_Various Readings[138] in the Life of COWLEY._
'All [future votaries of] _that may hereafter pant for_ solitude.
'To conceive and execute the [agitation or perception] _pains and the
pleasures_ of other minds.
'The wide effulgence of [the blazing] a _summer_ noon.'
In the Life of WALLER, Johnson gives a distinct and animated narrative
of publick affairs in that variegated period, with strong yet nice
touches of character; and having a fair opportunity to display his
political principles, does it with an unqualified manly confidence, and
satisfies his readers how nobly he might have executed a _Tory History_
of his country.
So easy is his style in these Lives, that I do not recollect more than
three uncommon or learned words[139]; one, when giving an account of the
approach of Waller's mortal disease, he says, 'he found his legs grow
_tumid_;' by using the expression his legs _swelled_, he would have
avoided this; and there would have been no impropriety in its being
followed by the interesting question to his physician, 'What that
_swelling_ meant?' Another, when he mentions that Pope had _emitted_
proposals; when _published_ or _issued_ would have been more readily
understood; and a third, when he calls Orrery and Dr.
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