31. At Montrose, Alexander Lindsay, Esq. second son of the late James Fullerton Lindsay Carnegie, Esq. of Boysack, to Amy, daughter of Alexander Cruickshank, Esq. of Stracathro. Nov. 1. At Inverary, John Stewart, Esq. of Achadashinaig, to Margaret, daughter of John Campbell, Esq. of Craignure. DEATHS. April 5. At Calcutta, one of the most amiable and universally respected ladies of the settlement, Mrs Robert Campbell. May 2. At Madras, Sebastian Holford Greig, Esq. 7. At Samarang, Java, John Polwarth, Esq. 19. On his passage from Bombay to England," William George Burrell, M. D. surgeon of the 65th regiment of foot, son of the late Mr William Burrell, merchant in Edinburgh. Aug. 11. On board his Majesty's ship Tartar, Howard, third son of Colonel Sir Howard Douglas. 17. In Jamaica, Hugh Walker, Esq. of Carron Hill. Sept. 7. At Wickham, in her 19th year, Miss Georgiana Jane M'Donald, eldest daughter of Dr M'Donald, royal navy. 9. At Ramham, near Chatham, George, eldest son of Sir James Malcolm, of the royal marines. 13. At Bourdeaux, where she had gone for the recovery of her health, Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Mr George Lyon, Edinburgh. 22. At Lasswade, Mr William Pedie, late of Mains of Dollar. - At Chapel-street, Grosvenor-place, London, Catherine, daughter of the late Right Honourable Lady Janet, and Sir Robert Anstruther, Bart. of Balcaskie, Fifeshire. 29. At her house, Wellington-place, Leith Links, Ann Armstrong, wife of Mr Alexander Burnett, and only sister of the late reverend John Armstrong, A. M.. 30. At Glenburn-hall, Thomas Ormiston, Esq. -At the Hirsel, Seigneor Guestenelli, at a very advanced age. Oct. 1. At Bickton-house, Lady Rolle. At Bognor, Sussex, Harriet, youngest daughter of Lord Spencer Chichester, deceased, and Lady Harriett Chichester. At Edinburgh, after a few days illness, James, youngest son of James Irvine, Esq. of Quebec, Lower Canada. At his house, Melville-street, Edinburgh, Charles Macpherson, Esq. late Inspector-General of Barracks for North Britain. 3. At Gateshead, near Newcastle-upon-Tyne, the Honourable Mrs Smith, sister to the Earl of Donoughmore and Lord Hutchinson. 4. At Stockbridge, Miss Margaret Irving, se cond daughter of the late Lieutenant-Colonel Irving, 70th foot. 6. At Dundee, at the advanced age of 95, Miss Susanna Lyon, daughter of the late William Lyon of Carse, Esq. advocate, and grand-daughter of the late Lord Carse, one of the senators of the College of Justice. -At Whiterig-house, John David, aged ten months, son of the reverend David Baxter, minister of the parish of Lilliesleaf. At Edinburgh, Helen, daughter of Thomas Bell, Esq. Wharton Place. 7. At the Manse of Sanquhar, the reverend W. Rankine, minister of that parish, in the 69th year of his age, and 35th of his ministry. 18. At his house, 18, Nielson-street, Edinburgh, Mr John Ramsay, of the Customs. At Duddingston, John Hamilton Dundas of Duddingston, Esq. 9. At Currie, Walter Brown, Esq. of Currie. 10. At Edinburgh, Mrs Janet Liddell, wife of Thomas Bell, Esq. Wharton Piace. 11. At Capledrae, Fifeshire, Margaret, third daughter of the late Mr William Mitchell, accountant, Bank of Scotland, Dunfermline. At Dalkeith-house, William Cuthill, Esq. -At Tweedside Lodge, Peebles, Mrs Grace Elizabeth Seton, relict of Mr John Bartram, writer in Edinburgh. At his house of Hill Top, Staffordshire, James Keir, Esq. aged 85. At Wooll, Charles Scott, Esq. of Wooll. 12. At Edinburgh, Mrs Margaret Miller, wife of Mr William White, merchant, Leith. -At Nether Barns, William Anderson, Esq. late of Jamaica. 13. At Edinburgh, Mrs Ann Ranken, relict of Mr David Allan, plumber in Edinburgh. 14. At London, in the prime of life, after a few days illness, Mary Stewart Mackenzie, youngest daughter of Mr Mackenzie, banker in Inverness. At Glasgow, Isabella Duncanson, daughter of the late Thomas Duncanson, merchant, Falkirk. At Hermitage Brae, Elizabeth Brown, spouse of James Wishart, merchant, Leith. 15. At Cheltenham, Mary, the wife of Major Patrick Campbell, late of the 52d regiment. At Edinburgh, Mrs Janet Blair, wife of Kenneth M'Kenzie, M. D. second daughter of the late William Blair, Esq. W. S. 16. Mrs Hagart, sen. of Bantaskine. At his house, Clerk-street, Edinburgh, Mr Alexander Phillip, baker; and at the same place, on the 20th October, Mrs Janet Inglis, his wife. - At Bermondsey, London, John Millar, M. D. only son of Mr John Millar, Canongate. 