Life of Samuel Johnson, Vol. II — 1773 part 2

On Monday, April 19, he called on me with Mrs. Williams, in Mr. Strahan's coach, and carried me out to dine with Mr. Elphinston[661], at his academy at Kensington.

A printer having acquired a fortune sufficient to keep his coach, was a good topick for the credit of literature[662].

Mrs. Williams said, that another printer, Mr. Hamilton, had not waited so long as Mr. Strahan, but had kept his coach several years sooner[663].

JOHNSON.

'He was in the right.

Life is short.

The sooner that a man begins to enjoy his wealth the better.'

Mr. Elphinston talked of a new book that was much admired, and asked Dr. Johnson if he had read it.

JOHNSON.

'I have looked into it.'

'What (said Elphinston,) have you not read it through?'

Johnson, offended at being thus pressed, and so obliged to own his cursory mode of reading, answered tartly, 'No, Sir, do _you_ read books _through_[664]?'

He this day again defended duelling[665], and put his argument upon what I have ever thought the most solid basis; that if publick war be allowed to be consistent with morality, private war must be equally so.

Indeed we may observe what strained arguments are used, to reconcile war with the Christian religion.

But, in my opinion, it is exceedingly clear that duelling, having better reasons for its barbarous violence, is more justifiable than war, in which thousands go forth without any cause of personal quarrel, and massacre each other.

On Wednesday, April 21, I dined with him at Mr. Thrale's. A gentleman[666] attacked Garrick for being vain.

JOHNSON.

'No wonder, Sir, that he is vain; a man who is perpetually flattered in every mode that can be conceived.

So many bellows have blown the fire, that one wonders he is not by this time become a cinder.'

BOSWELL.

'And such bellows too.

Lord Mansfield with his cheeks like to burst: Lord Chatham like an Aćolus.

I

have read such notes from them to him, as were enough to turn his head[667].'

JOHNSON.

'True.

When he whom every body else flatters, flatters me, I then am truely happy.'

MRS.

THRALE.

'The sentiment is in Congreve, I think.'

JOHNSON.

'Yes, Madam, in _The Way of the World_: "If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see That heart which others bleed for, bleed for me[668]."

'No, Sir, I should not be surprised though Garrick chained the ocean, and lashed the winds.'

BOSWELL.

'Should it not be, Sir, lashed the ocean and chained the winds?'

JOHNSON.

'No, Sir, recollect the original: "In Corum atque Eurum solitus saevire flagellis Barbarus, Aćolio nunquam hoc in carcere passos, Ipsum compedibus qui viscxerat Ennosigoeum[669]."

'This does very well, when both the winds and the sea are personified, and mentioned by their mythological names, as in Juvenal; but when they are mentioned in plain language, the application of the epithets suggested by me, is the most obvious; and accordingly my friend himself, in his imitation of the passage which describes Xerxes, has "The waves he lashes, and enchains the wind."

' The modes of living in different countries, and the various views with which men travel in quest of new scenes, having been talked of, a learned gentleman[670] who holds a considerable office in the law, expatiated on the happiness of a savage life[671]; and mentioned an instance of an officer who had actually lived for some time in the wilds of America, of whom, when in that state, he quoted this reflection with an air of admiration, as if it had been deeply philosophical: 'Here am I, free and unrestrained, amidst the rude magnificence of Nature, with this Indian woman by my side, and this gun with which I can procure food when I want it: what more can be desired for human happiness?'

It did not require much sagacity to foresee that such a sentiment would not be permitted to pass without due animadversion.

JOHNSON.

'Do not allow yourself, Sir, to be imposed upon by such gross absurdity.

It is sad stuff; it is brutish.

If a bull could speak, he might as well exclaim,--Here am I with this cow and this grass; what being can enjoy greater felicity?'

We talked of the melancholy end of a gentleman[672] who had destroyed himself.

JOHNSON.

'It was owing to imaginary difficulties in his affairs, which, had he talked with any friend, would soon have vanished.'

BOSWELL.

'Do you think, Sir, that all who commit suicide are mad?'

JOHNSON.

'Sir, they are often not universally disordered in their intellects, but one passion presses so upon them, that they yield to it, and commit suicide, as a passionate man will stab another.'

He added, 'I have often thought, that after a man has taken the resolution to kill himself, it is not courage in him to do any thing, however desperate, because he has nothing to fear.'

GOLDSMITH.

'I don't see that.'

JOHNSON.

