'To MR. JOHN HUSSEY.
'DEAR SIR,
'I have sent you the Grammar, and have left you two books more, by which I hope to be remembered; write my name in them; we may perhaps see each other no more, you part with my good wishes, nor do I despair of seeing you return. Let no opportunities of vice corrupt you; let no bad example seduce you; let the blindness of Mahometans confirm you in Christianity. GOD bless you.
'I am, dear Sir,
'Your affectionate humble servant,
'SAM. JOHNSON.'
'December 29, 1778.'
Johnson this year expressed great satisfaction at the publication of the first volume of Discourses to the Royal Academy[1107], by Sir Joshua Reynolds, whom he always considered as one of his literary school[1108]. Much praise indeed is due to those excellent Discourses, which are so universally admired, and for which the authour received from the Empress of Russia a gold snuff-box, adorned with her profile in bas relief, set in diamonds; and containing what is infinitely more valuable, a slip of paper, on which are written with her Imperial Majesty's own hand, the following words: 'Pour le Chevalier Reynolds en témoignage du contentement que j'ai ressentie[1109] à la lecture de ses excellens discours sur la peinture.'
In 1779, Johnson gave the world a luminous proof that the vigour of his mind in all its faculties, whether memory, judgement, or imagination, was not in the least abated; for this year came out the first four volumes of his Prefaces, biographical and critical, to the most eminent of the English Poets,[*] published by the booksellers of London. The remaining volumes came out in the year 1780[1110]. The Poets were selected by the several booksellers who had the honorary copy right, which is still preserved among them by mutual compact, notwithstanding the decision of the House of Lords against the perpetuity of Literary Property[1111]. We have his own authority[1112], that by his recommendation the poems of Blackmore[1113], Watts[1114], Pomfret[1115], and Yalden[1116], were added to the collection. Of this work I shall speak more particularly hereafter.
On the 22nd of January, I wrote to him on several topicks, and mentioned that as he had been so good as to permit me to have the proof sheets of his Lives of the Poets, I had written to his servant, Francis, to take care of them for me.