17. At Edinburgh, Miss Janet Buchan, young. est daughter of the late John Buchan, Esq. of Letham. 18. At Edinburgh, Mr James M'Lachlan, student in divinity. At Sauchiand, after a few hours illness, Mr John Ronaldson, aged 63. 19. At Leith, Mrs Ann Beugo, relict of the deceased Mr Alexander Balfour, cabinet-maker, Kinghorn. At her house, in Prince's-street, Edinburgh, Mrs Grace Ramsay, relict of the late David Ramsay, Esq. Craigleith. -At Strathaven, the reverend Dr John Scott, minister of that parish. 20. At Rainham, Kent, Jane Oliver, Lady of Sir James Malcolm, royal marines. - At Edinburgh, Mr Robert Findlay, writingmaster and accountant, South Bridge. -At 4, Graham-street, Edinburgh, Miss Lucy Lister, aged 17. 21. At Tweed Green, Peebles, Miss Stirling, daughter of the late Alexander Stirling, Esq. merchant in Glasgow. 22. At his son's Cottage, Altrive Lake, Yarrow, Mr Robert Hogg, at the advanced age of ninetytwo. -At Home Lacy, Herefordshire, her Grace the Duchess of Norfolk. At his house, Buccleuch Place, Mr Peter Anderson, merchant and general agent. At Aberdeen, Captain Hector M'Lean, formerly of the 42d regiment, and late Reay Highlanders. 23. At 34, Castle-street, Edinburgh, Miss Margaret Muat, of Lasswade Hill. At his house, Hill-place, Edinburgh, Mr Thomas Pyper, linen-draper. -At his house, Yardheads, Mr John Johnston, late baker in Leith. 25. At Gilmore-place, Edinburgh, James Tait, Esq. late of the Bahamas. 27. At Newmanswalls, near Montrose, in the 24th year of his age, Patrick, second son of the late reverend John Webster, minister of Inverarity. 27. At Leney, Catherine Lesly, daughter of the late John Hunter Spreull Crawford, Esq. of Cow donhill. At St Patrick-square, Edinburgh, Isabella Crawford, wife of Mr J. P. Lurchen, R. N. and daughter of Mr William Crawford, landsurveyor. At Glasgow, Dr Patrick Cumin, professor of Oriental Languages in the University of Glasgow. 29. At Edinburgh, in the 82d year of his age, the reverend John Touch, D. D. late minister of the Chapel of Ease, St Cuthbert's, to which charge he was inducted in 1766. 50. At Hawick, aged 89, Mr James Oliver, mer. chant there. Nov. 1. At St Ninians, near Wooler, H. H. St Paul, Esq. M. P. one of the representatives of the borough of Berwick. 2. At his house, in Hanover-street, Edinburgh, Mr John Cockburn, late baker there. Lately-At Annetto Bay, Kingston, Jamaica, of the yellow fever, Alexander, youngest son of the late Mr Alexander Pew, Leith. Oliver & Boyd, Printers, Edinburgh. BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE. No. XLV. DECEMBER 1820. VOL. VIII. ON THE LITERARY CHARACTERS OF BISHOP WARBURTON AND DR JOHNSON. THE two greatest men of the last century in our national literature, the greatest in comprehensiveness of mind and variety of talent, were undoubtedly Bishop Warburton and Dr Johnson. For a long period of time, they exercised a kind of joint domination over the republic of letters-a dominion which, in the former, chiefly arose fram the hardy and unshrinking defiance of public opinion he exhibited, backed by extraordinary intellectual force and vigour; and, in the latter, had its origin in the universal awe and veneration his genius and character had excited. In the one, it was a tribute which fear of an immediate consequent castigation compelled all to pay; in the other, it was an homage more voluntary, because less enforced, to powers of the highest magnitude, and virtue of the most unblemished purity. The one, accounting dissent from his favourite theories as a crime of the blackest dye, punished all nonconformists to the idol he had set up with a most merciless measure of pains and penalties; while the latter, possess ing, indeed, not less of haughtiness and irritability, but more of prudence, had the good sense to leave to public opinion his justification against the attacks of his enemies. This joint and equal literary supremacy, notwith standing that it was occasionally disturbed by frequent murmurings of jealousy in the former, and growlings of fearless opposition in the latter, continued, without being shaken by intestine division, till the former had lost, in inanity and