'Nay, but my dear Sir, why should not you see what every one else sees?'

GOLDSMITH.

'It is for fear of something that he has resolved to kill himself; and will not that timid disposition restrain him?'

JOHNSON.

'It does not signify that the fear of something made him resolve; it is upon the state of his mind, after the resolution is taken, that I argue.

Suppose a man, either from fear, or pride, or conscience, or whatever motive, has resolved to kill himself; when once the resolution is taken, he has nothing to fear.

He may then go and take the King of Prussia by the nose, at the head of his army.

He cannot fear the rack, who is resolved to kill himself.

When Eustace Budgel[673] was walking down to the Thames, determined to drown himself, he might, if he pleased, without any apprehension of danger, have turned aside, and first set fire to St. James's palace.'

On Tuesday, April 27, Mr. Beauclerk and I called on him in the morning.

As we walked up Johnson's-court, I said, 'I have a veneration for this court;' and was glad to find that Beauclerk had the same reverential enthusiasm[674].

We found him alone.

We talked of Mr. Andrew Stuart's elegant and plausible Letters to Lord Mansfield[675]: a copy of which had been sent by the authour to Dr. Johnson.

JOHNSON.

'They have not answered the end.

They have not been talked of; I have never heard of them.

This is owing to their not being sold.

People seldom read a book which is given to them; and few are given.

The way to spread a work is to sell it at a low price.

No man will send to buy a thing that costs even sixpence, without an intention to read it.'

BOSWELL.

'May it not be doubted, Sir, whether it be proper to publish letters, arraigning the ultimate decision of an important cause by the supreme judicature of the nation?'

JOHNSON.

'No, Sir, I do not think it was wrong to publish these letters.

If they are thought to do harm, why not answer them?

But they will do no harm; if Mr. Douglas be indeed the son of Lady Jane, he cannot be hurt: if he be not her son, and yet has the great estate of the family of Douglas, he may well submit to have a pamphlet against him by Andrew Stuart.

Sir, I think such a publication does good, as it does good to show us the possibilities of human life.

And Sir, you will not say that the Douglas cause was a cause of easy decision, when it divided your Court as much as it could do, to be determined at all.

When your Judges were seven and seven, the casting vote of the President must be given on one side or other: no matter, for my argument, on which; one or the other _must_ be taken: as when I am to move, there is no matter which leg I move first.

And then, Sir, it was otherwise determined here.

No, Sir, a more dubious determination of any question cannot be imagined[676].'

He said, 'Goldsmith should not be for ever attempting to shine in conversation: he has not temper for it, he is so much mortified when he fails.

Sir, a game of jokes is composed partly of skill, partly of chance, a man may be beat at times by one who has not the tenth part of his wit.

Now Goldsmith's putting himself against another, is like a man laying a hundred to one who cannot spare the hundred.

It is not worth a man's while.

A man should not lay a hundred to one, unless he can easily spare it, though he has a hundred chances for him: he can get but a guinea, and he may lose a hundred.

Goldsmith is in this state.

When he contends, if he gets the better, it is a very little addition to a man of his literary reputation: if he does not get the better, he is miserably vexed.'

Johnson's own superlative powers of wit set him above any risk of such uneasiness.

Garrick had remarked to me of him, a few days before, 'Rabelais and all other wits are nothing compared with him.

You may be diverted by them; but Johnson gives you a forcible hug, and shakes laughter out of you, whether you will or no.' Goldsmith, however, was often very fortunate in his witty contests, even when he entered the lists with Johnson himself.

Sir Joshua Reynolds was in company with them one day, when Goldsmith said, that he thought he could write a good fable, mentioned the simplicity which that kind of composition requires, and observed, that in most fables the animals introduced seldom talk in character.

'For instance, (said he,) the fable of the little fishes, who saw birds fly over their heads, and envying them, petitioned Jupiter to be changed into birds.

The skill (continued he,) consists in making them talk like little fishes.'

While he indulged himself in this fanciful reverie, he observed Johnson shaking his sides, and laughing.

Upon which he smartly proceeded, 'Why, Dr. Johnson, this is not so easy as you seem to think; for if you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like WHALES.'

Johnson, though remarkable for his great variety of composition, never exercised his talents in fable, except we allow his beautiful tale[677] published in Mrs. Williams's _Miscellanies_[678] to be of that species.

