it. It was the boy's own enthusiasm that
made me feel, as never before, how deep-rooted in the human breast the
love of destruction, of mere destruction, is. And I began to ask myself:
'Even if England as we know it, the English polity of which that cottage
was a symbol to me, were the work of (say) Mr. Robert Smillie's own
unaided hands'--but I waived the question coming from that hypothesis,
and other questions that would have followed; for I wished to be happy
while I might.

'A CLERGYMAN' 1918.

Fragmentary, pale, momentary; almost nothing; glimpsed and gone; as it
were, a faint human hand thrust up, never to reappear, from beneath the
rolling waters of Time, he forever haunts my memory and solicits my weak
imagination. Nothing is told of him but that once, abruptly, he asked a
question, and received an answer.

This was on the afternoon of April 7th, 1778, at Streatham, in the
well-appointed house of Mr. Thrale. Johnson, on the morning of that day,
had entertained Boswell at breakfast in Bolt Court, and invited him to
dine at Thrale Hall. The two took coach and arrived early. It seems that
Sir John Pringle had asked Boswell to ask Johnson 'what were the best
English sermons for style.' In the interval before dinner, accordingly,
Boswell reeled off the names of several divines whose prose might or
might not win commendation. 'Atterbury?' he suggested. 'JOHNSON: Yes,
Sir, one of the best. BOSWELL: Tillotson? JOHNSON: Why, not now. I
should not advise any one to imitate Tillotson's style; though I don't
know; I should be cautious of censuring anything that has been applauded
by so many suffrages.--South is one of the best, if you except
his peculiarities, and his violence, and sometimes coarseness of
language.--Seed has a very fine style; but he is not very theological.
Jortin's sermons are very elegant. Sherlock's style, too, is very
elegant, though he has not made it his principal study.--And you may add
Smalridge. BOSWELL: I like Ogden's Sermons on Prayer very much, both for
neatness of style and subtility of reasoning. JOHNSON: I should like to
read all that Ogden has written. BOSWELL: What I want to know is, what
sermons afford the best specimen of English pulpit eloquence. JOHNSON:
We have no sermons addressed to the passions, that are good for
anything; if you mean that kind of eloquence. A CLERGYMAN, whose name
I do not recollect: Were not Dodd's sermons addressed to the passions?
JOHNSON: They were n