432 Essay on
��a single manuscript a hundred years old. Martin, who in the last century published an Account of the Western Islands, men tions Irish, but never Earse manuscripts, to be found in the islands in his time. The bards could not read ; if they could, they might probably have written. But the bard was a barbarian among barbarians, and, knowing nothing himself, lived with others that knew no more. If there is a manuscript from which the translation was made, in what age was it written, and where is it ? If it was collected from oral recitation, it could only be in detached parts and scattered fragments : the whole is too long to be remembered V Who put it together in its present form ? For these, and such like reasons, Johnson calls the whole an imposture. He adds, ' The editor, or author, never could shew the original, nor can it be shewn by any other. To revenge reasonable incredulity, by refusing evidence, is a degree of in solence with which the world is not yet acquainted ; and stubborn audacity is the last refuge of guilt 2 .' This reasoning carries with it great weight. It roused the resentment of Mr. Macpherson. He sent a threatening letter to the author; and Johnson answered him in the rough phrase of stern defiance 3 . The two heroes frowned at a distance, but never came to action.
In the year 1777. the misfortunes of Dr. Dodd excited his compassion 4 . He wrote a speech for that unhappy man, when called up to receive judgement of death 5 ; besides two petitions, one to the King, and another to the Queen 6 ; and a sermon to be preached by Dodd to the convicts in Newgate 7 . It may appear trifling to add, that about the same time he wrote a prologue to the comedy of A Word to the Wise, written by Hugh Kelly 8 . The play, some years before, had been damned by a party on the first night. It was revived for the benefit of the author's widow. Mrs. Piozzi relates, that when Johnson
1 These extracts are an abridg- 7 Ib. p. 167. Johnson wrote to
ment of Johnson's Works, ix. 112- Mrs. Thrale from Lichfield on Aug. 9,
115. 1777 : ' Lucy [Porter] said, "When
- Ib. p. 115. I read Dr. Dodd's sermon to the
3 Life, ii. 297. prisoners, I said, Dr. Johnson could
4 Ib. iii. 139-148. 5 Ib. p. 141. not make a better." ' Letters, ii. 18. 6 Ib. p. 142. 8 Life, iii. 113.
was
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