An impudent fellow from Scotland was described to him, as affecting to be a savage, and railing at all established systems:-Johnson observed, "There is nothing surprizing in this. He wants to make himself conspicuous. He would tumble in a hogstye, as long as you looked at him and called to him to come out. But let him alone, never mind him, and he'll soon give it over."

It was added, that the same person maintained that there was no distinction between virtue and vice.-J. "Why, Sir, if the fellow does not think as he speaks he is lying; and I see not what honour he can propose to himself from having the character of a liar. But if he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, Sir, when he leaves our houses, let us count our spoons. There is (said he) in human nature a general inclination to make people stare; and every wise man has himself to cure of it, and does cure himself. If you wish to make people stare by doing better than others, why, make them stare till they stare their eyes out. But consider how easy it is to make people stare by being absurd. I may do it by going into a drawing-room without my shoes. You remember the gentleman in the Spectator, who had a commission of lunacy taken against him for his extreme singularity, such as never wearing a

wig, but a night-cap. Now, Sir, abstractedly the night-cap was best; but, relatively, the advantage was overbalanced by his making the boys run after him."

Talking of our feeling for the distresses of others, Johnson said, "Why, Sir, there is much noise made about it, but it is greatly exaggerated. No, Sir, we have a certain degree of feeling to prompt us to do good; more than that Providence does not intend. It would be misery to no purpose."-B. "But suppose now, Sir, that one of your intimate friends were apprehended for an offence for which he might be hanged."-J. "I should do what I could to bail him, and give him any other assistance; but if he were once fairly hanged, I should not suffer."-B. "Would you eat your dinner that day, Sir?"-J. "Yes, Sir; and eat it as if he were eating it with me. Why, there's Baretti, who is to be tried for his life tomorrow, friends have risen up for him on every side; yet if he should be hanged, none of them will eat a slice of plumb pudding the less. Sir, that sympathetic feeling goes a very little way in depressing the mind."

"I told him (says Mr. B.) that I had dined lately at Foote's, who shewed me a letter to him from Tom Davies, telling him that he had not been able to sleep from the concern which he felt an account of "this sad affair of Baretti,” beg

ging of him to try if he could suggest any thing that might be of service; and, at the same time, recommending to him an industrious young man who kept a pickle-shop.-J. " Aye, Sir, here you have a specimen of human sympathy; a friend hanged, and a cucumber pickled. We know not whether Baretti or the pickle-man has kept Davies from sleep; nor does he know himself. And as to his not sleeping, Sir, Tom Davies is a very great man; Tom has been upon the stage, and knows how to do those things: I have not been upon the stage, and cannot do those things.”—B. “I have often blamed myself, Sir, for not feeling for others as sensibly as many say they do.”—J. "Sir, don't be duped by them any more. You will find these very feeling people are not very ready to do you good. They pay you by feeling."

Of the late Mr. Fitzherbert, of Derbyshire, he said, "There was no sparkle, no brilliancy in Fitzherbert; but I never knew a man who was so generally acceptable. He made every body quite easy; overpowered nobody by the superiority of his talents; made no man think worse of himself by being his rival; seemed always to listen; did not oblige you to hear much from him; and did not oppose what you said. Every body liked him; but he had no friend, as I understand the word, nobody with whom he exchanged intimate

thoughts. People were willing to think well of every thing about him. A gentleman was making an affected rant, as many people do, of great feelings about his dear son,' who was at school near London; how anxious he was lest he might be ill, and what he would give to see him. Can't you (said Fitzherbert) take a post-chaise, and go to him?' This, to be sure, finished the affected man, but there was not much in it*. However, this was circulated as wit for a whole winter, and I believe part of a summer too; a proof that he was no very witty man. He was an instance of the truth of the observation, that a man will please more upon the whole by negative qualities than by positive; by never offending, than by giving a great deal of delight. In the first place, men hate more steadily than they love; and if I have said something to hurt a man once, I shall not get the better of this by saying many things to please him."

The affected gentleman is understood to have been the late John Gilbert Cooper, Esq. author of a Life of Socrates, and of some poems in Dodsley's collection. Mr. Fitzherbert found him one morning, apparently, in such violent agitation, on account of the indisposition of his son, as to seem beyond the power of comfort. At length, however, he exclaimed, "I'll write an elegy." Mr. Fitzherbert, being satisfied by this of the sincerity of his emotions, slyly said, "Had not you better take a post-chaise, and go and see him." It was the shrewdness of the insinuation which made the story be circulated.

On another occasion Johnson remarked, "That pity is not natural to man. Children are always cruel. Savages are always cruel. Pity is acquired and improved by the cultivation of reason. We may have uneasy sensations from seeing a creature in distress, without pity; for we have not pity unless we wish to relieve them. When I am on my way to dine with a friend, and finding it late have bid the coachman make haste, if I happen to attend when he whips his horses, I may feel unpleasantly that the animals are put to pain, but I do not wish him to desist. No, Sir, I wish him to drive on."

On a very wet day, Mr. Boswell complained of the disagreeable effects of such weather; but Johnson said, "Sir, this is all imagination, which physicians encourage; for man lives in air, as a fish lives in water; so that if the atmosphere press heavy from above, there is an equal resistance from below. To be sure, bad weather is hard upon people who are obliged to be abroad; and men cannot labour so well in the open air in bad weather as in good: but, Sir, a smith or a taylor, whose work is within doors, will surely do as much in rainy weather as in fair. Some very delicate frames, indeed, may be affected by wet weather, but not common constitutions."

One evening, when Johnson was somewhat fretful from illness, a gentleman asked him,