promoted by peace, which he accordingly maintained, with credit, during a very long period. Johnson himself afterwards honestly acknowledged the merit of Walpole, whom he called 'a fixed star;' while he characterized his opponent, Pitt, as 'a meteor[1].' But Johnson's juvenile poem was naturally impregnated with the fire of opposition, and upon every account was universally admired.
Though thus elevated into fame, and conscious of uncommon powers, he had not that bustling confidence, or, I may rather say, that animated ambition, which one might have supposed would have urged him to endeavour at rising in life. But such was his inflexible dignity of character, that he could not stoop to court the great; without which, hardly any man has made his way to a high station[2]. He could not expect to produce many such works as his London, and he felt the hardships of writing for bread; he was, therefore, willing to resume the office of a schoolmaster, so as to have
- ↑ See Boswell's Hebrides, Oct. 21, 1773, and Post, March 21, 1775, for Johnson's attack on Lord Chatham. In the Life of Thomson Johnson wrote:—'At this time a long course of opposition to Sir Robert Walpole had filled the nation with clamours for liberty, of which no man felt the want, and with care for liberty, which was not in danger.' Johnson's Works, viii. 370. Hawkins says (Life. p. 514):—'Of Walpole he had a high opinion. He said of him that he was a fine fellow, and that his very enemies deemed him so before his death. He honoured his memory for having kept this country in peace many years, as also for the goodness and plausibility of his temper.' Horace Walpole (Letters v. 509), says:—'My father alone was capable of acting on one great plan of honesty from the beginning of his life to the end. He could for ever wage war with knaves and malice, and preserve his temper; could know men, and yet feel for them; could smile when opposed, and be gentle after triumph.'
- ↑ Johnson in the Life of Milton describes himself:—'Milton was naturally a thinker for himself, confident of his own abilities, and disdainful of help or hindrance. From his contemporaries he neither courted nor received support; there is in his writings nothing by which the pride of other authors might be gratified, or favour gained; no exchange of praise, nor solicitation of support.' Johnson's Works, vii. 142. See Post, Feb. 1766, for Johnson's opinion on 'courting great men.'
