oses of irony and
satire, and again for striking directly home to the roots of morality and
religion. In a playful mood, he is never more characteristic than when he
is his own mimic, propounding with mock seriousness some preposterous
theory like that of the intellectual advantages of living in a garret:

I have discovered ... that the tenuity of a defecated air at a proper
distance from the surface of the earth accelerates the fancy, and sets
at liberty those intellectual powers which were before shackled by too
strong attraction, and unable to expand themselves under the pressure of
a gross atmosphere. I have found dullness to quicken into sentiment in a
thin ether, as water, though not very hot, boils in a receiver partly
exhausted; and heads, in appearance empty, have teemed with notions upon
rising ground, as the flaccid sides of a football would have swelled out
into stiffness and extension.

This is one side of his genius; but another, and profounder, appears in
the eloquent simplicity of such a passage as the following, against our
fears of lessening ourselves in the eyes of others:

The most useful medicines are often unpleasing to the taste. Those who
are oppressed by their own reputation will, perhaps, not be comforted by
hearing that their cares are unnecessary. But the truth is that no man
is much regarded by the rest of the world. He that considers how little
he dwells upon the condition of others, will learn how little the
attention of others is attracted to himself. While we see multitudes
passing before us, of whom, perhaps, not one appears to deserve our
notice, or excite our sympathy, we should remember that we likewise are
lost in the same throng; that the eye which happens to glance upon us is
turned in a moment on him that follows us, and that the utmost which we
can reasonably hope or fear is, to fill a vacant hour with prattle, and
be forgotten.

When we approach Johnson's poetry, the revolution of taste becomes a more
acute consideration. It seems very nearly impossible to compare or
contrast eighteenth-century poetry and that of the twentieth without
wilfully tipping the scales in one direction or the other, judgment in
this area being so much influenced by preference. But let us begin with
titles. For a start, let us take, from a recent Pulitzer Prize-winner:
"The Day's No Rounder Than Its Angles Are", and "Don't Look Now But
Mary Is Everybody"; fr