I

have, however, found among his manuscript collections the following sketch of one: 'Glow-worm[679] lying in the garden saw a candle in a neighbouring palace,--and complained of the littleness of his own light;--another observed--wait a little;--soon dark,--have outlasted [Greek: poll] [_many_] of these glaring lights which are only brighter as they haste to nothing.'

On Thursday, April 29, I dined with him at General Oglethorpe's, where were Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Langton, Dr. Goldsmith, and Mr. Thrale.

I

was very desirous to get Dr. Johnson absolutely fixed in his resolution to go with me to the Hebrides this year; and I told him that I had received a letter from Dr. Robertson the historian, upon the subject, with which he was much pleased; and now talked in such a manner of his long-intended tour, that I was satisfied he meant to fulfil his engagement.

The custom of eating dogs at Otaheite being mentioned, Goldsmith observed, that this was also a custom in China; that a dog-butcher is as common there as any other butcher; and that when he walks abroad all the dogs fall on him.

JOHNSON.

'That is not owing to his killing dogs, Sir.

I remember a butcher at Lichfield, whom a dog that was in the house where I lived, always attacked.

It is the smell of carnage which provokes this, let the animals he has killed be what they may.'

GOLDSMITH.

'Yes, there is a general abhorrence in animals at the signs of massacre.

If you put a tub full of blood into a stable, the horses are like to go mad.'

JOHNSON.

'I doubt that.'

GOLDSMITH.

'Nay, Sir, it is a fact well authenticated.'

THRALE.

'You had better prove it before you put it into your book on natural history.

You may do it in my stable if you will.'

JOHNSON.

'Nay, Sir, I would not have him prove it.

If he is content to take his information from others, he may get through his book with little trouble, and without much endangering his reputation.

But if he makes experiments for so comprehensive a book as his, there would be no end to them: his erroneous assertions would then fall upon himself, and he might be blamed for not having made experiments as to every particular.'

The character of Mallet having been introduced, and spoken of slightingly by Goldsmith; JOHNSON.

'Why, Sir, Mallet had talents enough to keep his literary reputation alive as long as he himself lived[680];

and that, let me tell you, is a good deal.'

GOLDSMITH.

'But I cannot agree that it was so.

His literary reputation was dead long before his natural death.

I consider an authour's literary reputation to be alive only while his name will ensure a good price for his copy from the booksellers.

I will get you (to Johnson,) a hundred guineas for any thing whatever that you shall write, if you put your name to it[681].'

Dr. Goldmith's new play, _She Stoops to Conquer_, being mentioned;

JOHNSON.

'I know of no comedy for many years that has so much exhilarated an audience, that has answered so much the great end of comedy--making an audience merry[682].'

Goldsmith having said, that Garrick's compliment to the Queen, which he introduced into the play of _The Chances_[683], which he had altered and revised this year, was mean and gross flattery;--JOHNSON.

'Why, Sir, I would not _write_, I would not give solemnly under my hand, a character beyond what I thought really true; but a speech on the stage, let it flatter ever so extravagantly, is formular[684].

It has always been formular to flatter Kings and Queens; so much so, that even in our church-service we have "our most religious King," used indiscriminately, whoever is King.

Nay, they even flatter themselves;--"we have been graciously pleased to grant."

No modern flattery, however, is so gross as that of the Augustan age, where the Emperour was deified.

"_Praesens Divus habebitur Augustus_[685]."

And as to meanness, (rising into warmth,) how is it mean in a player,--a showman,--a fellow who exhibits himself for a shilling, to flatter his Queen[686]?

The attempt, indeed, was dangerous; for if it had missed, what became of Garrick, and what became of the Queen?

As Sir William Temple says of a great General, it is necessary not only that his designs be formed in a masterly manner, but that they should be attended with success[687].

Sir, it is right, at a time when the Royal Family is not generally liked[688], to let it be seen that the people like at least one of them.'

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

'I do not perceive why the profession of a player should be despised[689]; for the great and ultimate end of all the employments of mankind is to produce amusement.

Garrick produces more amusement than any body.'

BOSWELL.

'You say, Dr. Johnson, that Garrick exhibits himself for a shilling.

In this respect he is only on a footing with a lawyer who exhibits himself for his fee, and even will maintain any nonsense or absurdity, if the case requires it.

Garrick refuses a play or a part which he does not like; a lawyer never refuses.'

JOHNSON.

'Why, Sir, what does this prove?

only that a lawyer is worse.

Boswell is now like Jack in _The Tale of a Tub_[690], who, when he is puzzled by an argument, hangs himself.

