��Essay on
��imputations. Mr. Dyer, however, was admired and loved through life. He was a man of literature *. Johnson loved to enter with him into a discussion of metaphysical, moral, and critical subjects ; in those conflicts, exercising his talents, and, according to his custom, always contending for victory 2 . Dr. Bathurst was the person on whom Johnson fixed his affection. He hardly ever spoke of him without tears in his eyes 3 . It was from him, who was a native of Jamaica, that
��1 On a point of Latinity Johnson once said to him: 'Sir, I beg to have your judgement, for I know your nicety.' Life, iv. 1 1. Burke described him as 'a man of profound and general erudition.' Ib. n. i.
2 Ante, p. 376. ' He owned he sometimes talked for victory.' Life, v. 17. ' Care must be taken to dis tinguish between Johnson when he "talked for victory," and Johnson when he had no desire but to inform and illustrate.' Ib. iv. in.
Dyer was little likely to have entered into such a contest. Accord ing to Malone 'he was so modest and reserved, that he frequently sat silent in company for an hour, and seldom spoke unless appealed to.' Ib. iv. n, n. i.
3 Ib. i. 190, 242, n. i ; Letters, i. 32 ; ante, p. 158. ' Bathurst thought of becoming an eminent London physician, and omitted no means to attain that character : he studied hard, dressed well, and associated with those who were likely to bring him forward, but he failed in his endeavours, and shortly before his leaving England [for the Havannah] confessed to Johnson that in the course of ten years' exercise of his faculty he had never opened his hand to more than one guinea.' Hawkins,
P- 235-
Johnson, who 'had in general a peculiar pleasure in the company
��of physicians' (Life, iv. 293), had three of them in his Club. Of these, ' M'Ghie, failing in his hope of getting forward in his profession, died of a broken heart, and was buried by a contribution of his friends ' (Haw kins, p. 233) ; Barker ' died in ob scurity' (Ib. p. 234), and Bathurst, ' missing of success,' went as ' phy sician to the army that was sent on the expedition against the Havan nah,' where he died of fever (ib. p. 235). According to Hawkins, Bathurst's failure drew from John son the following reflection which many years later he inserted in his Life of Akenside : ' A physician in a great city seems to be the mere plaything of fortune ; his degree of reputation is for the most part totally casual ; they that em ploy him know not his excellence ; they that reject him know not his deficience. By any acute observer, who had looked on the transactions of the medical world for half a cen tury, a very curious book might be written on the Fortune of Physicians! Works, viii. 471.
' Hawkins, remarking on ' the very many ignorant men who have been known to succeed in the profession,' adds in a note, 'so ignorant as to request of the College [of Physicians] the indulgence of an examination in English.'
Johnson
�� �
