Lives of the English Poets | Page 5

and the side of the question to be espoused, in order to frame the speeches himself; an artifice not wholly excusable, which afterwards occasioned him some self-reproach, and even at the time pleased him so little, that he did not consent to continue it. The whole extent of his assistance to Cave is not known. The Lives of Paul Sarpi, Boerhaave, Admirals Drake and Blake, Barretier, Burman, Sydenham, and Roscommon, with the Essay on Epitaphs, and an Essay on the Account of the Conduct of the Duchess of Marlborough, were certainly contributed to his Miscellany by Johnson. Two tracts, the one a Vindication of the Licenser of the Stage from the Aspersions of Brooke, Author of Gustavus Vasa; the other, Marmor Norfolciense, a pamphlet levelled against Sir Robert Walpole and the Hanoverian succession, were published by him, separately, in 1739.
For his version of Sarpi's History, he had received from Cave, before the 21st of April in this year, fifty pounds, and some sheets of it had been committed to the press, when, unfortunately, the design was stopped, in consequence of proposals appearing for a translation of the same book, by another person of the same name as our author, who was curate of St. Martin's in the Fields, and patronized by Dr. Pearce, the editor of Longinus. Warburton [3] afterwards expressed a wish that Johnson would give the original on one side, and his translation on the other. His next engagement was to draw up an account of the printed books in the Earl of Oxford's library, for Osborne, the bookseller, who had purchased them for thirteen thousand pounds. Such was the petulant impatience of Osborne, during the progress of this irksome task, that Johnson was once irritated so far as to beat him.
In May, 1738, appeared his "London," imitated from the Third Satire of Juvenal, for which he got ten guineas from Dodsley. The excellence of this poem was so immediately perceived, that it reached a second edition in the course of a week. Pope having made some ineffectual inquiries concerning the author, from Mr. Richardson, the son of the painter, observed that he would soon be deterre. In the August of 1739, we find him so far known to Pope, that at his intercession, Earl Gower applied to a friend of Swift to assist in procuring from the University the degree of Master of Arts, that he might be enabled to become a candidate for the mastership of a school then vacant; the application was without success.
His own wants, however pressing, did not hinder him from assisting his mother, who had lost her other son. A letter to Mr. Levett, of Lichfield, on the subject of a debt, for which he makes himself responsible on her account, affords so striking a proof of filial tenderness, that I cannot refuse myself the pleasure of transcribing it.
December, 1, 1743.
Sir,--I am extremely sorry that we have encroached so much upon your forbearance with respect to the interest, which a great perplexity of affairs hindered me from thinking of with that attention that I ought, and which I am not immediately able to remit to you, but will pay it (I think twelve pounds) in two months. I look upon this, and on the future interest of that mortgage, as my own debt; and beg that you will be pleased to give me directions how to pay it, and not mention it to my dear mother. If it be necessary to pay this in less time, I believe I can do it; but I take two months for certainty, and beg an answer whether you can allow me so much time. I think myself very much obliged for your forbearance, and shall esteem it a great happiness to be able to serve you. I have great opportunities of dispersing any thing that you may think it proper to make public. I will give a note for the money payable at the time mentioned, to any one here that you shall appoint.
I am, Sir, your most obedient,
and most humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON.
At Mr. Osborne's, Bookseller, in Gray's Inn.
In the following year (1744) he produced his Life of Savage, a work that gives the charm of a romance to a narrative of real [**re in original] events; and which, bearing the stamp of that eagerness [**ea ness in original] and rapidity with which it was thrown off the mind of the writer, exhibits rather the fervour of an eloquent advocate, than the laboriousness of a minute biographer. The forty-eight octavo pages, as he told Mr. Nichols [4], were written in one day and night. At its first appearance it was warmly praised, in the Champion, probably either by Fielding, or by Ralph, who succeeded to him in a share of that paper; and Sir Joshua