessing himself in the wrong. I want you to notice this particularly; because small, narrow minds think it “mean and poor-spirited” to do this, even when convinced that they are wrong. This blunt, rough, ordinary-looking, ill-dressed old man (for he lived, after all, to be an old man), had a kingly heart. I could tell you many instances of his kindness to the poor and unfortunate; of his devoted love for his wife, who died many years before him, and whose memory he sacredly and lovingly cherished. He numbered among his friends many great and talented people, who were attracted to him by the good qualities I have named, as, also, by his brilliant and intellectual conversation. Royalty, too, paid him special honor; and in his latter days, when money was not so plenty as it should have been in the pocket of a man to whom the world owes so much, the highest people in the land most assiduously endeavored to make his descent to the grave easy, by travel, change of scene, and more comfortable accommodations than he could otherwise have had. Rough as Dr. Johnson was reputed to be, he was a great favorite with ladies. No dandy could outdo him in a neat, graceful compliment to them, and no insect could sting sharper than he either, if they disgusted him with their nonsense and folly. Nice, honest, sham-hating old man! I am glad that the Saviour he loved, smiled so lovingly on him at the last, that he fearlessly crossed the dark waves he had dreaded, to lay that weary head upon His bosom.
THE LITTLE LORD.
Everybody has heard of Lord Byron. The world says, he had a very bad temper; and the world says his mother had a very bad temper, too. For once the world was right; but when I tell you that Byron’s mother, when a pretty, warm-hearted girl, married a man she dearly loved, and found out, after marriage, that it was her money, not herself, that he loved, and that, while spending this extravagantly, he was at the same time mean enough to ill-treat and abuse her, I think we should inquire how sweet-tempered we could have been under such circumstances, before we call her hard names. I believe this is the way God judges us, and that he always takes into account, as man does not, the circumstances by which we have been surrounded for good or evil. It is easy for anybody to be amiable, when there is nothing to thwart or annoy.
Well, as I have said, poor Mrs. Byron had a weary life of it; and little George, hearing his mother say violent words, when her misery pressed hard upon her, learned to say them, too; and set his handsome lips together, till he looked like a little fiend; and tore his frocks to tatters when things did not suit him; and later, when he was too old for this, he used to turn so deadly pale with speechless rage, that one would almost rather have encountered the violent words of his childhood.
A mother who cannot, or does not, control herself, cannot, of course, control her child; so that there was presented at their home that most pitiable of all sights, mother and child always contending for the mastery.