'
A casual coincidence with other writers, or an adoption of a sentiment
or image which has been found in the writings of another, and afterwards
appears in the mind as one's own, is not unfrequent. The richness of
Johnson's fancy, which could supply his page abundantly on all
occasions, and the strength of his memory, which at once detected the
real owner of any thought, made him less liable to the imputation of
plagiarism than, perhaps, any of our writers[1000]. In _The Idler_,
however, there is a paper[1001], in which conversation is assimilated to a
bowl of punch, where there is the same train of comparison as in a poem
by Blacklock, in his collection published in 1756[1002], in which a
parallel is ingeniously drawn between human life and that liquor. It
ends,--
'Say, then, physicians of each kind,
Who cure the body or the mind,
What harm in drinking can there be,
Since punch and life so well agree?'
[Page 335: Profits on The Idler. AEtat 49.]
To _The Idler_, when collected in volumes[1003], he added, beside the
'Essay on Epitaphs' and the 'Dissertation on those of Pope[1004],' an Essay
on the 'Bravery of the English common Soldiers.' He, however, omitted
one of the original papers, which in the folio copy is No. 22[1005].
'To THE REVEREND MR. THOMAS WARTON.
'DEAR SIR,
'Your notes upon my poet were very acceptable. I beg that you will be so
kind as to continue your searches.
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