[12:] Life of Johnson, iv, 83.
[13:] Ib., iii, 308.
[14:] p. xiii.
CHAPTER XII
The method we have been examining has revealed, in a sense, a second aspect of Boswell as the biographer, the natural complement of that scientific spirit which inspired the acute observation, the delicate experiments, the methodical accuracy; for he brought to the work of recording not merely the faculty for stating truthfully what he had seen, but the power of expressing his feelings; and it was particularly this feeling—an interest at the same time full-blooded, comprehensive and minute—that insisted upon expression.
The emotion which compels a man to bind himself to an ideal, and, having determined that something must be done under certain conditions, compels the doing of it without capitulation, is one which enters into many kinds of work and is to be found no doubt very often among scientists; but it is in a peculiar degree the possession of the artist. To him indeed it seems to be essential; for his value depends certainly not more on the quality of what he has to express than on the completeness with which he expresses it. And so perhaps we ought to connect the consistency, the truth, the faith of Boswell, and his disregard for obstacles, with his artistic rather than with his scientific qualities; so we ought to interpret Boswell's love of his labour and his conviction that it was good, and so to understand all the trouble that it cost to his mind and to the more sensitive part of him. The refusal to depart from his ideal which he made to Hannah More ('I would not cut off his claws, nor make my tiger a cat, to please anybody'),[1] and again to Bishop Percy when he declined, for the sake of 'authenticity,' to suppress the bishop's name,[2] is an indication of the need he had to express himself as an artist.[3]
But how was it that he came so to express himself? And what is it that he succeeded in expressing?
Of the impulse to expression and what it meant in Boswell's case something has been said already in these pages. We cannot understand the engine if we forget the power that drives it, and we must emphasise once again the force that Boswell obeyed. His passion for truth was not comprehensive: and it was for the truth of the realist, not the truth of the idealist. It did not include the whole of life; it did not attempt to view the entire scene in correct perspective; and TRUTH Boswell was decidedly not a philosopher. He did not greatly need explanations of the universe; he tended to accept such as seemed convenient. He had no logic about abstract theories, and only a very limited power of criticising evidence. One who cares for truth with respect to every fact and deduction is inclined to reject his first impressions, because experience has taught him that 'all men are liars.' The face of things is so often false! But Boswell was content to look no further; he sometimes deliberately disregarded the facts of existence; he lived one half his life in a glitter of his own creation. Nevertheless, the passion for truth was vivid and vital. It lived apart to work out its own consummation; and it was all the more vehement for being confined. It is perhaps for this reason—that the truth inherent in Boswell was confined within such strict limits—that it required expression. In these circumstances Boswell's buoyant nature had need of a safety-valve. Truth for him was concerned entirely with an external view of people. He was rarely analytical; he did not care for subtle states of mind and the feelings that composed them; he looked directly at actions and their primary motives. The vision was so clear and strong that Boswell by its very insistence was obliged to create an imperishable image.
The reasons that made it certain from the beginning that Johnson would become the vehicle for this expression extend beyond those qualities which made Boswell prefer and admire him above all other men; they depend upon Boswell's attitude towards mankind. We have seen that he apologises and justifies himself for relating the weaknesses and absurdities of Johnson. And yet he sometimes seems to have a peculiar delight in them. These shades in Johnson's character are dealt with not as an unpleasant but necessary task, to be despatched with a light touch as though it ill became him to speak of them, but with a full flavour of rich and lasting enjoyment.