8

She was willing to be kind to him in a mary of his experience—" a life radicooler fashion; and when her thoughts cally wretched!" What is to be said were not absorbed by her new passion of it? We know that, as he was clogged (which, it must be owned, was not dis- from the first with an unsound bodily honorable in itself) she was probably constitution, exhibiting itself in scrofsorry for the old friend and former in- ula, in strange nervous movements asmate, driven back into the loneliness tonishing to casual observers, and in from which her dead husband had once attacks of illness which crowd these rescued him, and which the increase of "Letters" with details of suffering, so, infirmities and diseases would render yet as Boswell words it, he "inherited from more dreary and woeful. For his part his father a vile melancholy," produche makes the most of anything like a ing dark fits of hypochondria, frequently revival of her former "attention and" operating against his health and his tenderness; "1 he writes to "dearest life with more or less violence," makMiss Susy and Miss Sophy" in the ing him say on one occasion that he familiar tone of a fatherly home friend. would consent to have a limb amputated He rejoices when Sophy recovers from to recover his spirits, and on another a threatening illness: "God bless you that part of his life had been spent in and your children so says, dear mad-gloomy discontent or importunate disam, your old friend." He is trying to tress." He could preach cheerfulness to clasp a departing shadow; he hopes others, 10 could exhort Taylor to avoid against hope; he tells her of his symp- fretting, could say that it was "useless toms, and tries, as it were, to move her and foolish, and perhaps sinful, to be pity by such words as "spiritless, in- gloomy, but he could not consistently firm, sleepless, and solitary, looking act on his own teaching. Add to this back with sorrow and forward with ter- his frequent illnesses, and especially ror- but I will stop.": ."2 She could actu- that burden of "wearisome nights," ally write to him about "dying with a caused by dyspepsia or by asthma, grace." This was too much, and he which is so often referred to in these sternly rebuked her flippant "folly." "Letters," 12 and we understand his One knows how the story must end. craving for club society, his horror of In June, 1784, she gives him to under- solitude, his frequent postponement of stand that she has "6 irrevocably" re- bedtime, his bursts of irritability, his solved to marry Piozzi. He writes a impatience of contradiction. If people letter, which Mr. Leslie Stephen calls a could have looked into his mind they "cry of blind indignation." She re- would have judged his "rudeness" monstrates with more dignity than one more equitably. And the shadows might have expected. In his rejoinder darkened, the waters became more turhe has recovered self-control, and bid, when he thought of "the inevitable "breathes out one sigh more of tender- hour." He once said that he had never ness, perhaps useless, but at least sin- had a moment when the thought of There follow deeply pathetic death was not terrible to him.18 And words, which have often been quoted, here comes in a question of painful inin grateful recognition of her kindness, as having soothed "twenty years of a life radically wretched." 5

cere."

There is a sad fascination in this sum

1 Letters, ii. 350. He adds: "You will never bestow any share of your good-will on one who deserves it better. Those that have loved longest love best." 2 Ibid., ii. 369. 3 Ibid., ii. 384.

4 She was not in fact married until July 23. See note, ibid., ii. 404, and Hayward's "Mrs. Piozzi.” Her second letter speaks prematurely of Piozzi as her husband."

5 Ibid., ii. 407.

11

terest. He was a convinced and earnest

6 Life, i. 35. "That miserable dejection of spirits to which he was constitutionally subject" (ibid., i. 298). He often" fancied himself approaching to insanity" (ibid., i. 66).

