[366] In a Discourse by Sir William Jones, addressed to the Asiatick Society [in Calcutta], Feb. 24, 1785, is the following passage:—
'One of the most sagacious men in this age who continues, I hope, to improve and adorn it, Samuel Johnson [he had been dead ten weeks], remarked in my hearing, that if Newton had flourished in ancient Greece, he would have been worshipped as a Divinity.' MALONE. Johnson, in An Account of an Attempt to ascertain the Longitude (Works, v, 299), makes the supposed author say:—'I have lived till I am able to produce in my favour the testimony of time, the inflexible enemy of false hypotheses; the only testimony which it becomes human understanding to oppose to the authority of Newton.'
[367] Murphy (Life, p. 91) places the scene of such a conversation in the house of the Bishop of Salisbury. 'Boscovitch,' he writes, 'had a ready current flow of that flimsy phraseology with which a priest may travel through Italy, Spain, and Germany. Johnson scorned what he called colloquial barbarisms. It was his pride to speak his best. He went on, after a little practice, with as much facility as if it was his native tongue. One sentence this writer well remembers. Observing that Fontenelle at first opposed the Newtonian philosophy, and embraced it afterwards, his words were:—"Fontenellus, ni fallor, in extrema senectute fuit transfuga ad castra Newtoniana."' See post, under Nov. 12, 1775. Boscovitch, the Jesuit astronomer, was a professor in the University of Pavia. When Dr. Burney visited him, 'he complained very much of the silence of the English astronomers, who answer none of his letters.' Burney's Tour in France and Italy, p. 92.
[368] See post, in 1781, the Life of Lyttelton.
[369] The first of Macpherson's forgeries was Fragments of Ancient Poetry collected in the Highlands. Edinburgh, 1760. In 1762, he published in London, The Works of Ossian, the son of Fingal, 2 vols. Vol. i. contained Fingal, an Ancient Epic Poem, in six Books. See post, Jan 1775.
[370] Horace, Ars Poetica, l. 41.
[371] Perhaps Johnson had some ill-will towards attorneys, such as he had towards excisemen (ante, i. 36, note 5 and 294). In London, which was published in May, 1738, he couples them with street robbers:
'Their ambush here relentless ruffians lay,
And here the fell attorney prowls for prey.'
Works, i. 1. In a paper in the Gent. Mag. for following June (p. 287), written, I have little doubt, by him, the profession is this savagely attacked:—'Our ancestors, in ancient times, had some regard to the moral character of the person sent to represent them in their national assemblies, and would have shewn some degree of resentment or indignation, had their votes been asked for murderer, an adulterer, a know oppressor, an hireling evidence, an attorney, a gamester, or pimp.' In the Life of Blackmere (Works, viii. 36) he has a sly hit at the profession. 'Sir Richard Blackmore was the son of Robert Blackmore, styled by Wood gentleman, and supposed to have been an attorney.' We may compare Goldsmith's lines in Retaliation:—'Then what was his failing? come tell it, and burn ye,—
'He was, could he help it? a special attorney.'