ADVERTISEMENT.
74 lines✦
t may be asserted, without a partial panegyric of the object of ourpraise, that the works of no single author in the wide range of Britishliterature, not excepting, perhaps, even Addison, contain a richer andmore varied fund of rational entertainment and sound instruction thanthose of Dr. Johnson. A correct edition of his works must, therefore, bean acceptable contribution to the mass of national literature. That thepresent edition has, perhaps, fairer claims on public approbation thanmost preceding ones, we feel ourselves justified in asserting, withoutenvious detraction of those who have gone before us. It has been ourwish and diligent endeavour to give as accurate a text as possible, towhich we have subjoined notes, where elucidation seemed to be required.They have been collected with care, and will prove our impartiality bytheir occasional censures of the faults and failings of the writer whoseworks it is our office to illustrate, and our more common and moregrateful task to praise. Though, being diffused over a wide space, theyappear less numerous than they really are, it has been our incessantcare to abstain from that method of redundant annotation, which tends todisplay the ingenuity or mental resources of an editor, much more thanto illustrate the original writer. Notes have been chiefly introducedfor the purpose of guarding our readers against some political sophisms,or to correct some hasty error. But happily, in the writings to which wehave devoted our time and attention, the chaff and dross lie so open toview, and are so easily separated from purer matter, that a hint issufficient to protect the most incautious from harm. Accordingly, in ournotes and prefaces we have confined ourselves to simple and succincthistories of the respective works under consideration, and have avoided,as much as might be, a burdensome repetition of criticisms or anecdotes,in almost every person's possession, or an idle pointing out of beautieswhich none could fail to recognise. The length of time that has elapsedsince the writings of Johnson were first published, has amply developedtheir intrinsic merits, and destroyed the personal and party prejudiceswhich assail a living author: but the years have been too few to renderthe customs and manners alluded to so obsolete as to require muchillustrative research.[a] It may be satisfactory to subjoin, that carehas been exercised in every thing that we have advanced, and that whenwe have erred, it has been on the side of caution. All the usually received works of Dr. Johnson, together with Murphy'sEssay on his Life and Genius, are comprised in this edition. Inpursuance of our plan of brevity, we shall not here give a list of hisminor and unacknowledged productions, but refer our readers to Boswell;a new, amended, and enlarged edition of whose interesting andpicturesque Memoirs we purpose speedily to present to the public, afterthe style and manner of the present work. One very important addition, however, we conceive that we have made, inpublishing the whole of his sermons. It has been hitherto the practiceto give one or two, with a cursory notice, that Johnson's theologicalknowledge was scanty, or unworthy of his general fame. We have actedunder a very different impression; for though Johnson was not, norpretended to be, a polemical or controversial divine, he well knew howto apply to the right regulation of our moral conduct the lessons ofthat Christianity which was not promulged for a sect, but for mankind;which sought not a distinctive garb in the philosopher's grove, norsecluded itself in the hermit's cell, but entered without reserve everywalk of life, and sympathized with all the instinctive feelings of ourcommon nature. This high privilege of our religion Johnson felt, and tothe diffusion of its practical, not of its theoretical advantages, heapplied the energies of his heart and mind; and with what success, weleave to every candid reader to pronounce. In conclusion, we would express a hope that we shall not inaptlycommence a series of OXFORD ENGLISH CLASSICS with the works of one whosewritings have so enlarged and embellished the science of moral evidence,which has long constituted a characteristic feature in the literarydiscipline of this university. The science of mind and its progress, asrecorded by history, or unfolded by biography, was Johnson's favouritestudy, and is still the main object of pursuit in the place whose systemand institutions he so warmly praised, and to which he ever professedhimself so deeply indebted. If the terseness of attic simplicity hasbeen desiderated by some in the pages of Johnson, they undeniablydisplay the depth of thought, the weight of argument, the insight intomind and morals, which are to be found in their native dignity only inthe compositions of those older writers with whose spirit he was sorichly imbued. In this place, then, where those models which Johnsonadmired and imitated are still upheld as the only sure guides to soundlearning, his writings can never be laid aside unread and neglected.
✦