as superior to Pope's: 'I fear not, Madam (said he), the little fellow has done wonders[1].' His superior reverence of Dryden notwithstanding still appeared in his talk as in his writings[2]; and when some one mentioned the ridicule thrown on him in the Rehearsal, as having hurt his general character as an author: 'On the contrary (says Mr. Johnson), the greatness of Dryden's reputation is now the only principle of vitality which keeps the duke of Buckingham's play from putrefaction[3].'
It was not very easy however for people not quite intimate with Dr. Johnson, to get exactly his opinion of a writer's merit, as he would now and then divert himself by confounding those who thought themselves obliged to say to-morrow what he had said yesterday; and even Garrick, who ought to have been better acquainted with his tricks, professed himself mortified, that one time when he was extolling Dryden in a rapture that I suppose disgusted his friend[4], Mr. Johnson suddenly challenged him to produce twenty lines in a series that would not disgrace the poet and his admirer[5]. Garrick produced a passage that he had once heard the Doctor commend, in which he now found, if I remember rightly, sixteen faults, and made Garrick look silly at his own table. When I told Mr. Johnson the story, 'Why, what
- ↑ 'Pope's preface,' Johnson says, 'every editor has an interest to suppress but that every reader would demand its insertion.' Works, v. 137. also 'ib'. viii. 272.
- ↑ For his estimate of Pope and Dryden see Life, ii. 5, 85, and Works, viii. 325.
- ↑ 'Talking of the Comedy of The Rehearsal, he said:—"It has not vitality enough to preserve it from putrefaction."' Life, iv. 320.
South says in his Sermons, iii. 398:—'They have souls so dull and stupid as to serve for little else but to keep their bodies from putrefaction.'
For The Rehearsal see Johnson's Works, vii. 272, and Life, ii. 168. - ↑ 'I do not know for certain' said Mrs. Thrale, 'what will please Dr. Johnson; but I know for certain that it will displease him to praise anything, even what he likes, extravagantly.' Life, ii. 225. One day he said to her:—'I know nobody who blasts by praise as you do; for whenever there is exaggerated praise everybody is set against a character.' Ib. 1v. 81.
- ↑ 'Dryden's faults of negligence are beyond recital. Such is the unevenness of his compositions that ten lines are seldom found together without something of which the reader is ashamed.' Works, vii. 344.
a monkey
