' Why Sir John should suppose that the gentleman alluded to would
act in this manner, he has not thought fit to explain. But what he did
was not approved of by Johnson; who, upon being acquainted of it without
delay by a friend, expressed great indignation, and warmly insisted on
the book being delivered up; and, afterwards, in the supposition of his
missing it, without knowing by whom it had been taken, he said, 'Sir, I
should have gone out of the world distrusting half mankind.' Sir John
next day wrote a letter to Johnson, assigning reasons for his conduct;
upon which Johnson observed to Mr. Langton, 'Bishop Sanderson could not
have dictated a better letter. I could almost say, _Melius est sic
penituisse quam non errasse_.' The agitation into which Johnson was
thrown by this incident, probably made him hastily burn those precious
records which must ever be regretted. BOSWELL. According to Mr. Croker,
Steevens was the man whom Hawkins said that he suspected. Porson, in his
witty _Panegyrical Epistle on Hawkins v. Johnson_ (_Gent. Mag._ 1787,
pp. 751-3, and _Porson Tracts_, p.
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