dotage, his great mental acuteness and strength,-and thus the latter had, by the departure of his rival, become the sole literary potentate of his country. Time, however, which as frequently consigns to neglect the meritorious productions of literature, as it showers down an increase of fame on the compositions of deserving genius, has long since quieted the bustle which the pen of Warburton always excited in his lifetime; and his name, once numbered amongst the mighty of the earth, has been for sometime subjected to a partial if not total neglect. As the Roman Catholic church treated the bones of Wickliffe with contumely, whom, living, they could not overcome; so the public seem determined to revenge upon Warburton, when dead, the contempt they experienced from his haughtiness, and the unwillingly-paid devotion which he enforced to his powers when living. And in the length of time which has elapsed from the period of his decease to the present day, many a kick has been inflicted on the dead lion by animals who could not have dared to approach him while capable of defending and revenging himself.* Popular hostility, as well as private, ought, however, to give place to candid examination Amongst these, see one Watkins, the author of a book called Anecdotes of distin guished Characters; who, in a note to the work, would fain persuade us that Warburton was merely a man of great and extensive reading, without intellect, acuteness, or wit. VOL. VIII. 2 H and allowance; and when exercised against a deserving subject, will only, in the end, reflect disgrace upon itself for an unworthy exercise of power. The fame of Warburton must, therefore, at length experience a renewal of its brightness; and though perhaps shorn of some of its beams, will receive its merited due at the hands of posterity. A very different effect has time had over the fame of his great competitor: its only influence has been in showering down additional lustre on the name of Samuel Johnson, and giving to it that fixed and permanent basis and foundation which it is only for posterity to bestow. The best proof which can be given of the extensive circulation of his writings, is the visible effect which they have had over literature, and criticism; and the incontestible assistance they have afforded to the great march of the human mind: while the works of Warburton stand unnumbered amongst the standard productions in theology and criticism; and his great work, the Divine Legation, remains, to use the words of Gibbon, a monument crumbling in the dust of the vigour and weakness of the human mind." As there is, I believe, no writing extant in which the merits of these extraordinary men have been made the subject of comparative criticism, though certainly the most alike in the peculiarities of their mental character of any of the literary worthies of their age, the most equal in force of intellect and universality of power, an examination and inquiry into their respective talents and characters may not be without its particular benefit. It will, at least, be of use in displaying how far it is possible for abilities the most splendid to seduce their possessor to extravagance in the search for originality; and how transient and momentary is the fame of paradoxical ingenuity, when compared with that which rests on the immobility of established truth! To the peculiar education of Warburton, may be ascribed most of the peculiarities of his character. Himself, at first, an obscure provincial attorney, undisciplined in the regular course of academical study; and refused, when he had even risen to celebrity, a common academical honour; owing none of the varied exuberance of his knowledge to professors or professorships, to universities or colleges; he naturally cherished a secret dislike to the regular disciplinarians of learning; and it was, at once, his delight and his pride to confound the followers of the beaten path in study, by recondite and variously sparkling erudition -to oppose himself to whole cohorts of the standard corps of literature, in the confidence of his own individual power; to strike out new paths in learning, and open new vistas in knowledge, with the rapidity of an enchanter; to demolish the old and stationary structures of theology and literature, and