I introduced the topick,which is often ignorantly urged,that the Universities of England are too rich;so that learning does not flourish in them as it would do,if those who teach had smaller salaries,and depended on their assiduity for a great part of their income.JOHNSON.'Sir,the very reverse of this is the truth;the English Universities are not rich enough.Our fellowships are only sufficient to support a man during his studies to fit him for the world,and accordingly in general they are held no longer than till an opportunity offers of getting away.Now and then,perhaps,there is a fellow who grows old in his college;but this is against his will,unless he be a man very indolent indeed.A hundred a year is reckoned a good fellowship,and that is no more than is necessary to keep a man decently as a scholar.We do not allow our fellows to marry,because we consider academical institutions as preparatory to a settlement in the world.It is only by being employed as a tutor,that a fellow can obtain any thing more than a livelihood.To be sure a man,who has enough without teaching,will probably not teach;for we would all be idle if we could.In the same manner,a man who is to get nothing by teaching,will not exert himself.Gresham College was intended as a place of instruction for London;able professors were to read lectures gratis,they contrived to have no scholars;whereas,if they had been allowed to receive but sixpence a lecture from each scholar,they would have been emulous to have had many scholars.Every body will agree that it should be the interest of those who teach to have scholars and this is the case in our Universities.That they are too rich is certainly not true;for they have nothing good enough to keep a man of eminent learning with them for his life.
In the foreign Universities a professorship is a high thing.It is as much almost as a man can make by his learning;and therefore we find the most learned men abroad are in the Universities.It is not so with us.Our Universities are impoverished of learning,by the penury of their provisions.I wish there were many places of a thousand a-year at Oxford,to keep first-rate men of learning from quitting the University.'
I mentioned Mr.Maclaurin's uneasiness on account of a degree of ridicule carelessly thrown on his deceased father,in Goldsmith's History of Animated Nature,in which that celebrated mathematician is represented as being subject to fits of yawning so violent as to render him incapable of proceeding in his lecture;a story altogether unfounded,but for the publication of which the law would give no reparation.This led us to agitate the question,whether legal redress could be obtained,even when a man's deceased relation was calumniated in a publication.
On Friday,April 5,being Good Friday,after having attended the morning service at St.Clement's Church,I walked home with Johnson.We talked of the Roman Catholick religion.JOHNSON.'In the barbarous ages,Sir,priests and people were equally deceived;but afterwards there were gross corruptions introduced by the clergy,such as indulgencies to priests to have concubines,and the worship of images,not,indeed,inculcated,but knowingly permitted.'He strongly censured the licensed stews at Rome.
BOSWELL.'So then,Sir,you would allow of no irregular intercourse whatever between the sexes?'JOHNSON.'To be sure Iwould not,Sir.I would punish it much more than it is done,and so restrain it.In all countries there has been fornication,as in all countries there has been theft;but there may be more or less of the one,as well as of the other,in proportion to the force of law.All men will naturally commit fornication,as all men will naturally steal.And,Sir,it is very absurd to argue,as has been often done,that prostitutes are necessary to prevent the violent effects of appetite from violating the decent order of life;nay,should be permitted,in order to preserve the chastity of our wives and daughters.Depend upon it,Sir,severe laws,steadily enforced,would be sufficient against those evils,and would promote marriage.'
Mr.Thrale called upon him,and appeared to bear the loss of his son with a manly composure.There was no affectation about him;and he talked,as usual,upon indifferent subjects.He seemed to me to hesitate as to the intended Italian tour,on which,Iflattered myself,he and Mrs.Thrale and Dr.Johnson were soon to set out;and,therefore,I pressed it as much as I could.Imentioned,that Mr.Beauclerk had said,that Baretti,whom they were to carry with them,would keep them so long in the little towns of his own district,that they would not have time to see Rome.I mentioned this,to put them on their guard.JOHNSON.
'Sir,we do not thank Mr.Beauclerk for supposing that we are to be directed by Baretti.No,Sir;Mr.Thrale is to go,by my advice,to Mr.Jackson,(the all-knowing)and get from him a plan for seeing the most that can be seen in the time that we have to travel.We must,to be sure,see Rome,Naples,Florence,and Venice,and as much more as we can.'(Speaking with a tone of animation.)When I expressed an earnest wish for his remarks on Italy,he said,'I do not see that I could make a book upon Italy;yet I should be glad to get two hundred pounds,or five hundred pounds,by such a work.'This shewed both that a journal of his Tour upon the Continent was not wholly out of his contemplation,and that he uniformly adhered to that strange opinion,which his indolent disposition made him utter:'No man but a blockhead ever wrote,except for money.'Numerous instances to refute this will occur to all who are versed in the history of literature.
