The Thatched House Tavern, in the large room of which the members of the Dilettanti Society were once wont to assemble, was for a time also the meeting-place of another somewhat similar society, the Literary Club. This is now represented by The Club, which is perhaps the most exclusive institution in Europe. So little known is the existence of this society that at the foundation of the Turf Club it was at first proposed to call it The Club; and, indeed, it was some time before the discovery that the name had been long before appropriated placed the adoption of such an appellation out of the question. The membership of The Club is limited in the extreme, which may be realized when it is stated that since its foundation, in 1764, not 300 members have secured election. Forty, according to the regulations, is the extreme limit of membership. Amongst distinguished men who have been members appear the names of Dr. Johnson, Boswell, Garrick, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Oliver Goldsmith, Burke, Fox, and Gibbon. In more modern times many prominent personalities have been members—amongst them Mr. Gladstone, Lord Leighton, Professor Huxley, Lord Salisbury, Lord Rosebery, Lord Goschen, the Duke of Argyll, Lord Herschell, Lord Dufferin, Lord Wolseley, Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff, Mr. Arthur Balfour, Lord Peel, Mr. Asquith, Sir Edward Poynter, and many others whose names are well known in legal, political, artistic, and literary circles.
The club was founded in 1764 by Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr. Samuel Johnson, and for some years met on Monday evenings at seven. In 1772 the day of meeting was changed to Friday, and about that time, instead of supping, they agreed to dine together once in every fortnight during the sitting of Parliament. In 1773 The Club, which soon after its foundation consisted of twelve members, was enlarged to twenty; March 11, 1777, to twenty-six; November 27, 1778, to thirty; May 9, 1780, to thirty-five; and it was then resolved that it should never exceed forty. It met originally at the Turk’s Head, in Gerrard Street, and continued to meet there till 1783, when their landlord died, and the house was soon afterwards shut up. They then removed to Prince’s, in Saville Street; and on his house being, soon afterwards, shut up, they removed to Baxter’s, which afterwards became Thomas’s, in Dover Street. In January 1792, they removed to Parsloe’s, in St. James’s Street; and on February 26, 1799, to the Thatched House, in the same street.
The club received the name of Literary Club at Garrick’s funeral.
In the early days of The Club, Dr. Johnson was exceedingly particular as to the admission of candidates, and would not hear of any increase in the number of members. Not long after its institution, Sir Joshua Reynolds was speaking of the club to Garrick. “I like it much,” said the great actor briskly; “I think I shall be of you.” When Sir Joshua mentioned this to Dr. Johnson, the latter, according to Boswell, was much displeased with the actor’s conceit. “He’ll be of us!” growled he; “how does he know we will permit him?”
Sir John Hawkins tried to soften Johnson, and spoke to him of Garrick in a very eulogistic way. “Sir,” replied Johnson, “he will disturb us by his buffoonery.” In the same spirit he declared to Mr. Thrale that, if Garrick should apply for admission, he would blackball him. “Who, sir?” exclaimed Thrale, with surprise: “Mr. Garrick—your friend, your companion—blackball him?” “Why, sir,” replied Johnson, “I love my little David dearly—better than all or any of his flatterers do; but surely one ought to sit, in a society like ours,
‘Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or player.’”
By degrees the rigour of the club relaxed; some of the members grew negligent. Beauclerk lost his right of membership by neglecting to attend. Nevertheless, on his marriage (with Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of the Duke of Marlborough, and recently divorced from Viscount Bolingbroke), he claimed and regained his seat in the club. The number of the members was likewise augmented. The proposition to increase it originated with Goldsmith. “It would give,” he thought, “an agreeable variety to their meetings; for there can be nothing new amongst us,” said he: “we have travelled over each other’s minds.” Johnson was piqued at the suggestion. “Sir,” said he, “you have not travelled over my mind, I promise you.” Sir Joshua, less confident in the exhaustless fecundity of his mind, felt and acknowledged the force of Goldsmith’s suggestion. Several new members therefore were elected; the first, to his great joy, was David Garrick. Goldsmith, who was now on cordial terms with the great actor, zealously promoted his election, and Johnson gave it his warm approbation.
The meetings of the Literary Club were often the occasion of much discussion between Edmund Burke and Johnson. One evening the former observed that a hogshead of claret, which had been sent as a present to the club, was almost out, and proposed that Johnson should write for another in such ambiguity of expression as might have a chance of procuring it also as a gift. One of the company said: “Dr. Johnson shall be our dictator.” “Were I,” said Johnson, “your dictator, you should have no wine; it would be my business ‘cavere ne quid detrimenti respublica caperet.’ Wine is dangerous; Rome was ruined by luxury.” Burke replied: “If you allow no wine as dictator, you shall not have me for master of the horse.”
Dr. Johnson for a time completely dominated the club, and once, in his usual grandiloquent manner, said to Boswell: “Sir, you got into the club by doing what a man can do. Several of the members wished to keep you out; Burke told me he doubted if you were fit for it. Now you are in, none of them are sorry.” Boswell: “They were afraid of you, sir, as it was you proposed me.” Johnson: “Sir, they knew that if they refused you they would probably have never got into another club—I would have kept them all out.”
At last, owing to his ill-temper and rudeness, the great lexicographer’s influence in the club sensibly decreased.