id,comments,provenance,dictionary,created_at,reviewed_on,work_id,theme,context,updated_at,metaphor,text
19982,"",Reading,"",2013-03-21 05:22:11 UTC,,5767,"",Aetat 69,2013-03-21 05:22:11 UTC,"""I have a wonderful superstitious love of mystery; when, perhaps, the truth is, that it is owing to the cloudy darkness of my own mind.""","In my interview with Dr. Johnson this evening, I was quite easy, quite as his companion; upon which I find in my Journal the following reflection: ""So ready is my mind to suggest matter for dissatisfaction, that I felt a sort of regret that I was so easy. I missed that aweful reverence with which I used to contemplate Mr. Samuel Johnson, in the complex magnitude of his literary, moral, and religious character. I have a wonderful superstitious love of mystery; when, perhaps, the truth is, that it is owing to the cloudy darkness of my own mind. I should be glad that I am more advanced in my progress of being, so that I can view Dr. Johnson with a steadier and clearer eye. My dissatisfaction to-night was foolish. Would it not be foolish to regret that we shall have less mystery in a future state? That we 'now see in a glass darkly,' but shall 'then see face to face ?""--This reflection, which I thus freely communicate, will be valued by the thinking part of my readers, who may have themselves experienced similar states of mind.
(vol. II, p. 187; Penguin, 645)"
21140,"",C-H Lion,"",2013-06-26 18:40:33 UTC,,5657,"","",2013-06-26 18:40:43 UTC,"""I was delighted with this flash bursting from the cloud which hung upon his mind, closed my letter directly, and joined the company.""","Professors Reid and Anderson, and the two Messieurs Foulis, the Elzevirs of Glasgow, dined and drank tea with us at our inn, after which the professors went away; and I, having a letter to write, left my fellow-traveller with Messieurs Foulis. Though good and ingenious men, they had that unsettled speculative mode of conversation which is offensive to a man regularly taught at an English school and university. I found that, instead of listening to the dictates of the Sage, they had teazed him with questions and doubtful disputations. He came in a flutter to me, and desired I might come back again, for he could not bear these men. 'O ho! sir,' said I, 'you are flying to me for refuge!' He never, in any situation, was at a loss for a ready repartee. He answered, with quick vivacity, 'It is of two evils choosing the least.' I was delighted with this flash bursting from the cloud which hung upon his mind, closed my letter directly, and joined the company.
(p. 390)"
21149,"",C-H Lion,"",2013-06-26 18:50:06 UTC,,5657,"","",2013-06-26 18:50:06 UTC,"""Transient clouds darkened my imagination, and in those clouds I saw events from which I shrunk; but a sentence or two of the Rambler's conversation gave me firmness, and I considered that I was upon an expedition for which I had wished for years, and the recollection of which would be a treasure to me for life.""","Not finding a letter here that I expected, I felt a momentary impatience to be at home. Transient clouds darkened my imagination, and in those clouds I saw events from which I shrunk; but a sentence or two of the Rambler's conversation gave me firmness, and I considered that I was upon an expedition for which I had wished for years, and the recollection of which would be a treasure to me for life.
(p. 228)"
21551,"",Reading,"",2013-07-09 03:33:55 UTC,,7516,"","",2013-07-09 03:33:55 UTC,"""I asked him, if he could give me any notion of the situation of our ideas which we have totally forgotten at the time, yet shall afterwards recollect. He paused, meditated a little, and acknowledged his ignorance in the spirit of a philosophical poet, by repeating as a very happy allusion a passage from Thomson's Seasons--Aye, said he, 'Where sleep the winds when it is calm?'""","But still we art left quite in the dark as to the essential nature of the faculty of Memory, and the manner in which its operations are performed. When we talk of a storehouse of our ideas, we are only forming an imagination of something similar to an enclosed portion of space in which material objects are reposited. But who ever actually saw this storehouse, or can have any clear perception of it when he endeavours by thinking closely to get a distinct view, of it? It is ""the fabrick of a vision,"" and every candid man who has fairly tried to get at it will confess that he can have no confidence that it exists. I had the honour to have a conversation with Voltaire on this subject. I asked him, if he could give me any notion of the situation of our ideas which we have totally forgotten at the time, yet shall afterwards recollect. He paused, meditated a little, and acknowledged his ignorance in the spirit of a philosophical poet, by repeating as a very happy allusion a passage from Thomson's Seasons--Aye, said he, ""Where sleep the winds when it is calm?""
