ely imaginary hypothesis of Mr.
and Mrs. Langton being in this position. Johnson said that it would be
useless to tell Langton, because he would be too sluggish to get a
divorce. Once Langton was the unconscious cause of one of Johnson's
oddest performances. Langton had employed Chambers, a common friend of
his and Johnson's, to draw his will. Johnson, talking to Chambers and
Boswell, was suddenly struck by the absurdity of his friend's appearing
in the character of testator. His companions, however, were utterly
unable to see in what the joke consisted; but Johnson laughed
obstreperously and irrepressibly: he laughed till he reached the Temple
Gate; and when in Fleet Street went almost into convulsions of hilarity.
Holding on by one of the posts in the street, he sent forth such peals
of laughter that they seemed in the silence of the night to resound from
Temple Bar to Fleet Ditch.

Not long before his death, Johnson applied to Langton for spiritual
advice. "I desired him to tell me sincerely in what he thought my life
was faulty." Langton wrote upon a sheet of paper certain texts
recommending Christian charity; and explained, upon inquiry, that he was
pointing at Johnson's habit of contradiction. The old doctor began by
thanking him earnestly for his kindness; but gradually waxed savage and
asked Langton, "in a loud and angry tone, What is your drift, sir?" He
complained of the well-meant advice to Boswell, with a sense that he had
been unjustly treated. It was a scene for a comedy, as Reynolds
observed, to see a penitent get into a passion and belabour his
confessor.

Through Langton, Johnson became acquainted with the friend whose manner
was in the strongest contrast to his own. Topham Beauclerk was a man of
fashion. He was commended to Johnson by a likeness to Charles II., from
whom he was descended, being the grandson of the first Duke of St.
Alban's. Beauclerk was a man of literary and scientific tastes. He
inherited some of the moral laxity which Johnson chose to pardon in his
ancestor. Some years after his acquaintance with Boswell he married Lady
Diana Spencer, a lady who had been divorced upon his account from her
husband, Lord Bolingbroke. But he took care not to obtrude his faults of
life, whatever they may have been, upon the old moralist, who
entertained for him a peculiar affection. He specially admired
Beauclerk's skill in the use of a more polished, if less vigorous, style
of conversation than his o