Sir; Tom Davies is a very great man; Tom has been upon the stage, and knows how to do those things.  I have not been upon the stage, and cannot do those things.’  Boswell.  ’I have often blamed myself, Sir, for not feeling for others as sensibly as many say they do.’  Johnson.  ’Sir, don’t be duped by them any more.  You will find these very feeling people are not very ready to do you good.  They pay you by feeling.’

Boswell.  ‘Foote has a great deal of humour?’ Johnson.  ‘Yes, Sir.’  Boswell.  ‘He has a singular talent of exhibiting character.’  Johnson.  ’Sir, it is not a talent; it is a vice; it is what others abstain from.  It is not comedy, which exhibits the character of a species, as that of a miser gathered from many misers:  it is farce, which exhibits individuals.’  Boswell.  ‘Did not he think of exhibiting you, Sir?’ Johnson.  ’Sir, fear restrained him; he knew I would have broken his bones.  I would have saved him the trouble of cutting off a leg; I would not have left him a leg to cut off.’  Boswell.  ’Pray, Sir, is not Foote an infidel?’ Johnson.  ’I do not know, Sir, that the fellow is an infidel; but if he be an infidel, he is an infidel as a dog is an infidel; that is to say, he has never thought upon the subject.’* Boswell.  ’I suppose, Sir, he has thought superficially, and seized the first notions which occurred to his mind.’  Johnson.  ’Why then, Sir, still he is like a dog, that snatches the piece next him.  Did you never observe that dogs have not the power of comparing?  A dog will take a small bit of meat as readily as a large, when both are before him.’

* When Mr. Foote was at Edinburgh, he thought fit to entertain a numerous Scotch company, with a great deal of coarse jocularity, at the expense of Dr. Johnson, imagining it would be acceptable.  I felt this as not civil to me; but sat very patiently till he had exhausted his merriment on that subject; and then observed, that surely Johnson must be allowed to have some sterling wit, and that I had heard him say a very good thing of Mr. Foote himself.  ’Ah, my old friend Sam (cried Foote,) no man says better things; do let us have it.’  Upon which I told the above story, which produced a very loud laugh from the company.  But I never saw Foote so disconcerted.—­Boswell.

Boswell.  ‘What do you think of Dr. Young’s Night Thoughts, Sir?’ Johnson.  ‘Why, Sir, there are very fine things in them.’  Boswell.  ’Is there not less religion in the nation now, Sir, than there was formerly?’ Johnson.  ‘I don’t know, Sir, that there is.’  Boswell.  ’For instance, there used to be a chaplain in every great family, which we do not find now.’  Johnson.  ’Neither do you find any of the state servants, which great families used formerly to have.  There is a change of modes in the whole department of life.’