Essay on
��Edial, near Lichfield, in Staffordshire, young Gentlemen are boarded and taught the Latin and Greek Languages, by Samuel Johnson.
The undertaking proved abortive. Johnson, having now abandoned all hopes of promoting his fortune in the country, determined to become an adventurer in the world at large. His young pupil, Garrick, had formed the same resolution 1 ; and, accordingly, in March, 1737, they arrived in London together. Two such candidates for fame perhaps never, before that day, entered the metropolis together. Their stock of money was soon exhausted 2 . In his visionary project of an academy Johnson had probably wasted his wife's substance ; and Garrick's father had little more than his half-pay. The two fellow-travellers had the world before them, and each was to chuse his road to fortune and to fame. They brought with them genius, and powers of mind, peculiarly formed by nature for the different vocations to which each of them felt himself inclined. They acted from the impulse of young minds, even then meditating great things, and with courage anticipating success. Their friend Mr. Walmsley, by a letter to the Rev. Mr. Colson, who, it seems, was a great mathematician, exerted his good offices in their favour. He gave notice of their in tended journey 3 . ' Davy Garrick,' he said, ' will be with you next week ; and Johnson, to try his fate with a tragedy, and to get himself employed in some translation either from the Latin or French. Johnson is a very good scholar and a poet, and, I have great hopes, will turn out a fine tragedy-writer. If it should be in your way, I doubt not but you will be ready to recommend and assist your countrymen.' Of Mr. Walmsley 's merits and the excellence of his character, Johnson has left a beautiful testimonial at the end of the Life of Edward Smith 4 . It is reasonable to conclude, that a mathematician, absorbed in abstract speculations, was not able to find a sphere of
��1 Garrick's intention was ' to com plete his education and follow the profession of the law.' Life, i. 101.
f Ib. n. i.
��3 Ib. i. 102. Murphy does not quote the letter accurately.
4 Edmund Smith. Works, vii. 380; Life, i. 81.
action
�� �
