n all these things, as elsewhere, his strength lies in shrewdness, in
a common sense that has been through the fire of experience, in a real
love of wisdom and truth. There is a story that Charlotte Bronte, when
a girl of sixteen, broke out very angrily at some one who said she was
always talking about clever men such as Johnson and Sheridan. "Now you
don't know the meaning of clever," she said; "Sheridan might be
clever--scamps often are, but Johnson hadn't a spark of 'cleverality'
in him." That remark gives the essence of _The Rambler_. Whoever
wants "cleverality," whoever wants what Mr. Shaw and Mr. Chesterton
supply so brilliantly and abundantly to the present generation, had
best leave Johnson alone. The signal merit of his writings is the
exact opposite of "cleverality"; it is that he always means exactly
what he says. He often talked for victory, but except, perhaps, in the
political pamphlets he always wrote for truth.

Books like _The Rambler_ and _Rasselas_ do not easily lend themselves
to illustration; the effect they produce is a cumulative effect.
Slowly, as we read paper after paper, the mind and character of Johnson
take hold of us; what we began with impatience or {198} perhaps with
contempt, we put down with respect and admiration. At the end we feel
that we would gladly put our lives into the hands of this rough, wise,
human, limited, lovable man. To get to that impression the books must
be read; but one or two illustrations may be given. There is nothing
new to say about death, but the human heart will itself be dead when it
is willing to give up saying again the old things that have been said
on that subject from the beginning of the world. Who puts more of it
into saying them than Johnson?

"When a friend is carried to his grave, we at once find excuses for
every weakness, and palliations of every fault; we recollect a thousand
endearments which before glided off our minds without impression, a
thousand favours unrepaid, a thousand duties unperformed, and wish,
vainly wish, for his return, not so much that we may receive, as that
we may bestow happiness, and recompense that kindness which before we
never understood."

Where in this is the pompous pedant who is so commonly supposed to be
the writer of Johnson's books? The English language has not often been
more beautifully handled. It is true that, until one looks closely,
the last words of the first sentence appear to be a piece of em