Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales Part 61

I long to be home, and have taken a place in the coach for Monday; I hope, therefore, to be in London on Friday, the 26th, in the evening.

Please to let Mrs. Williams know. I am, &c.

XXIX.--To THE SAME.

Lichfield, June 23, 1775.

DEAR MADAM,--Now I hope you are thinking: Shall I have a letter to-day from Lichfield? Something of a letter you will have; how else can I expect that you should write? and the morning, on which I should miss a letter, would be a morning of uneasiness, notwithstanding all that would be said or done by the sisters of Stowhill, who do and say whatever good they can. They give me good words, and cherries, and strawberries. Lady ****, and her mother and sister, were visiting there yesterday, and Lady ---- took her tea before her mother.

Mrs. Cobb is to come to Miss Porter's this afternoon. Miss A--comes little near me. Mr. Langley, of Ashbourne, was here to-day, in his way to Birmingham, and every body talks of you.

The ladies of the Amicable society are to walk, in a few days, from the townhall to the cathedral, in procession, to hear a sermon. They walk in linen gowns, and each has a stick, with an acorn; but for the acorn they could give no reason, till I told them of the civick crown.

I have just had your sweet letter, and am glad that you are to be at the regatta. You know how little I love to have you left out of any s.h.i.+ning part of life. You have every right to distinction, and should, therefore, be distinguished. You will see a show with philosophick superiority, and, therefore, may see it safely. It is easy to talk of sitting at home, contented, when others are seeing, or making shows.

But, not to have been where it is supposed, and seldom supposed falsely, that all would go if they could; to be able to say nothing, when every one is talking; to have no opinion, when every one is judging; to hear exclamations of rapture, without power to depress; to listen to falsehoods, without right to contradict, is, after all, a state of temporary inferiority, in which the mind is rather hardened by stubbornness, than supported by fort.i.tude. If the world be worth winning, let us enjoy it; if it is to be despised, let us despise it by conviction. But the world is not to be despised, but as it is compared with something better. Company is, in itself, better than solitude, and pleasure better than indolence: "Ex nihilo nihil fit," says the moral, as well as the natural, philosopher. By doing nothing, and by knowing nothing, no power of doing good can be obtained. He must mingle with the world, that desires to be useful. Every new scene impresses new ideas, enriches the imagination, and enlarges the power of reason, by new topicks of comparison. You, that have seen the regatta, will have images, which we, who miss it, must want; and no intellectual images are without use. But, when you are in this scene of splendour and gaiety, do not let one of your fits of negligence steal upon you. "Hoc age," is the great rule, whether you are serious or merry; whether you are stating the expenses of your family, learning science, or duty, from a folio, or floating on the Thames in a fancied dress. Of the whole entertainment, let me not hear so copious, nor so true an account, from any body as from you. I am, dearest madam, your, &c.

x.x.x.--To MRS. THRALE.

Ashbourne.

DEAR MADAM,--I am sure I write and write, and every letter that comes from you charges me with not writing. Since I wrote to Queeney I have written twice to you, on the 6th and the 9th: be pleased to let me know whether you have them, or have them not. That of the 6th you should regularly have had on the 8th, yet your letter of the 9th seems not to mention it; all this puzzles me.

Poor dear ****! He only grows dull, because he is sickly; age has not yet begun to impair him; nor is he such a chameleon as to take immediately the colour of his company. When you see him again you will find him reanimated. Most men have their bright and their cloudy days; at least they have days when they put their powers into action, and days when they suffer them to repose.

Fourteen thousand pounds make a sum sufficient for the establishment of a family, and which, in whatever flow of riches or confidence of prosperity, deserves to be very seriously considered. I hope a great part of it has paid debts, and no small part bought land. As for gravelling, and walling, and digging, though I am not much delighted with them, yet something, indeed much, must be allowed to every man's taste. He that is growing rich has a right to enjoy part of the growth his own way. I hope to range in the walk, and row upon the water, and devour fruit from the wall.

