[69] See post, p. 42.

[70] See ante, i. 326.

[71] This assertion concerning Johnson’s insensibility to the pathetick powers of Otway, is too round.  I once asked him, whether he did not think Otway frequently tender:  when he answered, ’Sir, he is all tenderness.’  BURNEY.  He describes Otway as ’one of the first names in the English drama.’ Works, vii. 173.

[72] See ante, April 16, 1779.

[73] Johnson; it seems, took up this study.  In July, 1773, he recorded that between Easter and Whitsuntide, he attempted to learn the Low Dutch language.  ‘My application,’ he continues, ’was very slight, and my memory very fallacious, though whether more than in my earlier years, I am not very certain.’ Pr. and Med. p. 129, and ante, ii. 263.  On his death-bed, he said to Mr. Hoole:—­’About two years since I feared that I had neglected God, and that then I had not a mind to give him; on which I set about to read Thomas a Kempis in Low Dutch, which I accomplished, and thence I judged that my mind was not impaired, Low Dutch having no affinity with any of the languages which I knew.’  Croker’s Boswell, p. 844.  See ante, iii. 235.

[74] See post, under July 5, 1783.

[75] See ante, ii. 409, and iii. 197.

[76] One of Goldsmith’s friends ’remembered his relating [about the year 1756] a strange Quixotic scheme he had in contemplation of going to decipher the inscriptions on the written mountains, though he was altogether ignorant of Arabic, or the language in which they might be supposed to be written.’  Goldsmith’s Misc.  Works, ed. 1801, i. 40.  Percy says that Goldsmith applied to the prime minister, Lord Bute, for a salary to enable him to execute ‘the visionary project’ mentioned in the text.  ’To prepare the way, he drew up that ingenious essay on this subject which was first printed in the Ledger, and afterwards in his Citizen of the World [No. 107].’ Ib. p. 65.  Percy adds that the Earl of Northumberland, who was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, regretted ’that he had not been made acquainted with his plan; for he would have procured him a sufficient salary on the Irish establishment.’  Goldsmith, in his review of Van Egmont’s Travels in Asia, says:—­’Could we see a man set out upon this journey [to Asia] not with an intent to consider rocks and rivers, but the manners, and the mechanic inventions, and the imperfect learning of the inhabitants; resolved to penetrate into countries as yet little known, and eager to pry into all their secrets, with an heart not terrified at trifling dangers; if there could be found a man who could unite this true courage with sound learning, from such a character we might hope much information.’  Goldsmith’s Works, ed. 1854, iv. 225.  Johnson would have gone to Constantinople, as he himself said, had he received his pension twenty years earlier. Post, p. 27.