PROLOGUE TO THE COMEDY OF A WORK TO THE WISE [a] SPOKEN BY MR. HULL. This night presents a play, which publick rage,Or right, or wrong, once hooted from the stage [b].From zeal or malice, now, no more we dread,For English vengeance wars not with the dead.A gen’rous foe regards, with pitying eye,The man whom […]

Acted at Drury lane theatre, for the benefit of Milton’s granddaughter [A]. Ye patriot crowds, who burn for England’s fame,Ye nymphs, whose bosoms beat at Milton’s name;Whose gen’rous zeal, unbought by flatt’ring rhymes,Shames the mean pensions of Augustan times;Immortal patrons of succeeding days,Attend this prelude of perpetual praise;Let wit, condemn’d the feeble war to wageWith […]

Prest by the load of life, the weary mindSurveys the gen’ral toil of human kind;With cool submission joins the lab’ring train,And social sorrow loses half its pain:Our anxious bard, without complaint, may shareThis bustling season’s epidemick care;Like Caesar’s pilot, dignify’d by fate,Tost in one common storm with all the great;Distrest alike the statesman and the […]

When learning’s triumph o’er her barb’rous foesFirst rear’d the stage, immortal Shakespeare rose;Each change of many-colour’d life he drew,Exhausted worlds, and then imagin’d new:Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign,And panting time toil’d after him in vain:His pow’rful strokes presiding truth impress’d,And unresisted passion storm’d the breast.Then Jonson came, instructed from the schoolTo please in […]

IN IMITATION OF THE TENTH SATIRE OF JUVENAL. Let[a] observation, with extensive view,Survey mankind, from China to Peru;Remark each anxious toil, each eager strife,And watch the busy scenes of crowded life;Then say, how hope and fear, desire and hateO’erspread with snares the clouded maze of fate,Where wav’ring man, betray’d by vent’rous prideTo tread the dreary […]

Adventurer No. 41. Tuesday, March 27, 1753. — Si mutabile pectus Est tibi, consiliis, non curribus, utere nostris; Dum potes, et solidis etiamnum sedibus adstas, Dumque male optatos nondum premis inscius axes.OVID. Met. ii. 143. –Th’ attempt forsake,And not my chariot but my counsel take;While yet securely on the earth you stand;Nor touch the horses […]

Adventurer No. 45. Tuesday, April 10, 1753 Nulla fides regni sociis, omnisque potestas Impatiens consortis erit.–LUCAN. Lib. i. 92. No faith of partnership dominion owns:Still discord hovers o’er divided thrones. It is well known, that many things appear plausible in speculation, which can never be reduced to practice; and that of the numberless projects that […]

Adventurer No. 50. Saturday, April 28, 1753. Quicunque turpi fraude semel innotuit, Etiamsi verum dicit, amittit fidem.PHAED. Lib. i. Fab. x. l. The wretch that often has deceiv’d,Though truth he speaks, is ne’er believ’d. When Aristotle was once asked, what a man could gain by uttering falsehoods? he replied, “Not to be credited when he […]

Adventurer No. 53. Tuesday, May 8, 1753. Quisque suos patimur manes.VIRG. Aen. Lib. vi. 743. Each has his lot, and bears the fate he drew. Sir, Fleet, May 6. In consequence of my engagements, I address you once more from the habitations of misery. In this place, from which business and pleasure are equally excluded, […]

[This argument cannot be better prefaced than by Mr. Boswell’s own exposition of the law of vitious intromission. He was himself an advocate at the Scotch bar, and of counsel in this case. “It was held of old, and continued for a long period, to be an established principle in Scotch law, that whoever intermeddled […]

[Dr. Johnson has treated this delicate and difficult subject with unusual acuteness. As Mr. Boswell has recorded the argument, we will make use, once more, of his words to introduce it; observing, by the way, that it did not convince Mr. Boswell’s own mind, who was himself a lay patron. “I introduced a question which […]

[This case shall be introduced by Mr. Boswell himself. “In the course of a contested election for the borough of Dumfermline, which I attended as one of my friend Sir Archibald Campbell’s counsel, one of his political agents, who was charged with having been unfaithful to his employer, and having deserted to the opposite party […]

Adventurer No. 34. Saturday, March 3, 1753. Has toties optata exegit gloria paenas.Juv. Sat. x. 187.Such fate pursues the votaries of praise. TO THE ADVENTURER. SIR, Fleet Prison, Feb. 24. To a benevolent disposition, every state of life will afford some opportunities of contributing to the welfare of mankind. Opulence and splendour are enabled to […]

Adventurer No. 39. Tuesday, March 20, 1753. –[Greek: Oduseus phulloisi kalupsato to d ar AthaenaeHypnon ep ommasi cheu, ina min pauseie tachistaDusponeos kamatoio.]–HOM. E. 491 –Pallas pour’d sweet slumbers on his soul;And balmy dreams, the gift of soft repose,Calm’d all his pains, and banish’d all his woes.POPE. If every day did not produce fresh instances […]

The publick may justly require to be informed of the nature and extent of every design, for which the favour of the publick is openly solicited. The artists, who were themselves the first projectors of an exhibition in this nation, and who have now contributed to the following catalogue, think it, therefore, necessary to explain […]

The following opinions on cases of law may be regarded as among the strongest proofs of Johnson’s enlarged powers of mind, and of his ability to grapple with subjects, on general principles, with whose technicalities he could not be familiar. Of law, as a science, he ever expressed the deepest admiration, and an author who […]

ABRIDGED BY MR. CAVE, 1739. 1. That the copy of a book is the property of the author, and that he may, by sale, or otherwise, transfer that property to another, who has a right to be protected in the possession of that property, so transferred, is not to be denied. 2. That the complainants […]

[The following argument, on school chastisement, was dictated to Mr. Boswell, who was counsel in the case. It originated in 1772, when a schoolmaster at Campbelltown was deprived, by a court of inferior jurisdiction, of his office, for alleged cruelty to his scholars. The court of session restored him. The parents or friends, whose weak […]

TRANSLATED FROM BRUMOY[1]. ADVERTISEMENT. I conclude this work, according to my promise, with an account of the comick theatre, and entreat the reader, whether a favourer or an enemy of the ancient drama, not to pass his censure upon the authors or upon me, without a regular perusal of this whole work. For, though it […]

1. SUMMARY OF THE FOUR ARTICLES TREATED OF IN THIS DISCOURSE. Thus I have given a faithful extract of the remains of Aristophanes. That I have not shown them in their true form, I am not afraid that any body will complain. I have given an account of every thing, as far as it was […]