s you call
it, about love, but because they treat of nothing, that they are
despicable: we must not ridicule a passion which he who never felt,
never was happy, and he who laughs at, never deserves to feel--a
passion which has caused the change of empires, and the loss of
worlds--a passion which has inspired heroism and subdued avarice.' He
thought he had already said too much. 'A passion, in short,' added
he, with an altered tone, 'that consumes me away for my pretty Fanny
here, and she 'is very cruel,' speaking of another lady (Miss Burney)
in the room."

As the high-flown language which he occasionally employed in
addressing or discussing women, has originated a theory that the
basis or essence of his character was romance, it may be as well to
contrast what he said in soberer moods on love. He remarked to Dr.
Maxwell, that "its violence and ill-effects were much exaggerated;
for who knows any real sufferings on that head, more than from the
exorbitancy of any other passion?" On Boswell asking him whether he
did not suppose that there are fifty women in the world with any of
whom a man may be as happy as with any one woman in particular, he
replied, "Ay, Sir, fifty thousand. I believe marriages would in
general be as happy, and often more so, if they were all made by the
lord-chancellor upon a due consideration of the characters and
circumstances without the parties having any choice in the matter."
On another occasion he observed that sensible men rarely married for
love.

These peculiarities throw light on more questions than one relating
to Johnson's prolonged intimacy and alleged quarrel with Mrs. Thrale.
His gallantry, and the flattering air of deferential tenderness which
he threw into his commerce with his female favourites, may have had
little less to do with his domestication at Streatham than his
celebrity, his learning, or his wit. The most submissive wife will
manage to dislodge an inmate who is displeasing to her, "Aye, a
marriage, man," said Bucklaw to his led captain, "but wherefore
droops thy mighty spirit? The board will have a corner, and the
corner will have a trencher, and the trencher will have a glass
beside it; and the board end shall be filled, and the trencher and
the glass shall be replenished for thee, if all the petticoats in
Lothian had sworn the contrary." "So says many an honest fellow,"
said Craigenfelt, "and some of my special friends; but curse me if I
know the reason, the women