Dr. Taylor wants to be gardening. He means to buy a piece of ground in the neighbourhood, and surround it with a wall, and build a gardener's house upon it, and have fruit, and be happy. Much happiness it will not bring him; but what can he do better? If I had money enough, what would I do? Perhaps, if you and master did not hold me, I might go to Cairo, and down the Red sea to Bengal, and take a ramble in India. Would this be better than building and planting? It would surely give more variety to the eye, and more amplitude to the mind. Half fourteen thousand would send me out to see other forms of existence, and bring me back to describe them.

I answer this the day on which I had yours of the 9th, that is on the 11th. Let me know when it comes. I am, &c.

x.x.xI.--To MRS. THRALE.

Lichfield, August 2, 1775.

MADAM,--I dined to-day at Stowhill, and am come away to write my letter.

Never, surely, was I such a writer before. Do you keep my letters? I am not of your opinion, that I shall not like to read them hereafter; for though there is in them not much history of mind, or anything else, they will, I hope, always be, in some degree, the records of a pure and blameless friends.h.i.+p, and, in some hours of languor and sadness, may revive the memory of more cheerful times.

Why you should suppose yourself not desirous hereafter to read the history of your own mind, I do not see. Twelve years, on which you now look, as on a vast expanse of life, will, probably, be pa.s.sed over uniformly and smoothly, with very little perception of your progress, and with very few remarks upon the way. The acc.u.mulation of knowledge, which you promise to yourself, by which the future is to look back upon the present, with the superiority of manhood to infancy, will, perhaps, never be attempted, or never will be made; and you will find, as millions have found before you, that forty-five has made little sensible addition to thirty-three.

As the body, after a certain time, gains no increase of height, and little of strength, there is, likewise, a period, though more variable by external causes, when the mind commonly attains its stationary point, and very little advances its powers of reflection, judgment, and ratiocination. The body may acquire new modes of motion, or new dexterities of mechanick operations, but its original strength receives not improvement: the mind may be stored with new languages, or new sciences, but its power of thinking remains nearly the same, and, unless it attains new subjects of meditation, it commonly produces thoughts of the same force and the same extent, at very distant intervals of life; as the tree, unless a foreign fruit be ingrafted, gives, year after year, productions of the same form, and the same flavour.

By intellectual force, or strength of thought, is meant the degree of power which the mind possesses of surveying the subject of meditation, with its circuit of concomitants, and its train of dependence.

Of this power, which all observe to be very different in different minds, part seems the gift of nature, and part the acquisition of experience. When the powers of nature have attained their intended energy, they can be no more advanced. The shrub can never become a tree.

And it is not unreasonable to suppose, that they are, before the middle of life, in their full vigour.

Nothing then remains but practice and experience; and, perhaps, why they do so little, may be worth inquiry.

But I have just now looked, and find it so late, that I will inquire against the next post night. I am, &c.

x.x.xII.--To MRS. THRALE.

Lichfield, Augusts, 1775.

DEAR MADAM,--Instead of forty reasons for my return, one is sufficient, --that you wish for my company. I purpose to write no more till you see me. The ladies at Stowhill and Greenhill are unanimously of opinion, that it will be best to take a post chaise, and not to be troubled with the vexations of a common carriage. I will venture to suppose the ladies at Streatham to be of the same mind.

You will now expect to be told, why you will not be so much wiser, as you expect, when you have lived twelve years longer.

It is said, and said truly, that experience is the best teacher; and it is supposed, that, as life is lengthened, experience is increased. But a closer inspection of human life will discover, that time often pa.s.ses without any incident which can much enlarge knowledge, or ratify judgment. When we are young we learn much, because we are universally ignorant; we observe every thing, because every thing is new. But, after some years, the occurrences of daily life are exhausted; one day pa.s.ses like another, in the same scene of appearances, in the same course of transactions: we have to do what we have often done, and what we do not try, because we do not wish to do much better; we are told what we already know, and, therefore, what repet.i.tion cannot make us know with greater certainty.

