o has
not been in Italy, is always conscious of an inferiority, from his not
having seen what it is expected a man should see. The grand object of
travelling is to see the shores of the Mediterranean. On those shores
were the four great Empires of the world; the Assyrian, the Persian, the
Grecian, and the Roman.--All our religion, almost all our law, almost
all our arts, almost all that sets us above savages, has come to us
from the shores of the Mediterranean.' The General observed, that 'THE
MEDITERRANEAN would be a noble subject for a poem.'

We talked of translation. I said, I could not define it, nor could I
think of a similitude to illustrate it; but that it appeared to me
the translation of poetry could be only imitation. JOHNSON. 'You may
translate books of science exactly. You may also translate history, in
so far as it is not embellished with oratory, which is poetical. Poetry,
indeed, cannot be translated; and, therefore, it is the poets that
preserve languages; for we would not be at the trouble to learn a
language, if we could have all that is written in it just as well in a
translation. But as the beauties of poetry cannot be preserved in any
language except that in which it was originally written, we learn the
language.'

'Goldsmith (he said,) referred every thing to vanity; his virtues, and
his vices too, were from that motive. He was not a social man. He never
exchanged mind with you.'

We spent the evening at Mr. Hoole's. Mr. Mickle, the excellent
translator of The Lusiad, was there. I have preserved little of the
conversation of this evening. Dr. Johnson said, 'Thomson had a true
poetical genius, the power of viewing every thing in a poetical light.
His fault is such a cloud of words sometimes, that the sense can hardly
peep through. Shiels, who compiled Cibber's Lives of the Poets, was one
day sitting with me. I took down Thomson, and read aloud a large portion
of him, and then asked,--Is not this fine? Shiels having expressed the
highest admiration. Well, Sir, (said I,) I have omitted every other
line.'

I related a dispute between Goldsmith and Mr. Robert Dodsley, one
day when they and I were dining at Tom Davies's, in 1762. Goldsmith
asserted, that there was no poetry produced in this age. Dodsley
appealed to his own Collection, and maintained, that though you could
not find a palace like Dryden's Ode on St. Cecilia's Day, you had
villages composed of very pretty houses; and he mentioned part