Christian. Why, it may be asked, did | sional "radiations of comfort" in the not his Christianity deliver him from course of divine service; 10 the means of this fear, which a sacred writer would grace, habitually used, would have been have called his “bondage”? Nay, did it for him means of "a strong consonot rather intensify the infliction? He lation." 11 In the last year of his life, more than once explained himself on 1784, the "terrors diminished; during the subject from a distinctly religious an illness in February he gave a whole point of view. "No man could be sure day to devotion, and "on a sudden obthat his repentance and obedience had tained extraordinary relief, for which been such " as to satisfy "the terms on he looked up to heaven" with thankfulwhich the mediation of our Saviour was ness. 12 The phrase 66 eternal mercy promised." "1 "The Redeemer himself," drops more than once from his pen as he once said with "gloomy agitation" the end draws nearer. 18 As Macaulay at Oxford, "had declared that he would expresses it, "when at length the moset some on his left hand; " 2 or again, ment dreaded through so many years "goodness, always wishing to be better, came close, the dark cloud passed away never dares to suppose the condition of from Johnson's mind." 14 That same forgiveness fulfilled.”8 It is language relief from an "overwhelming dread” like this apparently which has led Dr. which was granted in their extremity to Hill to say that Cowper's mind "took a the Abbess Angélique, to Maria Thedeeper gloom from religion than even resa, and to Charles Wesley, was not Johnson's." But is this a satisfactory withheld from him, who, according to account of the matter? Johnson re- Thackeray's estimate, had "shamed the peatedly made resolutions to give more nation out of irreligion.” 15 George time to definitely religious exercises Strahan, the vicar of Islington (who as to read the Bible more regularly, to a schoolboy at Abingdon, as a freshman form a habit of attending Church ser- at Oxford,16 and in later life under a vice. Once he said, "Whenever I miss painful domestic difficulty,1 had experichurch on a Sunday, I resolve to go an-enced Johnson's considerate and steadother day, but I do not always do it." | fast kindness), had the privilege of Again, "I hope in time to take pleasure ministering to him on his deathbed, in public worship." 5 Indolence was one of his interior troubles; in his surveys of past years he ascribes to it the failures of which he is conscious. "I have been idle, and of idleness comes no goodness, 6 is a confession which may be exaggerated, but which explains such language as "I have lived a life of which I do not like the review."7 He once associates indolence with "indifference." If he had made steadier efforts to conquer these hindrances in regard to participation in public worship, and, especially, if he had communicated more frequently than at Easter," he would not have had merely occa

10 Ibid., iii. 25. He was on this occasion so much moved by the second part of the "Gloria in Excelsis" that he "could not utter it."

11"We find his devotions in this year (1777) emi-
nently fervent; and we are comforted by observing
intervals of quiet, composure, and gladness" (Life,
iii. 99). At the Easter service, he says,
"As my
On Holy
heart grew lighter my hopes revived."

Week see "The Idler," No. 103.
12 Life, iv. 272.

13 Letters, ii. 327, 335. So earlier: "I hope the happiness which I have not found in this world will by infinite mercy be granted in another” (ii. 281).

14 Biographical Essay on Johnson. He died December 13, 1784. In 1783 he had written, “I hope I shall learn to die as dear Williams is dying

with calmness and hope" (Letters, ii. 327).
15 The Four Georges.

16 His father, William Strahan, had printed the

Dictionary. Johnson writes to George as a pupil of Henry Bright, the master of Abingdon School, urging him to take pains about writing Latin, and assuring him that if he had not answered his letters it was from no diminution of regard. "I love you,” he says to the sensitive lad, "and hope to love you long." In 1764 he secured George's election as a scholar of University College. "The college is almost filled with my friends, and he will be well treated" (Letters, i. 95-97, 100, 113).

17 Letters, ii. 267, 272, 283. He reproves George for "discontent."

" 1

and testified that "his foreboding dread | Johnson's.5 This tonic quality appears of the divine justice by degrees sub- in his "Letters." Take a few specisided into a pious trust and humble mens only. "What is modesty," i.e., hope in the divine mercy.' Three self-depreciation, "if it deserts from years before he had written out for Bos-truth?" 6 "We can hardly be confident well an argument for the vicariousness of the state of our own minds, but as it of the Atonement, as a "satisfaction of stands attested by some external action ; God's justice by Christ's death; "2 he we are seldom sure that we sincerely now as a dying man exhorted his kind meant what we omitted to do." " All physician, who seems to have been pleasure preconceived and preconcerted somewhat sceptical, to believe in "the ends in disappointment." 8 "All unpropitiatory sacrifice of Jesus, as neces- necessary vows are folly, because they sary, beyond all good works whatever, suppose a prescience of the future which for the salvation of mankind." 3 In his has not been given us."9 "He must last will he bequeathed to God "a soul mingle with the world that desires to polluted by many sins, but, I hope, be useful." 10 "Nor is there any sempurified by Jesus Christ;" and before blance of kindness more vigorously to his last communion he prayed: "Grant be repelled than that which voluntarily that my whole hope and confidence may offers" (to an elderly man) "a vicaribe in his merits and in thy mercy. . . .ous performance of the duties of life, Make the death of thy Son effectual to and conspires with the natural love of my redemption," etc. ease against diligence and persever"Sadness only multiplies