He thinks I shall cut him down, but I'll let him hang' (laughing vociferously).

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

'Mr. Boswell thinks that the profession of a lawyer being unquestionably honourable, if he can show the profession of a player to be more honourable, he proves his argument.'

On Friday, April 30, I dined with him at Mr. Beauclerk's, where were Lord Charlemont, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and some more members of the LITERARY CLUB, whom he had obligingly invited to meet me, as I was this evening to be balloted for as candidate for admission into that distinguished society.

Johnson had done me the honour to propose me[691], and Beauclerk was very zealous for me.

Goldsmith being mentioned; JOHNSON.

'It is amazing how little Goldsmith knows.

He seldom comes where he is not more ignorant than any one else.'

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

'Yet there is no man whose company is more liked.'

JOHNSON.

'To be sure, Sir.

When people find a man of the most distinguished abilities as a writer, their inferiour while he is with them, it must be highly gratifying to them.

What Goldsmith comically says of himself is very true,--he always gets the better when he argues alone; meaning, that he is master of a subject in his study, and can write well upon it; but when he comes into company, grows confused, and unable to talk[692].

Take him as a poet, his _Traveller_ is a very fine performance; ay, and so is his _Deserted Village_, were it not sometimes too much the echo of his _Traveller_.

Whether, indeed, we take him as a poet,--as a comick writer,--or as an historian, he stands in the first class.'

BOSWELL.

'An historian!

My dear Sir, you surely will not rank his compilation of the Roman History with the works of other historians of this age?'

JOHNSON.

'Why, who are before him[693]?'

BOSWELL.

'Hume,-- Robertson[694],--Lord Lyttelton.'

JOHNSON (his antipathy to the Scotch beginning to rise).

'I have not read Hume; but, doubtless, Goldsmith's _History_ is better than the _verbiage_ of Robertson[695], or the foppery of Dalrymple[696].'

BOSWELL.

'Will you not admit the superiority of Robertson, in whose _History_ we find such penetration--such painting?'

JOHNSON.

'Sir, you must consider how that penetration and that painting are employed.

It is not history, it is imagination.

He who describes what he never saw, draws from fancy.

Robertson paints minds as Sir Joshua paints faces in a history-piece: he imagines an heroic countenance.

You must look upon Robertson's work as romance, and try it by that standard[697].

History it is not.

Besides, Sir, it is the great excellence of a writer to put into his book as much as his book will hold.

Goldsmith has done this in his _History_.

Now Robertson might have put twice as much into his book.

Robertson is like a man who has packed gold in wool: the wool takes up more room than the gold.

No, Sir; I always thought Robertson would be crushed by his own weight,--would be buried under his own ornaments.

Goldsmith tells you shortly all you want to know: Robertson detains you a great deal too long.

No man will read Robertson's cumbrous detail a second time; but Goldsmith's plain narrative will please again and again.

I would say to Robertson what an old tutor of a college said to one of his pupils: "Read over your compositions, and where ever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."

Goldsmith's abridgement is better than that of Lucius Florus or Eutropius; and I will venture to say, that if you compare him with Vertot[698], in the same places of the Roman History, you will find that he excels Vertot.

Sir, he has the art of compiling, and of saying every thing he has to say in a pleasing manner[699].

He is now writing a Natural History and will make it as entertaining as a Persian Tale.'

I cannot dismiss the present topick without observing, that it is probable that Dr. Johnson, who owned that he often 'talked for victory,' rather urged plausible objections to Dr. Robertson's excellent historical works, in the ardour of contest, than expressed his real and decided opinion; for it is not easy to suppose, that he should so widely differ from the rest of the literary world[700].

JOHNSON.

'I remember once being with Goldsmith in Westminster-abbey.

While we surveyed the Poets' Corner, I said to him, "_Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur istis_[701]."

When we got to Temple-bar he stopped me, pointed to the heads upon it[702], and slily whispered me, "_Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur_ ISTIS[703]."

'.

Johnson praised John Bunyan highly.

'His _Pilgrim's Progress_ has great merit, both for invention, imagination, and the conduct of the story;

and it has had the best evidence of its merit, the general and continued approbation of mankind.

Few books, I believe, have had a more extensive sale.

It is remarkable, that it begins very much like the poem of Dante;

yet there was no translation of Dante when Bunyan wrote.

There is reason to think that he had read Spenser[704].'

A proposition which had been agitated, that monuments to eminent persons should, for the time to come, be erected in St. Paul's church as well as in Westminster-abbey, was mentioned; and it was asked, who should be honoured by having his monument first erected there[705].

