The Works of Samuel Johnson, Volume 06 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 612 pages of information about The Works of Samuel Johnson, Volume 06.

The Works of Samuel Johnson, Volume 06 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 612 pages of information about The Works of Samuel Johnson, Volume 06.

But if it be considered, how well the persons, I recommend, must have been qualified, by their education and profession, for the provinces assigned them, the objection will grow less weighty than it appears.  It is well known to be the constant study of the lawyers to discover, in acts of parliament, meanings which escaped the committees that drew them up, and the senates that passed them into laws, and to explain wills, into a sense wholly contrary to the intention of the testator.  How easily may an adept in these admirable and useful arts, penetrate into the most hidden import of this prediction?  A man, accustomed to satisfy himself with the obvious and natural meaning of a sentence, does not easily shake off his habit; but a true-bred lawyer never contents himself with one sense, when there is another to be found.

Nor will the beneficial consequences of this scheme terminate in the explication of this monument:  they will extend much further; for the commentators, having sharpened and improved their sagacity by this long and difficult course of study, will, when they return into publick life, be of wonderful service to the government, in examining pamphlets, songs, and journals, and in drawing up informations, indictments, and instructions for special juries.  They will be wonderfully fitted for the posts of attorney and solicitor general, but will excel, above all, as licensers for the stage.

The gentlemen of the army will equally adorn the province to which I have assigned them, of setting the discoveries and sentiments of their associates in a clear and agreeable light.  The lawyers are well known not to be very happy in expressing their ideas, being, for the most part, able to make themselves understood by none but their own fraternity.  But the geniuses of the army have sufficient opportunities, by their free access to the levee and the toilet, their constant attendance on balls and assemblies, and that abundant leisure which they enjoy, beyond any other body of men, to acquaint themselves with every new word, and prevailing mode of expression, and to attain the utmost nicety, and most polished prettiness of language.

It will be necessary, that, during their attendance upon the society, they be exempt from any obligation to appear on Hyde park; and that upon no emergency, however pressing, they be called away from their studies, unless the nation be in immediate danger, by an insurrection of weavers, colliers, or smugglers.

There may not, perhaps, be found in the army such a number of men, who have ever condescended to pass through the labours, and irksome forms of education in use, among the lower classes of people, or submitted to learn the mercantile and plebeian arts of writing and reading.  I must own, that though I entirely agree with the notions of the uselessness of any such trivial accomplishments in the military profession, and of their inconsistency with more valuable attainments;

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
The Works of Samuel Johnson, Volume 06 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.