"I wonder how you and I admitted this to the publick eye, for Windham &c. were struck with its indelicacy, and it might hurt the book much. It is, however, mighty good stuff."—Boswell to Malone, 10 Feb., 1791.
WHEN Boswell's mind was not preoccupied and splendidly buzzing with drink, women, friends, celebrities, business, literature and glory, it was occupied with religion. He was no Calvinist, the good Boswell; and he did God the justice to believe him no Calvinist either. From Pope and the tolerant deists of his day he acquired a leaning toward universalism. Of one thing at least he was sure: That the use of religion is to comfort men with whom everything in this world has not gone strictly according to hope and expectation.
How he himself would have governed the universe, with what benignity of temper he would have dealt with sheep and goats alike, one may deliciously infer from his comment on the death of his "poor uncle, Dr. Boswell," who seems to have been, like his poor nephew, what is called nowadays a "yea-sayer to life." Writing to his lifelong confidant, the Rev. William Temple, James Boswell says of his deceased relative, with sympathetic indulgence and a sidelong
