re not more untrue
to themselves than is Boswell at such moments. But 'within the focus of
the Lichfield lamps' he regains his strength like a Samson.

Boswell, with all his experience, never attained the mellow Sadduceeism
of the diner-out. As a reward, he never lost the literary conscience,
the capacity for labour, the assiduity and veracity that have set his
work upon a pedestal of its own. The dedication to Reynolds, a masterly
piece of writing, will shew the trouble that he took over his method,
'obliged to run half over London in order to fix a date correctly.' And
he knew the value of his work, which the man with the note-book never
does. In his moments of self-complacency he could compare his
_Johnsoniad_ with the _Odyssey_; and he will not repress his
'satisfaction in the consciousness of having largely provided for the
instruction and entertainment of mankind.' Literary models before him he
had none. Scott suggests the life of the philosopher Demophon in Lucian,
but Boswell was not likely to have known it. He modestly himself says he
has enlarged on the plan of Mason's _Life of Gray_; but his merits are
his own. For the history of the period it is, as Cardinal Duperron said
of Rabelais, _le livre_--_the_ book--'in worth as a book,' decides
Carlyle, 'beyond any other production of the eighteenth century.'

Time has dealt gently with both Johnson and Boswell. 'The chief glory of
every people,' said the former in the preface to his _Dictionary_
'arises from its authors: whether I shall add anything to the reputation
of English literature must be left to time.' In the constituency of the
present no dead writer addresses such an audience as Johnson does. Of
Johnson Boswell might have said, as Cervantes did of his great creation
Don Quixote, he and his subject were born for each other. There is no
greater figure, no more familiar face in our literature than 'the old
man eloquent'; and as the inseparable companion 'held in my heart of
hearts, whose fidelity and tenderness I consider as a great part of the
comforts which are yet left to me,' rises the figure of his biographer,
the Bozzy no more of countless follies and fatuities, but Boswell, the
prince of biographers, the inheritor of unfulfilled renown, now become,
like his hero himself, an ancient. And they are still in the heyday of
their great fame. Along the stream of time the little bark, as he hoped,
sails attendant, pursues the triumph and partakes the gale.