4

11

"Vain

Here, then, it was precisely John-ance.' son's religion, when allowed to exercise self." 12 "Whoever lives heedlessly "Praise and money, its full legitimate power, and to flood lives in a mist." 78 his soul with an adequate perception of the two powerful corrupters of manthe love of God in Christ, which tri- kind." 14 "Incommunicative taciturnity umphed at last over his lifelong melan-. . . reposes on a stubborn sufficiency "Take all the opporcholy, and brightened his deathbed with self-centred." 15 the peace which would otherwise have tunities of learning that offer thembeen lacking. Had this benign power selves, however remote the matter may been habitually and thoroughly recog- be from common life," etc. 16 nized in his life; had he treated the and idle discontent" is finely defaith which he firmly held as given not scribed as "corroding" the character.17 less to cheer than to overawe; had he" Though effects are not always in our thus taken Christianity at its own word, power, yet Providence always gives us and resorted oftener to its ordinances as something to do." 18 There are sayings remedies for anxiety and "points of also which concentrate a mass of relicontact" with him who "is our Peace," gious wisdom as brought to bear on the how much unhappiness would he have expectation or the reality of bereaveavoided! On the other hand, imagine ment: "There is always this consolaa man of Johnson's temperament pass-tion, that we have our Protector, who ing out of the world without prayer and can never be lost but by our own fault." faith, and what blackness of darkness" Let us resign her with confidence into would have enveloped such a scene! the hands of him who knows, and who only knows, what is best both for her and for us; "Turn your thoughts to

Boswell has admirably said that "in no writings whatever can be found more bark and steel for the mind than" in

7 Ibid., i. 353.
Ibid., i. 217. The

• Letters, i. 35.

8 Ibid., i. 339.

context of this weighty ser

tence is worth pondering.

10 Ibid., i. 337.

Ibid., i. 401. 13 Ibid., ii. 344.

12 Ibid., ii. 102.

14 Ibid., ii, 345.

15 Ibid., ii. 356.

16 Ibid., ii. 386.

18 Ibid., i. 383.

17 Ibid., i. 208.

him who gives and takes away, in inherited taste, with the difference that whose presence the living and dead are transmission had strengthened instead standing together." 1 Other consola- of having weakened the heritage. In toria in the same tone have already been earlier days Ulrich junior had not shown quoted. an undivided spirit of devotion to commercial interests; he had, on the contrary, permitted himself the treasonable luxury of gazing abroad upon many objects not connected with the business of the firm. Amateur theatricals had engaged his affections in youth; five-act tragedies, in alexandrines as long as the acts, had proved him fickle, and operatic music had sent him fairly distraught. He aspired to excel in all the arts, and as a fact was successful in none.

These are the golden words of a great teacher, whose infirmities of temperament, or old-world prejudices, or practical inconsistencies, can never impair his right to our love and honor; and those who by aid of these "Letters" have renewed their intimacy with the subject of the "Life," will probably, on their next visit to the royal Abbey church, turn aside with a sense of relief from some monuments, and some memories too little in accord with a great sanctuary of Christian worship, and stand with thankful reverence beside the large blue stone in the south transept, which covers the sacred dust of Samuel Johnson.

1 Letters, i. 139, 212, 294.

From Macmillan's Magazine.
ARMAND'S MISTAKE.

I.

UNTIL the age of twenty-one, Armand Ulrich submitted to the controlling influences around him, somewhat gracelessly, be it admitted. He sat out his uncle's long dinners, and solaced himself by sketching on the cloth between the courses. He showed a discontented face at his mother's weekly receptions in a big Parisian hotel, and all the while his heart was out upon the country roads and among the pleasant fields, where the children played under poplars and dabbled on the brim of reedy streams. At twenty-one, however, he regarded himself as a free man, and threw up a situation worth £50,000 a year or thereabouts. From this we may infer that he was a lad full of bright hopes and fair dreams.

When congratulated upon his brother's versatility, Ulrich senior would contemptuously retort that the fellow was able to do everything except attend to his business. As a result, he was held in light esteem at the bank, and the meanest client would have regarded himself insulted if passed for consultation to this accomplished but incompetent representative of the firm. However agreeable his tastes may have rendered him in society, it cannot be denied that they were of a nature to diminish his commercial authority. Humanity wisely draws the line at a sonneteering banker, and looks upon the ill-assorted marriage of account and sketch-book with a natural distrust.