He that has early learned much, perhaps, seldom makes, with regard to life and manners, much addition to his knowledge; not only, because, as more is known, there is less to learn, but because a mind, stored with images and principles, turns inwards for its own entertainment, and is employed in settling those ideas, which run into confusion, and in recollecting those which are stealing away; practices by which wisdom may be kept, but not gained. The merchant, who was at first busy in acquiring money, ceases to grow richer, from the time when he makes it his business only to count it.

Those who have families, or employments, are engaged in business of little difficulty, but of great importance, requiring rather a.s.siduity of practice than subtilty of speculation, occupying the attention with images too bulky for refinement, and too obvious for research. The right is already known: what remains is only to follow it. Daily business adds no more to wisdom, than daily lesson to the learning of the teacher. But of how few lives does not stated duty claim the greater part!

Far the greater part of human minds never endeavour their own improvement. Opinions, once received from instruction, or settled by whatever accident, are seldom recalled to examination; having been once supposed to be right, they are never discovered to be erroneous, for no application is made of any thing that time may present, either to shake or to confirm them. From this acquiescence in preconceptions none are wholly free; between fear of uncertainty, and dislike of labour, every one rests while he might yet go forward; and they that were wise at thirty-three, are very little wiser at forty-five.

Of this speculation you are, perhaps, tired, and would rather hear of Sophy. I hope, before this comes, that her head will be easier, and your head less filled with fears and troubles, which you know are to be indulged only to prevent evil, not to increase it.

Your uneasiness about Sophy is, probably, unnecessary, and, at worst, your own children are healthful, and your affairs prosperous. Unmingled good cannot be expected; but, as we may lawfully gather all the good within our reach, we may be allowed to lament after that which we lose.

I hope your losses are at an end, and that, as far as the condition of our present existence permits, your remaining life will be happy. I am, &c.

x.x.xIII.--To MRS. THRALE.

Lichfield, March 25, 1776.

DEAR MADAM,--This letter will not, I hope, reach you many days before me; in a distress which can be so little relieved, nothing remains for a friend, but to come and partake it.

Poor, dear, sweet little boy! When I read the letter this day to Mrs.

Aston, she said, "such a death is the next to translation." Yet, however I may convince myself of this, the tears are in my eyes, and yet I could not love him as you loved him, nor reckon upon him for a future comfort, as you and his father reckoned upon him.

He is gone, and we are going! We could not have enjoyed him long, and shall not long be separated from him. He has, probably, escaped many such pangs as you are now feeling.

Nothing remains, but that, with humble confidence we resign ourselves to almighty goodness, and fall down, without irreverent murmurs, before the sovereign distributer of good and evil, with hope, that though sorrow endureth for a night, yet joy may come in the morning.

I have known you, madam, too long to think that you want any arguments for submission to the supreme will; nor can my consolation have any effect, but that of showing that I wish to comfort you. What can be done, you must do for yourself. Remember first, that your child is happy; and then, that he is safe, not only from the ills of this world, but from those more formidable dangers which extend their mischief to eternity. You have brought into the world a rational being; have seen him happy during the little life that has been granted him; and can have no doubt but that his happiness is now permanent and immutable.

When you have obtained, by prayer, such tranquillity as nature will admit, force your attention, as you can, upon your accustomed duties and accustomed entertainments. You can do no more for our dear boy, but you must not, therefore, think less on those whom your attention may make fitter for the place to which he is gone. I am, dearest, dearest madam, your most affectionate humble servant.

x.x.xIV.--To MRS. THRALE.

Sept. 6, 1777.

DEAREST LADY,--It is true, that I have loitered, and, what is worse, loitered with very little pleasure. The time has run away, as most time runs, without account, without use, and without memorial. But, to say this of a few weeks, though not pleasing, might be borne; but what ought to be the regret of him who, in a few days, will have so nearly the same to say of sixty-eight years? But complaint is vain.