Somebody suggested Pope.

JOHNSON.

'Why, Sir, as Pope was a Roman Catholick, I would not have his to be first.

I think Milton's rather should have the precedence[706].

I think more highly of him now than I did at twenty[707].

There is more thinking in him and in Butler, than in any of our poets.'

Some of the company expressed a wonder why the authour of so excellent a book as _The Whole Duty of Man_[708] should conceal himself.

JOHNSON.

'There may be different reasons assigned for this, any one of which would be very sufficient.

He may have been a clergyman, and may have thought that his religious counsels would have less weight when known to come from a man whose profession was Theology.

He may have been a man whose practice was not suitable to his principles, so that his character might injure the effect of his book, which he had written in a season of penitence.

Or he may have been a man of rigid self-denial, so that he would have no reward for his pious labours while in this world, but refer it all to a future state.'

The gentlemen went away to their club, and I was left at Beauclerk's till the fate of my election should be announced to me.

I sat in a state of anxiety which even the charming conversation of Lady Di Beauclerk could not entirely dissipate.

In a short time I received the agreeable intelligence that I was chosen[709].

I hastened to the place of meeting, and was introduced to such a society as can seldom be found.

Mr. Edmund Burke, whom I then saw for the first time, and whose splendid talents had long made me ardently wish for his acquaintance; Dr. Nugent, Mr. Garrick, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. (afterwards Sir William) Jones[710], and the company with whom I had dined.

Upon my entrance, Johnson placed himself behind a chair, on which he leaned as on a desk or pulpit, and with humorous formality gave me a _Charge_, pointing out the conduct expected from me as a good member of this club.

Goldsmith produced some very absurd verses which had been publickly recited to an audience for money[711].

JOHNSON.

'I can match this nonsense.

There was a poem called _Eugenio_, which came out some years ago, and concludes thus: "And now, ye trifling, self-assuming elves, Brimful of pride, of nothing, of yourselves, Survey Eugenio, view him o'er and o'er, Then sink into yourselves, and be no more[712]."

'Nay, Dryden in his poem on the Royal Society[713], has these lines: "Then we upon our globe's last verge shall go, And see the ocean leaning on the sky;

From thence our rolling neighbours we shall know, And on the lunar world securely pry."

' Talking of puns, Johnson, who had a great contempt for that species of wit[714], deigned to allow that there was one good pun in _Menagiana_, I think on the word _corps_[715].

Much pleasant conversation passed, which Johnson relished with great good humour.

But his conversation alone, or what led to it, or was interwoven with it, is the business of this work[716].

On Saturday, May 1, we dined by ourselves at our old rendezvous, the Mitre tavern.

He was placid, but not much disposed to talk.

He observed that 'The Irish mix better with the English than the Scotch do; their language is nearer to English; as a proof of which, they succeed very well as players, which Scotchmen do not.

Then, Sir, they have not that extreme nationality which we find in the Scotch.

I will do you, Boswell, the justice to say, that you are the most _unscottified_ of your countrymen.

You are almost the only instance of a Scotchman that I have known, who did not at every other sentence bring in some other Scotchman[717].'

We drank tea with Mrs. Williams.

I introduced a question which has been much agitated in the Church of Scotland, whether the claim of lay-patrons to present ministers to parishes be well founded; and supposing it to be well founded, whether it ought to be exercised without the concurrence of the people?

That Church is composed of a series of judicatures: a Presbytery, a Synod, and finally, a General Assembly; before all of which, this matter may be contended: and in some cases the Presbytery having refused to induct or _settle_, as they call it, the person presented by the patron, it has been found necessary to appeal to the General Assembly.

He said, I might see the subject well treated in the _Defence of Pluralities_[718]; and although he thought that a patron should exercise his right with tenderness to the inclinations of the people of a parish, he was very clear as to his right.

Then supposing the question to be pleaded before the General Assembly, he dictated to me what follows: 'Against the right of patrons is commonly opposed, by the inferiour judicatures, the plea of conscience.

Their conscience tells them, that the people ought to choose their pastor; their conscience tells them that they ought not to impose upon a congregation a minister ungrateful and unacceptable to his auditors.

Conscience is nothing more than a conviction felt by ourselves of something to be done, or something to be avoided; and in questions of simple unperplexed morality, conscience is very often a guide that may be trusted.

But before conscience can determine, the state of the question is supposed to be completely known.