(pp. 156-7 in London Magazine)"
21557,"",Reading,Animals,2013-07-09 03:42:33 UTC,,7516,"","",2013-07-09 15:01:32 UTC,"""Or it may be thus: his ideas hide themselves like birds in gloomy weather; but in warm sunshine they spring forth gay and airy.""","Many of the phoenomena of Memory and circumstances attending it, while they puzzle a keen inquirer, are exceedingly amusing to a moderate observer. If there be no substance in the mind on which impressions are made, how is it that by reiterated repetition we produce this effect, that ideas and words which we are conscious were not in our minds before are now in it, and though forgotten or unobserved for a time, appear again in it? How is it that according to the common very expressive phrase, we get compositions by heart? If impressions are made upon some substance in the mind, may not forgetfulness of them be only that the perceptive faculty of the soul is turned to other objects, while these still remain ready to be perceived whenever the ""mind's eye,"" glances upon them? An Hypochondriack is subject to forgetfulness, which may be owing to another cause; that there is a darkness in his mind, or that its perceptive eye is injured and weak at times. Or it may be thus: his ideas hide themselves like birds in gloomy weather; but in warm sunshine they spring forth gay and airy. It is plain they cannot rise if they are not there. Let an Hypochondriack then have his park well stocked. Let him get as many agreeable ideas into his mind as he can; and though there may in wintery days seem: a total vacancy, yet when summer glows benignant, and the time of singing of birds is come, he will be delighted with gay colours and enchanting notes.
(p. 158 in London Magazine)"
21558,"",Reading,Animals,2013-07-09 03:44:12 UTC,,7516,"","",2013-07-09 03:44:12 UTC,"""Let an Hypochondriack then have his park well stocked. Let him get as many agreeable ideas into his mind as he can; and though there may in wintery days seem: a total vacancy, yet when summer glows benignant, and the time of singing of birds is come, he will be delighted with gay colours and enchanting notes.""","Many of the phoenomena of Memory and circumstances attending it, while they puzzle a keen inquirer, are exceedingly amusing to a moderate observer. If there be no substance in the mind on which impressions are made, how is it that by reiterated repetition we produce this effect, that ideas and words which we are conscious were not in our minds before are now in it, and though forgotten or unobserved for a time, appear again in it? How is it that according to the common very expressive phrase, we get compositions by heart? If impressions are made upon some substance in the mind, may not forgetfulness of them be only that the perceptive faculty of the soul is turned to other objects, while these still remain ready to be perceived whenever the ""mind's eye,"" glances upon them? An Hypochondriack is subject to forgetfulness, which may be owing to another cause; that there is a darkness in his mind, or that its perceptive eye is injured and weak at times. Or it may be thus: his ideas hide themselves like birds in gloomy weather; but in warm sunshine they spring forth gay and airy. It is plain they cannot rise if they are not there. Let an Hypochondriack then have his park well stocked. Let him get as many agreeable ideas into his mind as he can; and though there may in wintery days seem: a total vacancy, yet when summer glows benignant, and the time of singing of birds is come, he will be delighted with gay colours and enchanting notes.
(p. 158 in London Magazine)"
23823,"",Reading,"",2014-04-29 02:52:21 UTC,,5767,"","",2014-04-29 02:52:21 UTC,"""I said to him, I was sure that human life was not machinery, that is to say, a chain of fatality planned and directed by the Supreme Being, as it had in it so much wickedness and misery, so many instances of both, as that by which my mind was now clouded.""","On Wednesday, June 23, I visited him in the forenoon, after having been present at the shocking sight of fifteen men executed before Newgate. I said to him, I was sure that human life was not machinery, that is to say, a chain of fatality planned and directed by the Supreme Being, as it had in it so much wickedness and misery, so many instances of both, as that by which my mind was now clouded. Were it machinery it would be better than it is in these respects, though less noble, as not being a system of moral government. He agreed with me now, as he always did, upon the great question of the liberty of the human will, which has been in all ages perplexed with so much sophistry. But, Sir, as to the doctrine of Necessity, no man believes it. If a man should give me arguments that I do not see, though I could not answer them, should I believe that I do not see?"" It will be observed, that Johnson at all times made the just distinction between doctrines contrary to reason, and doctrines above reason.
(I, p. 522; cf. p. 945 in Penguin)"
24877,"","Reading William C. Dowling, Language and Logos in Boswell's 'Life of Johnson' (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1981), 50. See also Felicity Nussbaum, ""Boswell's Treatment of Johnson's Temper: 'A Warm West-Indian Climate,'"" Studies in English Literature (Summer 1974): 421-433, 432-3.
","",2016-03-14 01:58:16 UTC,,5767,"","",2016-03-14 02:21:28 UTC,"""I compared him at this time to a warm West-Indian climate, where you have a bright sun, quick vegetation, luxuriant foliage, luscious fruits; but where the same heat sometimes produces thunder, lightening, and earthquakes in a terrible degree.","He then rose again into passion, and attacked the young proselyte in the severest terms of reproach, so that both the ladies seemed to be much shocked.
We remained together till it was pretty late. Notwithstanding occasional explosions of violence, we were all delighted upon the whole with Johnson. I compared him at this time to a warm West-Indian climate, where you have a bright sun, quick vegetation, luxuriant foliage, luscious fruits; but where the same heat sometimes produces thunder, lightening, and earthquakes in a terrible degree.
(II, p. 232)"