No more of his conversation for some days appears in my journal, except that when a gentleman told him he had bought a suit of lace for his lady, he said, ‘Well, Sir, you have done a good thing and a wise thing.’  ’I have done a good thing, (said the gentleman,) but I do not know that I have done a wise thing.’  Johnson.  ’Yes, Sir; no money is better spent than what is laid out for domestick satisfaction.  A man is pleased that his wife is drest as well as other people; and a wife is pleased that she is drest.’

On Friday, April 14, being Good-Friday, I repaired to him in the morning, according to my usual custom on that day, and breakfasted with him.  I observed that he fasted so very strictly, that he did not even taste bread, and took no milk with his tea; I suppose because it is a kind of animal food.

I told him that I had been informed by Mr. Orme, that many parts of the East-Indies were better mapped than the Highlands of Scotland.  Johnson.  ‘That a country may be mapped, it must be travelled over.’  ’Nay, (said I, meaning to laugh with him at one of his prejudices,) can’t you say, it is not worth mapping?’

As we walked to St. Clement’s church, and saw several shops open upon this most solemn fast-day of the Christian world, I remarked, that one disadvantage arising from the immensity of London, was, that nobody was heeded by his neighbour; there was no fear of censure for not observing Good-Friday, as it ought to be kept, and as it is kept in country-towns.  He said, it was, upon the whole, very well observed even in London.  He, however, owned, that London was too large; but added, ’It is nonsense to say the head is too big for the body.  It would be as much too big, though the body were ever so large; that is to say, though the country were ever so extensive.  It has no similarity to a head connected with a body.’

Dr. Wetherell, Master of University College, Oxford, accompanied us home from church; and after he was gone, there came two other gentlemen, one of whom uttered the commonplace complaints, that by the increase of taxes, labour would be dear, other nations would undersell us, and our commerce would be ruined.  Johnson. (smiling,) ’Never fear, Sir.  Our commerce is in a very good state; and suppose we had no commerce at all, we could live very well on the produce of our own country.’  I cannot omit to mention, that I never knew any man who was less disposed to be querulous than Johnson.  Whether the subject was his own situation, or the state of the publick, or the state of human nature in general, though he saw the evils, his mind was turned to resolution, and never to whining or complaint.

We went again to St. Clement’s in the afternoon.  He had found fault with the preacher in the morning for not choosing a text adapted to the day.  The preacher in the afternoon had chosen one extremely proper:  ’It is finished.’