ELL. _Pr. and
Med._ p. 219.

[1143] _Life of Johnson_, p. 599.

[1144] Porson with admirable humour satirised Hawkins for his attack on
Barber. _Gent. Mag._ 1787, p. 752, and _Porson Tracts_, p. 358. Baretti
in his _Tolondron_, p. 149, says that 'Barber from his earliest youth
served Johnson with the greatest affection and disinterestedness.'

[1145] Vol. ii. p. 30. BOSWELL.

[1146] I shall add one instance only to those which I have thought it
incumbent on me to point out. Talking of Mr. Garrick's having signified
his willingness to let Johnson have the loan of any of his books to
assist him in his edition of Shakspeare [_ante_, ii. 192]; Sir John
says, (p. 444,) 'Mr. Garrick knew not what risque he ran by this offer.
Johnson had so strange a forgetfulness of obligations of this sort, that
few who lent him books ever saw them again.' This surely conveys a most
unfavourable insinuation, and has been so understood. Sir John mentions
the single case of a curious edition of Politian [_ante_, i. 90], which
he tells us, 'appeared to belong to Pembroke College, and which,
probably, had been considered by Johnson as his own, for upwards of
fifty years.' Would it not be fairer to consider this as an
inadvertence, and draw no general inference? The truth is, that Johnson
was so attentive, that in one of his manuscripts in my possession, he
has marked in two columns, books borrowed, and books lent.

In Sir John Hawkins's compilation, there are, however, some passages
concerning Johnson which have unquestionable merit. One of them I shall
transcribe, in justice to a writer whom I have had too much occasion to
censure, and to shew my fairness as the biographer of my illustrious
friend: 'There was wanting in his conduct and behaviour, that dignity
which results from a regular and orderly course of action, and by an
irresistible power commands esteem. He could not be said to be a stayed
man, nor so to have adjusted in his mind the balance of reason and
passion, as to give occasion to say what may be observed of some men,
that all they do is just, fit, and right.' [Hawkins's _Johnson_, p.
409.] Yet a judicious friend well suggests, 'It might, however, have
been added, that such men are often merely just, and rigidly correct,
while their hearts are cold and unfeeling; and that Johnson's virtues
were of a much higher tone than those of the _stayed, orderly man_, here
described.' BOSWELL.

[1147] 'Lich, a dead carcase; whence Lich