Dr. Hill’s two volumes are as delightful books as ever issued from the press. In them Dr. Johnson is to be seen in every aspect of his character, whilst a complete study may be made from them of the enormous versatility of his style. It is hard to say what one admires most--the ardour of his affection, the piety of his nature, the friendliness of his disposition, the playfulness of his humour, or his love of learning and of letters. What strikes one perhaps most, if you assume a merely critical attitude, is the glorious ease and aptitude of his quotations from ancient and modern writings. Of pedantry there is not a trace. Nothing is forced or dragged in. It is all, apparently, simply inevitable. You do not exclaim as you read, ‘What a memory the fellow has!’ but merely, ‘How charming it all is!’ It is not difficult to construct from these two volumes alone the gospel--the familiar, the noble gospel according to Dr. Johnson. It reads somewhat as follows: ‘Your father begot you and your mother bore you. Honour them both. Husbands, be faithful to your wives. Wives, forgive your husbands’ unfaithfulness--once. No grown man who is dependent on the will, that is the whim, of another can be happy, and life without enjoyment is intolerable gloom. Therefore, as money means independence and enjoyment, get money, and having got it keep it. A spendthrift is a fool. ‘Clear your mind of cant and never debauch your understanding. The only liberty worth turning out into the street for, is the liberty to do what you like in your own house and to say what you like in your own inn. All work is bondage. ‘Never get excited about causes you do not understand, or about people you have never seen. Keep Corsica out of your head. ‘Life is a struggle with either poverty or ennui; but it is better to be rich than to be poor. Death is a terrible thing to face. The man who says he is not afraid of it lies. Yet, as murderers have met it bravely on the scaffold, when the time comes so perhaps may I. In the meantime I am horribly afraid. The future is dark. I should like more evidence of the immortality of the soul. ‘There is great solace in talk. We--you and I--are shipwrecked on a wave-swept rock. At any moment one or other of us, perhaps both, may be carried out to sea and lost. For the time being we have a modicum of light and warmth, of meat and drink. Let us constitute ourselves a club, stretch out our legs and talk. We have minds, memories, varied experiences, different opinions. Sir, let us talk, not as men who mock at fate, not with coarse speech or foul tongue, but with a manly mixture of the gloom that admits the inevitable, and the merriment that observes the incongruous. Thus talking we shall learn to love one another, not sentimentally but fundamentally.