In expressing these opinions, Dr. Johnson seems to forget what he himself has elsewhere said, very justly—to the effect that a great deal of the truth and correctness of a sentiment is sacrificed to the point of it. He also says, amusingly enough—“Goldsmith should not be always attempting to shine in conversation,” (certainly not—this would be a sort of contumacy in Johnson’s presence!) “he has not temper for it.” (Johnson’s own was of such a meek, philosophic stamp!) Even when the dignity of Goldsmith’s doings was more questionable than that of his sayings or writings, the doctor could not help entertaining some little pique. When Oliver had chastised Evans, the publisher, for printing some offensive observations, Johnson remarked to his _fidus Achates_: “Why, sir, this is the first time he _has_ beaten; he may have _been_ beaten before. This is a new pleasure to him.” He alluded to a white-bait dinner at Blackwall, where Goldsmith, denouncing obscene novels and the indelicacies of Tristram Shandy, created a warm argument among the feasters, whence they fell into personalities; then into an uproar, and thence to fisticuffs, in the midst of which, it is said, Oliver got a smart share of what was going—before they broke up this feast of reason—pretty fairly expressed by the _Irish_ participles, _bait_, beating, beaten! The affair was very laughable, to be sure. But Johnson should have remembered that he himself had knocked his own publisher down—Osborne. He should have commented more leniently on poor Goldie. The old feuds between authors and publishers were as lively in those times as they were before or have been since. Goldsmith wrote a very dignified public letter, to justify the beating, and showed that there were certain rascalities which called for the imposition of violent hands upon them, and that the punishment of them was sanctioned by the sense of society, though against the letter of the law. But, as we were saying, Johnson permitted himself on many occasions to disparage Goldsmith. Still, in the main, he has stood up strongly for the fame of his friend—thereby showing that such opinions as the foregoing were not very just or generous. When his conscience got the better of his occasional feelings, as was usually the case—for his nature was intrinsically good (he “had nothing of the bear but the skin,” as Goldsmith used to say,) he would do Oliver justice. In this, to be sure, he had a consoling sense of the superiority and patronage which belong to such a championship; and, in maintaining the cause of his friend, he could argue vigorously for himself—for, their fortunes were very much alike. He could express his own feelings of scorn for the conventions or misconceptions of society, in defending the character of a man of genius. Be this as it may, he has left on record sentiments highly honorable to himself as well as to Goldsmith; and has had some of them graven in his epitaph on the poet, dramatist and historian