fine lines on love, by the former, (which I have now forgotten,) and gave great applause to the character of Zimri.  Goldsmith said, that Pope’s character of Addison shewed a deep knowledge of the human heart.  Johnson said, that the description of the temple, in The Mourning Bride, was the finest poetical passage he had ever read; he recollected none in Shakspeare equal to it.  ’But, (said Garrick, all alarmed for the ‘God of his idolatry,’) we know not the extent and variety of his powers.  We are to suppose there are such passages in his works.  Shakspeare must not suffer from the badness of our memories.’  Johnson, diverted by this enthusiastick jealousy, went on with greater ardour:  ‘No, Sir; Congreve has nature;’ (smiling on the tragick eagerness of Garrick;) but composing himself, he added, ’Sir, this is not comparing Congreve on the whole, with Shakspeare on the whole; but only maintaining that Congreve has one finer passage than any that can be found in Shakspeare.  Sir, a man may have no more than ten guineas in the world, but he may have those ten guineas in one piece; and so may have a finer piece than a man who has ten thousand pounds:  but then he has only one ten-guinea piece.  What I mean is, that you can shew me no passage where there is simply a description of material objects, without any intermixture of moral notions, which produces such an effect.’  Mr. Murphy mentioned Shakspeare’s description of the night before the battle of Agincourt; but it was observed, it had men in it.  Mr. Davies suggested the speech of Juliet, in which she figures herself awaking in the tomb of her ancestors.  Some one mentioned the description of Dover Cliff.  Johnson.  ’No, Sir; it should be all precipice,—­all vacuum.  The crows impede your fall.  The diminished appearance of the boats, and other circumstances, are all very good descriptions; but do not impress the mind at once with the horrible idea of immense height.  The impression is divided; you pass on by computation, from one stage of the tremendous space to another.  Had the girl in The Mourning Bride said, she could not cast her shoe to the top of one of the pillars in the temple, it would not have aided the idea, but weakened it.’

     * Everyone guesses that ‘one of the company’ was Boswell. 
     —­Hill.

Talking of a Barrister who had a bad utterance, some one, (to rouse Johnson,) wickedly said, that he was unfortunate in not having been taught oratory by Sheridan.  Johnson.  ’Nay, Sir, if he had been taught by Sheridan, he would have cleared the room.’  Garrick.  ’Sheridan has too much vanity to be a good man.’  We shall now see Johnson’s mode of defending a man; taking him into his own hands, and discriminating.  Johnson.  ’No, Sir.  There is, to be sure, in Sheridan, something to reprehend, and every thing to laugh at; but, Sir, he is not a bad man.  No, Sir; were mankind to be divided into good and bad, he would stand considerably within the ranks of good.  And, Sir, it must be allowed that Sheridan excels in plain declamation, though he can exhibit no character.’