He is a brave man. Would not a
gentleman be disgraced by having his wife singing publickly for hire?
No, Sir, there can be no doubt here. I know not if I should not PREPARE
myself for a publick singer, as readily as let my wife be one.'
* Probably Richard Brinsley Sheridan, whose romantic
marriage with the beautiful Elizabeth Linley took place in
1773. He became a member of the Club on Johnson's proposal.
See below, p. 325.--ED.
Johnson arraigned the modern politicks of this country, as entirely
devoid of all principle of whatever kind. 'Politicks (said he,) are now
nothing more than means of rising in the world. With this sole view do
men engage in politicks, and their whole conduct proceeds upon it.'
Somebody found fault with writing verses in a dead language, maintaining
that they were merely arrangements of so many words, and laughed at the
Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, for sending forth collections of
them not only in Greek and Latin, but even in Syriac, Arabick, and
other more unknown tongues.
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