This state of things broke the banker's heart. He had a reverence for the firm of Ulrich Brothers, and if he considered himself specially gifted for anything, it was for the judicious management of its affairs. Thus he lived and died a misappreciated and misunderstood person. To him it was a grievous injustice that he should be treated as a man of no account, because of a few irregular and purely decorative accomplishments. His heart might be led astray, he argued, but his head was untampered with, and that, after all, is the sole organ essential to the matter of bonds and shares. He was the only son of a French- A man may be a wise head of a family woman of noble birth and of the junior and an honest husband, and not for that partner of a wealthy Alsatian banking- unacquainted with lighter loves. Such house. His taste for strolling and trifles are but gossiping pauses in the camping out of doors, sketch-book in serious commotions and preoccupations hand and pipe in mouth, was partly an of life. But no amount of argument,

however logical, could blind him or respectability in horror. Whether na

others to the fact that commercially he was a dead failure, because a few illregulated impulses had occasionally led him into idle converse with two or three of the disreputable Nine; and mindful of this, he solemnly exhorted his son Armand to fix his thoughts upon the bank, and not let himself be led astray like his misguided father by illusive talents and disastrous tastes.

Armand Ulrich was a merry young fellow, who cared not a button for all the privileges of wealth, and looked upon an office stool with loathing. He only wanted the free air, his pencil, and a comfortable pipe of tobacco, and there he was, as he described himself, the happiest animal in France. Before his easel he could be serious enough, but in his uncle's office he felt an irresistible inclination to burst into profane song, and make rash mention of such places of perdition as the Red Mill and the Shepherd Follies, follies perfectly the reverse of pastoral. He was not in the least depraved, but he took his pleasure where he found it, and made the most of it. A handsome youngster, whom the traditional felt hat and velvet jacket of art became a trifle too well. At least he wore this raiment somewhat ostentatiously, and winked a conscious eye at the maids of earth. With such solid advantages as a bright, audacious glance, a winning smile, and a wellturned figure, he was not backward in his demands upon their admiration, and it must be confessed, that men in all times have proved destructive with less

material.

ture or his art were responsible for a certain loose and merry generosity of spirit, I cannot say; but I am of opinion that, had his mind run to bank-books instead of paints, though his work might be of indifferent quality, he might have proved himself of sounder and more sordid disposition.

Even the brightest nature finds a shadow somewhere upon the shine, and the shade that dimmed the sun for Armand was his mother's want of faith in his artistic capacities. He loved his mother fondly, and took refuge from her wounding scepticism in his conviction that women, by nature and training, are unfitted to comprehend or pronounce upon the niceties of art. They may be perfect in all things else, but they have not the artistic sense, and cannot descry true talent until they have been taught to do so. It has ever been the destiny of great men to be undervalued upon the domestic hearth, and 'tis a wise law of nature to keep them evenly balanced, and set a limit to their inclination to assume airs. Thinking thus, he shook off the chill of unappreciated talent, and warmed himself back into the pleasant confidence that was the lad's best baggage upon the road of life. For a moment an upbraiding word, a cold comment upon dear lips, might check his nethusiasm and cloud his mirthful glance, but a whistled bar of song, a smart stroke of pencil or brush, a glimpse of his becoming velvet jacket in a mirror, were enough to send hope blithely through his veins, and speed him carolling on the way to fame.

But he was an amiable rogue, not It chanced one morning that he was consciously built for evil, and he cheated interrupted at his easel by a letter from the women not a whit more than they that domestic unbeliever who cast the cheated him. He knew he was playing sole blot upon his artist's sunshine. a game, and was fair enough to remem- There was a certain haziness in Arber that there is honor among thieves. mand's relations with art. He worked For the rest, he was fond of every sort briskly enough at intervals, but he was of wayside stoppages, paid his bill un- naturally an idler. The attitude he grudgingly, in whatever coin demanded, preferred was that of uneager waiter like a gentleman, and clinked glasses upon inspiration, and he had a notion cordially with artists, strollers, and such that the longer he waited, provided the like vagabonds. The frock-coated indi- intervals of rest were comfortably subvidual alone inspired him with repug-ject to distraction, the better the inspinance, and he held the trammels of ration was likely to be. He had neither