��the letters of Lady Wortley Montagu, on which they had bestowed great praise. The Doctor said, ' Why, Madam, there might be great charms to them in being intrusted with honour able letters ; but those who know better of the world, would have rather possessed two pages of true history 1 .' One day that he came to my house to meet many others, we told him that we had arranged our party to go to Westminster Abbey, would not he go with us ? ' No,' he replied ; ' not while I can keep out 2 .' Upon our saying, that the friends of a lady had been in great fear lest she should make a certain match for herself, he said, 'We that are his friends have had great fears for him.' I talked to Mrs. Thrale much of dear Mrs. Williams. She said she was highly born ; that she was very nearly related to a Welsh peer ; but that, though Dr. Johnson had always pressed her to be acquainted with her, yet she could not ; she was afraid of her 3 . I named her virtues ; she seemed to hear me as if I had spoken of a newly discovered country 4 .
I think the character of Dr. Johnson can never be better summed up than in his own words in Rasselas, chapter xlii 5 .
1 Horace Walpole wrote to Lady son's house' (Life, iv. 235, 239), Craven on Jan. 2, 1787 (Letters, ix. Macaulay includes her in the ' crowd 87) : * I am sorry to hear, Madam, of wretched old creatures who could that by your account Lady Mary find no other asylum ' than his Wortley was not so accurate and house ; whose ' peevishness and faithful as modern travellers. ... As ingratitude could not weary out his you rival her in poetic talents, I had benevolence.' Essays, ed. 1843, i. rather you would employ them to cele- 390.
brate her for her nostrum [inocula- It was not till 1778 that discord
tionl than detect her for romancing.' was caused by his taking in three
2 For his visit to the Abbey with more poor women. Life, iii. 222. Goldsmith see Life, ii. 238, and for Towards the end of Miss Williams' the satisfaction he felt on being told life her illness increased her peevish- that he would be buried there see ness. Ib. iii. 128.
ib. iv. 419. 5 It is doubtless to chapter xl
3 Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale that she refers, where the astronomer from Lichfield in 1775 : c Mrs. is thus described : ' His compre- Williams wrote me word that you hension is vast, his memory capa- had honoured her with a visit, and cious and retentive, his discourse is behaved lovely? Letters, i. 360. methodical, and his expression clear.
4 In spite of all the evidence of His integrity and benevolence are her ' valuable qualities,' and of ' the equal to his learning. His deepest blank that her departure left in John- researches and most favourite studies
He
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