'No,
Sir, (replied the Doctor) it is a very fine night. The LORD is
abroad.' BOSWELL.
[208] See _ante_, ii.96, and iii.251; and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept.
30.
[209] 'An ardent judge, who zealous in his trust, With warmth gives
sentence, yet is always just.' Pope's _Essay on Criticism_, l.677.
[210] _Works_, viii.459. Though the _Life of Young_ is by Croft, yet the
critical remarks are by Johnson.
[211] _Ib._ p.460.
[212] Johnson refers to Chambers's _Dissertation on Oriental Gardening_,
which was ridiculed in the _Heroic Epistle_. See _post_, under May 8,
1781, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. 13.
[213] Boswell refers to the death of Narcissa in the third of the _Night
Thoughts_. While he was writing the _Life of Johnson_ Mrs. Boswell was
dying of consumption in (to quote Young's words)
The rigid north,
Her native bed, on which bleak
Boreas blew.'
She died nearly two years before _The Life_ was published.
[214] _Proverbs_, xviii.14.
[215] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 16.
[216] See vol. i. page 133. BOSWELL.
[217] 'In his economy Swift practised a peculiar and offensive
parsimony, without disguise or apology.
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