n opportunity of
knowing how to answer it. For instance, he would call up a boy and ask
him Latin for a candlestick, which the boy could not expect to be asked.
Now, Sir, if a boy could answer every question, there would be no need
of a master to teach him.'

It is, however, but justice to the memory of Mr. Hunter to mention, that
though he might err in being too severe, the school of Lichfield
was very respectable in his time. The late Dr. Taylor, Prebendary
of Westminster, who was educated under him, told me, that 'he was an
excellent master, and that his ushers were most of them men of eminence;
that Holbrook, one of the most ingenious men, best scholars, and best
preachers of his age, was usher during the greatest part of the time
that Johnson was at school. Then came Hague, of whom as much might be
said, with the addition that he was an elegant poet. Hague was succeeded
by Green, afterwards Bishop of Lincoln, whose character in the learned
world is well known.'

Indeed Johnson was very sensible how much he owed to Mr. Hunter. Mr.
Langton one day asked him how he had acquired so accurate a knowledge
of Latin, in which, I believe, he was exceeded by no man of his time;
he said, 'My master whipt me very well. Without that, Sir, I should have
done nothing.' He told Mr. Langton, that while Hunter was flogging his
boys unmercifully, he used to say, 'And this I do to save you from the
gallows.' Johnson, upon all occasions, expressed his approbation of
enforcing instruction by means of the rod. 'I would rather (said he)
have the rod to be the general terrour to all, to make them learn, than
tell a child, if you do thus, or thus, you will be more esteemed than
your brothers or sisters. The rod produces an effect which terminates
in itself. A child is afraid of being whipped, and gets his task, and
there's an end on't; whereas, by exciting emulation and comparisons
of superiority, you lay the foundation of lasting mischief; you make
brothers and sisters hate each other.'

That superiority over his fellows, which he maintained with so much
dignity in his march through life, was not assumed from vanity
and ostentation, but was the natural and constant effect of those
extraordinary powers of mind, of which he could not but be conscious
by comparison; the intellectual difference, which in other cases of
comparison of characters, is often a matter of undecided contest, being
as clear in his case as the superiority of stature i