In questions of law, or of fact, conscience is very often confounded with opinion.

No man's conscience can tell him the right of another man[719]; they must be known by rational investigation or historical enquiry.

Opinion, which he that holds it may call his conscience, may teach some men that religion would be promoted, and quiet preserved, by granting to the people universally the choice of their ministers.

But it is a conscience very ill informed that violates the rights of one man, for the convenience of another.

Religion cannot be promoted by injustice: and it was never yet found that a popular election was very quietly transacted.

'That justice would be violated by transferring to the people the right of patronage, is apparent to all who know whence that right had its original.

The right of patronage was not at first a privilege torn by power from unresisting poverty.

It is not an authority at first usurped in times of ignorance, and established only by succession and by precedents.

It is not a grant capriciously made from a higher tyrant to a lower.

It is a right dearly purchased by the first possessors, and justly inherited by those that succeeded them.

When Christianity was established in this island, a regular mode of publick worship was prescribed.

Publick worship requires a publick place; and the proprietors of lands, as they were converted, built churches for their families and their vassals.

For the maintenance of ministers, they settled a certain portion of their lands; and a district, through which each minister was required to extend his care, was, by that circumscription, constituted a parish.

This is a position so generally received in England, that the extent of a manor and of a parish are regularly received for each other.

The churches which the proprietors of lands had thus built and thus endowed, they justly thought themselves entitled to provide with ministers; and where the episcopal government prevails, the Bishop has no power to reject a man nominated by the patron, but for some crime that might exclude him from the priesthood.

For the endowment of the church being the gift of the landlord, he was consequently at liberty to give it according to his choice, to any man capable of performing the holy offices.

The people did not choose him, because the people did not pay him.

'We hear it sometimes urged, that this original right is passed out of memory, and is obliterated and obscured by many translations of property and changes of government; that scarce any church is now in the hands of the heirs of the builders; and that the present persons have entered subsequently upon the pretended rights by a thousand accidental and unknown causes.

Much of this, perhaps, is true.

But how is the right of patronage extinguished?

If the right followed the lands, it is possessed by the same equity by which the lands are possessed.

It is, in effect, part of the manor, and protected by the same laws with every other privilege.

Let us suppose an estate forfeited by treason, and granted by the Crown to a new family.

With the lands were forfeited all the rights appendant to those lands; by the same power that grants the lands, the rights also are granted.

The right lost to the patron falls not to the people, but is either retained by the Crown, or what to the people is the same thing, is by the Crown given away.

Let it change hands ever so often, it is possessed by him that receives it with the same right as it was conveyed.

It may, indeed, like all our possessions, be forcibly seized or fraudulently obtained.

But no injury is still done to the people; for what they never had, they have never lost.

Caius may usurp the right of Titius; but neither Caius nor Titius injure the people; and no man's conscience, however tender or however active, can prompt him to restore what may be proved to have been never taken away.

Supposing, what I think cannot be proved, that a popular election of ministers were to be desired, our desires are not the measure of equity.

It were to be desired that power should be only in the hands of the merciful, and riches in the possession of the generous; but the law must leave both riches and power where it finds them: and must often leave riches with the covetous, and power with the cruel.

Convenience may be a rule in little things, where no other rule has been established.

But as the great end of government is to give every man his own, no inconvenience is greater than that of making right uncertain.

Nor is any man more an enemy to publick peace, than he who fills weak heads with imaginary claims, and breaks the series of civil subordination, by inciting the lower classes of mankind to encroach upon the higher.

'Having thus shown that the right of patronage, being originally purchased, may be legally transferred, and that it is now in the hands of lawful possessors, at least as certainly as any other right;--we have left to the advocates of the people no other plea than that of convenience.

Let us, therefore, now consider what the people would really gain by a general abolition of the right of patronage.

What is most to be desired by such a change is, that the country should be supplied with better ministers.

But why should we suppose that the parish will make a wiser choice than the patron?

If we suppose mankind actuated by interest, the patron is more likely to choose with caution, because he will suffer more by choosing wrong.

By the deficiencies of his minister, or by his vices, he is equally offended with the rest of the congregation; but he will have this reason more to lament them, that they will be imputed to his absurdity or corruption.

The qualifications of a minister are well known to be learning and piety.

Of his learning the patron is probably the only judge in the parish; and of his piety not less a judge than others; and is more likely to enquire minutely and diligently before he gives a presentation, than one of the parochial rabble, who can give nothing but a vote.