Page:Johnsonian Miscellanies II.djvu/438

 430 Minor Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson.

1 Ay, Sir ; Davy, Davy loves flattery ; but here, indeed, you have flattered him as he deserves, paying a just tribute to his merit V

��OF STYAN THIRLBY BY DR. JOHNSON.

[From a copy of the original in the possession of Mr. R. B. Adam.

These anecdotes were sent by Johnson to John Nichols, who used them in a brief account of Thirlby, Life, iv. 161, n. 4; Letters, ii. 276.]

What I can tell of Thirlby, I had from those who knew him. I never saw him myself.

1. This was an exercise written by him, at the school of the Rev. Mr. Kilby of Leicester, who preserved it, and by whom his proficiency was praised as very quick. He went through my school^ said Mr. Kilby, in three years, and his self-conceit was censured as very offensive. He thought he knew more than all the school. Perhaps, said a gentlewoman to whom this was told, he thought rightly.

2. After Thirlby J s publication of Justin, Dr. Ashton, perhaps to show him that he had not done all which might have been done, published in one of the foreign journals some emendations of faulty passages, which when Thirlby saw he said slightly, that any man who would, might have made them, and a hundred more.

3. While he was a nominal Physician, he lived some time with the Duke of Chandos as Librarian, and is reported to have affected a perverse and insolent independence, so as capriciously to refuse his company when it was desired. It may be supposed they were soon weary of each other.

1 ' Here is a man (said Johnson) rick Johnson said, * She is rewarded

who has advanced the dignity of his for it by Garrick.' Life, iii. 293. Mrs.

profession. Garrick has made a Montagu flattered him in her foolish

player a higher character.' Life, iii. Essay on Shakespeare (ib. v. 245),

263 ; ante, ii. 241. and he in turn praised it. Ib. ii.

Of Hannah More's flattery of Gar- 88.

4. He

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