But the most significant revisions are concerned with organization. By transferring segments of certain verse paragraphs to others, he achieves a more unified portrait of Johnson. By means of such revision, he forms his general evaluation of Johnson's writing into one unit and his comments on individual works into another, where before they had been awkwardly interwoven. Courtenay's _Review_ did not go unnoticed at the time, though for obvious reasons it was given less attention by the reviewers than the more notorious Johnsoniana. Extracts from the poem were printed in several magazines. The reviewers were almost unanimous in damning the poem's inelegance, unevenness, and lack of harmony, but reserved praise for the sentiments and candor.[17] Chesterfield's apologist in William Hayley's _Two Dialogues; Containing a Comparative View of the Lives, Characters, and Writings of Philip, the Late Earl of Chesterfield, and Dr. Samuel Johnson_ (1787) protested that Courtenay was too kind to Johnson. The severest indictment of the Review came from the anonymous author of _A Poetical Epistle from the Ghost of Dr. Johnson_, mentioned earlier, who charged Courtenay with poor taste and with belaboring the obvious by proving that Johnson was "not quite destitute of brains."[18] The greatest champion of the _Review_ was, of course, Boswell. The _Life_ is sprinkled with quotations from the third edition, 118 lines in all, mostly from Courtenay's commendatory verses. In view of the many published attacks on Johnson, Boswell must have appreciated Courtenay's sentiments all the more. Doubtless Courtenay's warm praise of the _Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides_ also found favor with Boswell.[19] Perhaps Boswell's final and least partial judgment of the _Review_ was expressed in his letter to James Abercrombie of Philadelphia dated 11 June 1792. He sent Abercrombie a copy of the poem, commenting that "though I except to several passages, you will find some very good writing."[20] Courtenay's _Review_, together with several other little known _memorabilia_ concerning Johnson, stimulated one of the most energetic and splenetic literary controversies of the late eighteenth century. In addition, the _Review_ and pieces like it aroused a considerable amount of useful, if vitriolic, discussion about the art of biography. University of Iowa NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION [1] See _DNB_.