It was this habit of painstaking accuracy, rather than good taste, which led him to avoid the vice of rhetorical amplification. It also prevented him from missing the point of a joke of which he was unconscious. As a rule, his 'Johnsoniana' are better than those of Sir John Hawkins or Mrs. Piozzi, because they are more literal. In one or two instances an embellishment which improved a story was rejected by him because it was not true. These powers--observation, scrupulous accuracy and industry, and enthusiastic admiration of his hero--were all that he needed for the production of a great book; for Dr. Johnson was so unaffected, so outspoken, and so entertaining a man, and every sentence he uttered was so characteristic, that realism was a far better method for his biographer than analysis. Perhaps it is always better when the subject is strongly marked. That Dr. Johnson was a good subject is so evident that the mere statement is sufficient. Mrs. Thrale-Piozzi's and even Sir John Hawkins's books are entertaining simply because they are about him.
The eighteenth-century man presents a number of excellent features for literary portraiture, because he is a compound of formality and explosiveness. The formal manners and dress and ponderous courtesy of the eighteenth century, combined with an outspoken way of calling things by their right names and a boyish petulance and quickness of temper, make a contrast that is essentially humorous, and more attractive than the philosophic and broad-minded temper of earlier times or the reticence and indifference of our own day. Dr. Johnson was a typical eighteenth-century man, and epitomized these contrasts. Personally, too, he was a man for whom we must feel the most profound regard and respect. He represents the normal Englishman, a compound of moral integrity, rooted prejudice, and hatred of shams, with a mind which works mechanically and a kind heart. We instinctively recognize this compound as the ancestral type of our race, and are drawn to it. The real power of our race depends upon the simplicity and solid humanity of this central type, the heavy-armed and disciplined infantry about which are grouped the more gifted and erratic types, the scouts and light-horse of civilization. For these general reasons Samuel Johnson seems to us the best sitter for a literary portrait that ever fell into the hands of a literary painter, and the excellence of his biography to depend quite as much upon the fact that it is a life of Samuel Johnson as upon the fact that it is a life by James Boswell.
Boswell's private character is outside the question in a consideration of his writings. Macaulay calls him a drunkard. If this be true, it seems a little severe to call a Scotchman to account for being intoxicated one hundred years ago. He also speaks of him as a toady; but he was a friend of Johnson, whose detestation of sycophancy was a positive principle. Hume speaks of him as a "friend of mine, very good-humored, very agreeable, and very mad." Macaulay's and Carlyle's essays may be considered as mutually corrective. The truth is that Boswell was absolutely frank, and if a man is frank about himself on paper he must write himself down a fool, unless he belongs to a higher type than Boswell or his critics.
AN ACCOUNT OF CORSICA
Having said so much of the genius and character of the Corsicans, I must beg leave to present my readers with a very distinguished Corsican character, that of Signor Clemente de' Paoli, brother of the General.
This gentleman is the eldest son of the old General Giacinto Paoli. He is about fifty years of age, of a middle size and dark complexion; his eyes are quick and piercing, and he has something in the form of his mouth which renders his appearance very particular. His understanding is of the first rate, and he has by no means suffered it to lie neglected. He was married, and has an only daughter, the wife of Signor Barbaggi, one of the first men in the island.
For these many years past, Signor Clemente, being in a state of widowhood, has resided at Rostino, from whence the family of Paoli comes. He lives there in a very retired manner. He is of a saturnine disposition, and his notions of religion are rather gloomy and severe. He spends his whole time in study, except what he passes at his devotions. These generally take up six or eight hours every day; during all which time he is in church, and before the altar, in a fixed posture, with his hands and eyes lifted up to heaven with solemn fervor.