Soon after his death, while the public curiosity was strongly excited about his extraordinary character and his not less extraor dinary adventures, a life of him appeared widely different from the catchpenny lives of eminent men which were then a staple article of manufacture in Grub Street. The style was indeed deficient in ease and variety; and the writer was evidently too partial to the Latin element of our language. But the little work, with all its faults, was a masterpiece. No finer specimen of literary biography existed in any language, living or dead; and a discerning critic might have confidently predicted that the author was destined to be the founder of a new school of English eloquence.
The Life of Savage was anonymous ; but it was well known in literary circles that Johnson was the writer. During the three years which followed, he produced no important work; but he was not, and indeed could not be, idle. The fame of his abilities and learning continued to grow. Warburton pronounced him a man of parts and genius; and the praise of Warburton was then no light thing. Such was Johnson's reputition that, in 1747, several emi nent booksellers combined to employ him in the arduous work of preparing a Dictionary of the English Language, in two folio vol umes. The sum which they agreed to pay him was only fifteen hundred guineas ; and out of this sum he had to pay several poor men of letters who assisted him in the humbler parts of his task.
The prospectus of the Dictionary he addressed to the earl of Chesterfield. Chesterfield had long been celebrated for the polite ness of his manners, the brilliancy of his wit and the delicacy of his taste. He was acknowledged to be the finest speaker in the House of Lords. He had recently governed Ireland, at a mo mentous conjuncture, with eminent firmness, wisdom and hu manity ; and he had since become secretary of state. He received Johnson's homage with the most winning affability, and requited it with a few guineas, bestowed doubtless in a very graceful man ner, but was by no means desirous to see all his carpets blackened with the London mud, and his soups and wines thrown to right and left over the gowns of fine ladies and the waistcoats of fine gentlemen, by an absent-minded scholar, who gave strange starts and uttered strange growls, who dressed like a scarecrow and ate like a cormorant. During some time Johnson continued to call on his patron, but, after being repeatedly told by the porter that his lordship was not at home, took the hint and ceased to present himself at the inhospitable door.
Johnson had flattered himself that he should have completed his Dictionary by the end of 175o; but it was not till 1755 that he at length gave his huge volumes to the world. During the seven years which he passed in the drudgery of penning definitions and mark ing quotations for transcription, he sought for relaxation in lit erary labour of a more agreeable kind. In January 1749 he pub lished The Vanity of Human Wishes, an excellent imitation of the tenth satire of Juvenal, for which he received fifteen guineas.
A few days after the publication of this poem, his tragedy of Irene, begun many years before, was brought on the stage by his old pupil, David Garrick, now manager of Drury Lane Theatre. The relation between him and his old preceptor was of a very sin gular kind. They repelled each other strongly, and yet attracted each other strongly. Nature had made them of very different clay; and circumstances had fully brought out the natural peculiarities of both. Sudden prosperity had turned Garrick's head. Continued adversity had soured Johnson's temper. Johnson saw with more envy than became so great a man the villa, the plate, the china, the Brussels carpet, which the little mimic had got by repeating, with grimaces and gesticulations, what wiser men had written ; and the exquisitely sensitive vanity of Garrick was galled by the thought that, while all the rest of the world was applauding him, he could obtain from one morose cynic, whose opinion it was impossible to despise, scarcely any compliment not acidulated with scorn. Yet the two Lichfield men had so many early recollections in common, and sympathized with each other on so many points on which they sympathized with nobody else in the vast population of the capital, that, though the master was often provoked by the monkey-like impertinence of the pupil, and the pupil by the bearish rudeness of the master, they remained friends till they were parted by death. Garrick now brought Irene out, with alterations sufficient to dis please the author, yet not sufficient to make the piece pleasing to the audience. After nine representations the play was withdrawn. The poet however cleared by his benefit nights, and by the sale of the copyright of his tragedy, about three hundred pounds, then a great sum in his estimation.