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Samuel Johnson's Life of Thomas Parnell

Poems
* Hesiod: or, The Rise of Woman
* A Fairy Tale in the Ancient English Style
* The Vigil of Venus
* Homer's Battle of the Frogs and Mice

The Life of Parnell was written in 1780; in this life Johnson makes liberal use of Oliver Goldsmith's biography of Parnell.

Samuel Johnson's Life of Thomas Parnell

THE Life of Dr. PARNELL is a task which I should very willingly decline, since it has been lately written by Goldsmith, a man of such variety of powers, and such felicity of performance, that he always seemed to do the best of that which he was doing; a man who had the art of being minute without tediousness, and general without confusion; whose language was copious without exuberance, exact without constraint and easy without weakness.

What such an author has told, who would tell again? I have made an abstract from his larger narrative; and have this gratification from my attempt, that it gives me an opportinuty of paying due tribute to the memory of a departed genius.

THOMAS PARNELL was the son of a commonwealth man of the same name, who at the Restoration left Congleton in Cheshire, where the family had been established for several centuries, and setting in Ireland, purchased an estate, which, with his lands in Cheshire, descended to the poet, who was born at Dublin in 1679; and, after the usual education at a grammar school, was at the age of thirteen admitted into the College, where in the year 1700, he became master of arts; and was the same year ordained a deacon, though under the canonical age, by a dispensation from the bishop of Derry.

About three years afterwards he was made a priest; and in 1705 Dr. Ashe, the bishop of Clogher, conferred upon him the archdeaconery of Clogher. About the same time he married Mrs. Anne Minchin, an amiable lady, by whom he had two sons who died young, and a daughter who long survived him.

At the ejection of the Whigs, in the end of queen Anne's reign, Parnell was persuaded to change his party, not without much censure from those whom he forsook, and was received by the new ministery as a valuable reinforcement. When the earl of Oxford was told that Dr. Parnell waited amoung the croud in the outer room, he went, by the persuasion of Swift, with his treasurer's staff in his hand, to enquire for him, and to bid him welcome; and, as may be inferred from Pope's dedication, admitted him as a favorite companion to his convivial hours, but, as it seems often to have happened in those times to the favourites of the great, without attention to his fortune, which indeed was in no great need of improvement.

Parnell, who did not want ambition or vanity, was desirous to make himself conspicuous, and to shew how worthy he was of high preferment, as he thought himself qualified to become a popular preacher, he displayed his elocution with great success in the pulpits of London; but he Queen's death putting an end to his expectations, abated his diligence: and Pope represents him as falling from that time into intemperance of mind. That in his later life he was too much a lover of the bottle is not denied; but I have heard it imputed to a cause more likely to obtain forgiveness from mankind, the untimely death of a darling son; or, as others tell, the loss of his wife, who died (1712) in the midst of his expectations.

He was now to derive every future addition to his preferments from his personal interest with his private friends, and he was not long unregarded. He was warmly recommended by Swift to archbishop King, who gave him a prebend in 1713; and in May 1716 presented him to the vicarage of Finglass, in the diocese of Dublin, worth four hundred pounds a year. Such notice from such a man inclines me to believe that the vice of which he has been accused was not gross, or not notorious.

But his prosperity did not last long. His end, whatever was its cause, was now approaching. He enjoyed his preferment little more than a year; for in July 1717, in his thirty-eighth year, he died at Chester on his way to Ireland.

He seems to have been one of those poets who take delight in writing. He contributed to the papers of that time, and probably published more than he owned. He left many compositions behind him, of which Pope sleected those which he thought best, dedicated them to the earl of Oxford. Of these Goldsmith has given an opinion, and his criticism it is seldom safe to contradict. He bestows just praise upon The Rise of Woman, The Fairy Tale, and the Pervigilium Veneris; but has very properly remarked that in the Battle of Mice and Frogs the Greek names have not in English their original effect.

He tells us, that the Book Worm is borrowed from Beza; but he should have added ,with modern applications: and when he discovers that Gay Bacchus is translated from Augurellus, he ought to have remarked, that the latter part is purely Parnell's. Another poem, When spring comes on, is, he says taken from the French. I would add that the description of Barrenness, in his verses to Pope, was borrowed from Secundus; but lately searching for the passage, which I had formerly read, I could not find it. The Night-piece on Death is indirectly preferred by Goldsmith to Gray's Church-yard; but, in my opinion, Gray has the advantage in digniry, variety, and originality of sentiment. He observes, that the story of the Hermitis in More's Dialogues and Howell's Letters and supposes it to have been originally Arabian.

Goldsmith has not taken any notice of the Elegy to the old Beauty, which is, perhaps, the meanest; nor of the Allegory on Man, the happiest of Parnell's performances. The hint of the Hymn to Contentment I suspect to have been borrowed from Cleiveland.

The general character of Parnell is not great extent of comprehension, or fertility of mind. Of the little that appears still less is his own. His praise must be derived from the easy sweetness of his diction: in his verses there is more happiness than pains; he is sprightly without effort, and always delights, though he never ravishes; everything is proper, yet every thing seems casual. If there is some appearance of elaboration in the Hermit, the narrative, as it is less airy is less pleasing. Of his other compositions it is impossible to say whether they are the productions of Nature, so excellent as not to want the help of Art, or of Art so refined as to resemble Nature.

This criticism relates only to the pieces published by Pope. Of the large appendages which I find in the last edition, I can only say, that I know not whence they came, nor have ever inquired whither they are going. They stand upon the faith of the compilers.*

The copy text for this edition is:
Johnson, Samuel. Prefaces, Biographical and Critical to the Works of the English Poets. 10 vols. Vol ?. London: J. Nicols et al., 1779