overturn them from their foundations, for the purpose of erecting his own novelties in their stead, which supplied what they wanted of solidity, by speciousness and splendour; and to dazzle and astound the supporters of established principles and maxims, by combating them with a force of reason, and strength of logic, which was, perhaps, as unexampled as it was audacious. His learning and his mental powers were equally established without assistance, and his haughtiness loved to shew how his inbred mental vigour had triumphed over difficulties. From the same source arose both the excellencies and defects of his character. No pruning hand had ever been exerted to remove the excrescencies which had been generated in his mind, and to tame and sober the wildness and extravagance with which it was so often overshadowed. Thus his intellect rose up in rough and unshorn mightiness, and with it the pullulating seeds of sophistical ingenuity which grew with its growth, and strengthened with its strength, till at last he became an inveterate and radicated system-monger, and his mind a repositary, where every subject in theology, criticism, or literature, had an hypothesis ready prepared for it. Nor less powerful in its influence, on his character, was the first reception he met with in literature,-in the universal war, which seemed, at his first rise, to be proclaimed against him. his innovating and paradoxical spirit should procure him many adversaries, was hardly to be doubted, but, as if the hypotheses he advanced were matters of established belief, he resented every departure from them, as a departure from truth itself; and his ungovernable haughtiness, and impatience of contradiction, flamed out in angry defiance against his opposers, That 2 and overwhelmed them with an overpowering torrent of scurrility and abuse, which was served by an inexpugnable force of argument, and strengthened by an unequalled promptitude of wit. From these primary circumstances, his mind received an indelible impression; and from his first advance to greatness, to his last approach to imbecility, he was the same, and unchanged; the same constructor of systems, the same desperate controversialist, the same dogmatical decider, the same determined oppugner of whatever authority had sanctioned in theology, or common sense established in taste. The resources of his ingenuity were not exhausted by time-the severity of his pen was not composed by age-and Lowth, on whom his last attack was made, was no less fated than his first antagonist, Tillard, to receive the overflowings of his gall. The character of Dr Johnson was, perhaps, not less influenced by exterinal circumstances, but they had much less influence on the purely intellectual part of it. If the early difficulties through which he struggled, in conjunction with the original irrita bility of his system, gave a strong tinge of morosity to his character, that morosity was not communicated entire and unsoftened to his writings. It did not form a constituent and essential part of his compositions-a kind of perpetual and inseparable quality of the mind-nor was the same itch for controversy so completely engrafted into, and connected with it. He had not any of that foolish knight-errantry which leads forth its votaries to renew, in the intellectual arena, the ancient feats of personal prowess, and individual strength; and which would sally forth, manfully dealing its blows to the right hand and to the left, careless on whom they fell, and regardless what side they injured, for no certain purpose, or visible design, save to manifest the mightiness of its own strength. He did not vainly and ridiculously oppose himself to the world, for he well knew, that he who takes the world for his opponent, is sure, in the end, not to win; and that, at last, his consolation will only be that of Nathaniel Lee in the madhouse. "The world thinks me mad, and I think them so, but numbers have prevailed over right." He did not concern him self to answer every trifling and fool- If we proceed to compare their respective intellects, it will, perhaps, be rather difficult to adjust the balance of superiority. In the first, great characteristics of genius, unbounded comprehension of mind, and receptability of images in the power of