is for
want of the habit of composing quickly, which I am insisting one should
acquire.' WATSON. 'Blair was not composing all the week, but only such
hours as he found himself disposed for composition.' JOHNSON. 'Nay, Sir,
unless you tell me the time he took, you tell me nothing. If I say I
took a week to walk a mile, and have had the gout five days, and been
ill otherwise another day, I have taken but one day. I myself have
composed about forty sermons[202]. I have begun a sermon after dinner,
and sent it off by the post that night. I wrote forty-eight of the
printed octavo pages of the _Life of Savage_ at a sitting; but then I
sat up all night. I have also written six sheets in a day of translation
from the French[203].' BOSWELL. 'We have all observed how one man
dresses himself slowly, and another fast.' JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir: it is
wonderful how much time some people will consume in dressing; taking up
a thing and looking at it, and laying it down, and taking it up again.
Every one should get the habit of doing it quickly. I would say to a
young divine, "Here is your text; let me see how soon you can make a
sermon." Then I'd say, "Let me see how much better you can make it."
Thus I should see both his powers and his judgement.'

We all went to Dr. Watson's to supper. Miss Sharp, great grandchild of
Archbishop Sharp, was there; as was Mr. Craig, the ingenious architect
of the new town of Edinburgh[204] and nephew of Thomson, to whom Dr.
Johnson has since done so much justice, in his _Lives of the Poets_.

We talked of memory, and its various modes. JOHNSON. 'Memory will play
strange tricks. One sometimes loses a single word. I once lost _fugaces_
in the Ode _Posthume, Posthume_[205].' I mentioned to him, that a worthy
gentleman of my acquaintance actually forgot his own name. JOHNSON.
'Sir, that was a morbid oblivion.'

FRIDAY, AUGUST 20.

Dr. Shaw, the professor of divinity, breakfasted with us. I took out my
_Ogden on Prayer_, and read some of it to the company. Dr. Johnson
praised him. 'Abernethy[206], (said he,) allows only of a physical
effect of prayer upon the mind, which may be produced many ways, as well
as by prayer; for instance, by meditation. Ogden goes farther. In truth,
we have the consent of all nations for the efficacy of prayer, whether
offered up by individuals, or by assemblies; and Revelation has told us,
it will be effectual.' I said, 'Leechman seemed to incline to
Abernethy's doctrine.'