th us
yesterday, with some other company, insisted that Dr. Johnson and I
should dine with him to-day. This gave me an opportunity to shew my
friend the road to the church, made by my father at a great expence, for
above three miles, on his own estate, through a range of well enclosed
farms, with a row of trees on each side of it. He called it the _Via
sacra_, and was very fond of it.[1037]Dr. Johnson, though he held
notions far distant from those of the Presbyterian clergy, yet could
associate on good terms with them. He indeed occasionally attacked
them. One of them discovered a narrowness of information concerning the
dignitaries of the Church of England, among whom may be found men of the
greatest learning, virtue, and piety, and of a truly apostolic
character. He talked before Dr. Johnson, of fat bishops and drowsy
deans; and, in short, seemed to believe the illiberal and profane
scoffings of professed satyrists, or vulgar railers. Dr. Johnson was so
highly offended, that he said to him, 'Sir, you know no more of our
Church than a Hottentot[1038].' I was sorry that he brought this
upon himself.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6.

I cannot be certain, whether it was on this day, or a former, that Dr.
Johnson and my father came in collision. If I recollect right, the
contest began while my father was shewing him his collection of medals;
and Oliver Cromwell's coin unfortunately introduced Charles the First,
and Toryism. They became exceedingly warm, and violent, and I was very
much distressed by being present at such an altercation between two men,
both of whom I reverenced; yet I durst not interfere. It would certainly
be very unbecoming in me to exhibit my honoured father, and my respected
friend, as intellectual gladiators, for the entertainment of the
publick: and therefore I suppress what would, I dare say, make an
interesting scene in this dramatick sketch,--this account of the
transit of Johnson over the Caledonian Hemisphere[1039].

Yet I think I may, without impropriety, mention one circumstance, as an
instance of my father's address. Dr. Johnson challenged him, as he did
us all at Talisker[1040], to point out any theological works of merit
written by Presbyterian ministers in Scotland. My father, whose studies
did not lie much in that way, owned to me afterwards, that he was
somewhat at a loss how to answer, but that luckily he recollected having
read in catalogues the title of _Durham on the Galatians_; upon