communicating, to mental matter, that living energy and alimental nourishment that intellectual leaven which gives it the capacity of being kneaded and worked up into an exhaustless diversity of shapes and figurations-in the power of extracting and drawing forth all that human reason, when bent to any given point, can educe-in the power of conceiving mighty plans in the mind without destroying, in the grasp of the whole, the beauty and the symmetry of the parts-in these first and foremost requisites of genius, the endowments of both seem very evenly divided, though the balance, if at all, preponderates on the side of Johnson. He had, certainly, more of the vivifying mind of a poet-more of that brightness of imagination which clothes all objects in a vesture of splendour-more of that fervid fulness which deepens and swells the current of thought-but not more of the boundless expansion and versatility of mind-not more of the variegated exuberance of imagery, or expatiating ubiquity of fancy. He had, perhaps, not so much of that wide sweep of intellect, which, like a drag-net, draws all within its reach into its capacious reservoir of illustration, and which diminishes and contracts the resources of ingenuity by its extraordinary power of exhaustion; nor had he any part of that fiery fervour, that indomitable vehemence, which blazed forth in Warburton; with which he could burst through every bondage, and overcome every obstacle; which it was impossible to withstand in its attacks, or delay in its course; and which, like the burning simoom of the Arabian deserts, absolutely devastated and laid waste the regions of literature, with the sultriness of its ardour, and the unquenchableness of its flame. In logical strength and acuteness in the faculty of seeing immediately the weak side of an argument, and exposing its fallacy with clearness and force-in those powers which Dr Johnson has called the grappling irons of the understanding each was superlatively pre-eminent; and it would be difficult to decide which is the superior. Both great masters of the science of reasoning-endowed with that penetration of discernment, which in a moment pierces through the sophistications of argumentation, and unravels the mazes of subtlety with intuitive quickness and precision-they were yet considerably different in the manner in which those talents were displayed. In Johnson, the science of reasoning has the appearance of being more a natural faculty; and in Warburton, more an artificial acquirement. The one delighted in exhibiting it in its naked force and undivided powerthe other was fonder of dividing it into distinctions, and reducing it into parts. The one delighted to overwhelm and confound-the other rather to lead into intricacies, and puzzle with contradictions. The one wielded his weapons with such overpowering strength, that skill was useless, and art unnecessary-the other made use of them as an experienced fencing-master, whom great natural strength, joined with much acquired skill, render irresistible. In the one, the first blow was generally the decider of the combat-in the other, the contest was often more protracted, though the success in the end not less sure. It was the glory of the one, to evince at once his power, and, by a mighty blow, to destroy the antagonist who assailed him-while it was at once the delight and pride of the other, to deprive his opponent gradually of every particle of armour and weapon of defence; and when he had riven away every obstacle and protection, exultingly and mercilessly to despatch him. In real and true taste, Johnson was unquestionably the superior. Discarding all those systems of criticism which had so long fettered and confined the efforts of talent, he first established criticism on the basis and foundation of common sense; and thus liberated our future Shakspeares from those degrading chains and unworthy shackles, which custom had so long allowed the weak to impose upon the strong. His critical decisions-whereever personal hostility did not interfere, and wherever his want of the finer and more delicate perception of inanimate or intellectual beauty did not incapacitate him from judging correctly-are, and ever will be, incontestible for their truth, and unequalled for their talent, and carry with them |