Johnson.—Tilly fally, what is all this preparation? what is all this weighty matter?
R.—Why, it is a weighty matter; this subject I have been thinking upon, is Predestination, and Free will, two things, which I cannot reconcile together, for the life of me. In my opinion, Dr. Johnson, free will and fore knowledge cannot be reconciled.
J.—Sir, it is not of very great importance, what your opinion is upon such a question.
R.—But I meant only, Dr. J., to know your opinion.
J.—No, sir, you meant no such thing; you meant only to show these gentlemen that you are not the man they took you to be, but that you think of high matters sometimes, and that you may have the credit of having it said, that you held an argument with Sam Johnson, on predestination, and free will; a subject of that magnitude, to have engaged the attention of the world, to have perplexed the wisdom of man, for these 2,000 years; a subject on which the fallen angels who had not yet lost all their original brightness find themselves in wandering mazes lost. That such a subject could be discussed in the levity of convivial conversation, is a degree of absurdity beyond what is easily conceivable.
R.—It is so, as you say, to be sure; I talked once to our friend Garrick on this subject, but I remember we could make nothing of it.
J.—Oh noble pair!
R.—Garrick was a clever fellow, Dr. J.; Garrick, take him altogether, was certainly a very great man.
J.—Garrick, sir, may be a great man in your opinion, as far as I know, but he was not so in mine; little things are great to little men.
R.—I have heard you say, Dr. Johnson——