[286] Mackintosh says, in his Life, i. 9:—'In October, 1780, I was admitted into the Greek class, then taught by Mr. Leslie, who did not aspire beyond teaching us the first rudiments of the language; more would, I believe, have been useless to his scholars.'

[287] 'Boswell was very angry that the Aberdeen professors would not talk.' Piozzi Letters, i. 118. Dr. Robertson and Dr. Blair, whom Boswell, five years earlier, invited to meet Johnson at supper, 'with an excess of prudence hardly opened their lips' (ante, ii. 63). At Glasgow the professors did not dare to talk much (post, Oct. 29). On another occasion when Johnson came in, the company 'were all as quiet as a school upon the entrance of the headmaster.' Ante, iii. 332.

[288] Dr. Beattie says that this printer was Strahan. He had seen the letter mentioned by Gerard, and many other letters too from the Bishop to Strahan. 'They were,' he continues, 'very particularly acquainted.' He adds that 'Strahan was eminently skilled in composition, and had corrected (as he told me himself) the phraseology of both Mr. Hume and Dr. Robertson.' Forbes's Beattie, ed. 1824, p. 341.

[289] An instance of this is given in Johnson's Works, viii. 288:—'Warburton had in the early part of his life pleased himself with the notice of inferior wits, and corresponded with the enemies of Pope. A letter was produced, when he had perhaps himself forgotten it, in which he tells Concanen, "Dryden, I observe, borrows for want of leisure, and Pope for want of genius; Milton out of pride, and Addison out of modesty."'

[290] 'Goldsmith asserted that Warburton was a weak writer. "Warburton," said Johnson, "may be absurd, but he will never be weak; he flounders well."' Stockdale's Memoirs, ii. 64. See Appendix A.

[291] The Doctrine of Grace; or the Office and Operations of the Holy Spirit vindicated from the Insults of Infidelity and the Abuses of Fanaticism, 1762.

[292] A Letter to the Bishop of Gloucester, occasioned by his Tract on the Office and Operations of the Holy Spirit, by John Wesley, 1762.

[293] Malone records:—'I could not find from Mr. Walpole that his father [Sir Robert] read any other book but Sydenham in his retirement.' To his admiration of Sydenham his death was attributed; for it led him to treat himself wrongly when he was suffering from the stone. Prior's Malone, p. 387. Johnson wrote a Life of Sydenham. In it he ridicules the notion that 'a man eminent for integrity practised Medicine by chance, and grew wise only by murder.' Works, vi. 409.

[294] All this, as Dr. Johnson suspected at the time, was the immediate invention of his own lively imagination; for there is not one word of it in Mr. Locke's complimentary performance. My readers will, I have no doubt, like to be satisfied, by comparing them; and, at any rate, it may entertain them to read verses composed by our great metaphysician, when a Bachelor in Physick. AUCTORI, IN TRACTATUM EJUS DE FEBRIBUS.

Febriles aestus, victumque ardoribus orbem
Flevit, non tantis par Medicina malis.
Nam post mille artes, medicae tentamina curae,
Ardet adhuc Febris; nec velit arte regi.
Praeda sumus flammis; solum hoc speramus ab igne,
Ut restet paucus, quem capit urna, cinis.
Dum quaerit medicus febris caussamque, modumque,
Flammarum & tenebras, & sine luce faces;
Quas tractat patitur flammas, & febre calescens,
Corruit ipse suis victima rapta focis.
Qui tardos potuit morbos, artusque trementes,
Sistere, febrili se videt igne rapi.
Sic faber exesos fulsit tibicine muros;
Dum trahit antiquas lenta ruina domos.
Sed si flamma vorax miseras incenderit aedes,
Unica flagrantes tunc sepelire salus.
Fit fuga, tectonicas nemo tunc invocat artes;
Cum perit artificis non minus usta domus.
Se tandem Sydenham febrisque Scholaeque furori
Opponens, morbi quaerit, & artis opem.
Non temere incusat tectae putedinis [putredinis] ignes;
Nec fictus, febres qui fovet, humor erit.
Non bilem ille movet, nulla hic pituita; Salutis
Quae spes, si fallax ardeat intus aqua?
Nec doctas magno rixas ostentat hiatu,
Quîs ipsis major febribus ardor inest.
Innocuas placide corpus jubet urere flammas,
Et justo rapidos temperat igne focos.
Quid febrim exstinguat, varius quid postulet usus,
Solari aegrotos, qua potes arte, docet,
Hactenus ipsa suum timuit Natura calorem,
Dum saepe incerto, quo calet, igne perit:
Dum reparat tacitos male provida sanguinis ignes,
Praslusit busto, fit calor iste rogus.
Jam secura suas foveant praecordia flammas,
Quem Natura negat, dat Medicina modum.
Nec solum faciles compescit sanguinis aestus,
Dum dubia est inter spemque metumque salus;
Sed fatale malum domuit, quodque astra malignum
Credimus, iratam vel genuisse Stygem.
Extorsit Lachesi cultros, Pestique venenum
Abstulit, & tantos non sinit esse metus.
Quis tandem arte nova domitam mitescere Pestem
Credat, & antiquas ponere posse minas?
Post tot mille neces, cumulataque funera busto,
Victa jacet parvo vulnere dira Lues.
Aetheriae quanquam spargunt contagia flammae,
Quicquid inest istis ignibus, ignis erit.
Delapsae coelo flammae licet acrius urant
Has gelida exstingui non nisi morte putas?
Tu meliora paras victrix Medicina; tuusque,
Pestis quae superat cuncta, triumphus eris [erit].
Vive liber, victis febrilibus ignibus; unus
Te simul & mundum qui manet, ignis erit.