[882] Newton was born Jan. 1, 1704, and was made Bishop in 1761.  In his Account of his own Life (p. 65) he says:—­’He was no great gainer by his preferment; for he was obliged to give up the prebend of Westminster, the precentorship of York, the lecturership of St. George’s, Hanover Square, and the genteel office of sub-almoner.’  He died in 1781.  His Works were published in 1782.  Gibbon, defending himself against an attack by Newton, says (Misc.  Works, l. 24l):—­’The old man should not have indulged his zeal in a false and feeble charge against the historian, who,’ &c.

[883] Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 3rd ed. p. 371 [Oct. 25].  BOSWELL.  See ante, ii. 216.

[884] The Rev. Mr. Agutter [post, under Dec. 20] has favoured me with a note of a dialogue between Mr. John Henderson [post, June 12] and Dr. Johnson on this topick, as related by Mr. Henderson, and it is evidently so authentick that I shall here insert it:—­HENDERSON.  ’What do you think, Sir, of William Law?’ JOHNSON.  ’William Law, Sir, wrote the best piece of Parenetick Divinity; but William Law was no reasoner.’  HENDERSON.  ‘Jeremy Collier, Sir?’ JOHNSON.  ’Jeremy Collier fought without a rival, and therefore could not claim the victory.’  Mr. Henderson mentioned Kenn and Kettlewell; but some objections were made:  at last he said, ‘But, Sir, what do you think of Leslie?’ JOHNSON.  ’Charles Leslie I had forgotten.  Leslie was a reasoner, and a reasoner who was not to be reasoned against.’ BOSWELL.

For the effect of Law’s ‘Parenetick Divinity’ on Johnson, see ante, i. 68.  ‘I am surprised,’ writes Macaulay, ’that Johnson should have pronounced Law no reasoner.  Law did indeed fall into great errors; but they were errors against which logic affords no security.  In mere dialectical skill he had very few superiors.’  Macaulay’s England, ed. 1874, v. 81, note.  Jeremy Collier’s attack on the play-writers Johnson describes in his Life of Congreve (Works, viii. 28), and continues:—­’Nothing now remained for the poets but to resist or fly.  Dryden’s conscience, or his prudence, angry as he was, withheld him from the conflict:  Congreve and Vanbrugh attempted answers.’  Of Leslie, Lord Bolingbroke thus writes (Works, in. 45):—­’Let neither the polemical skill of Leslie, nor the antique erudition of Bedford, persuade us to put on again those old shackles of false law, false reason, and false gospel, which were forged before the Revolution, and broken to pieces by it.’  Leslie is described by Macaulay, History of England, v. 81.

[885] Burnet (History of his own Time, ed. 1818, iv. 303) in 1712 speaks of Hickes and Brett as being both in the Church, but as shewing ‘an inclination towards Popery.’  Hickes, he says, was at the head of the Jacobite party.  See Boswell’s Hebrides, Oct. 25.

[886] ’Only five of the seven were non-jurors; and anybody but Boswell would have known that a man may resist arbitrary power, and yet not be a good reasoner.  Nay, the resistance which Sancroft and the other nonjuring Bishops offered to arbitrary power, while they continued to hold the doctrine of non-resistance, is the most decisive proof that they were incapable of reasoning.’  Macaulay’s England, ed. 1874, v. 81.