ANECDOTES OF JOHNSON
PUBLISHED BY G. KEARSLEY*
��MR. JOHNSON was not unacquainted with Savage's frailties ; but. as he has not long since said to a friend on this subject, * he knew his heart, and that was never intentionally abandoned ; for though he generally mistook the love for the practice of virtue, he was at all times a true and sincere believer a .'
Savage living very intimately with most of the wits of what is called our Augustan age, gave Mr. Johnson many anecdotes, with which he has since enriched his Biographical Prefaces 3 . The following, however, I believe, has never appeared in print before.
Sir Richard Steele 4 , Phillips 5 , and Savage, spending the night together, at a tavern, in Gerard-street 6 , Soho, they sallied out in the morning all very much intoxicated with liquor when they were accosted by a tradesman, going to his work, at the top of
1 This Life is said to be by William of mankind.' Works, viii. 190. Cooke, known as ' Conversation For principles and practice see Cooke.' Nichols, Lit. Hist. vii. 467. Life, i. 418 ; ii. 341 ; v. 210, 359. He derived his name from his poem ' No man's religion ever survives On Conversation. Ib. He was a his morals.' South's Sermons, ed. member of the Essex Head Club. 1823,1.291.
Life, iv. 437. 3 The Lives of the Poets. Life, iv.
2 Johnson in his Life of Savage 35, n. I.
says that ' in cases indifferent [where 4 For anecdotes of Steele and the
friends or enemies were not con- bailiffs see Works, viii. 104.
cerned] he was zealous for virtue, s No doubt Ambrose Philips, who
truth and justice; he knew very knew Steele. Works, viii. 388.
well the necessity of goodness to 6 At the Turk's Head in this
the present and future happiness street the Literary Club met at first.
VOL. II. M Hedge-lane
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