arrear which had run on for two years. On this occasion he mentioned a
circumstance as characteristick of the Scotch. One of that nation, (said
he,) who had been a candidate, against whom I had voted, came up to me
with a civil salutation. Now, Sir, this is their way. An Englishman
would have stomached it, and been sulky, and never have taken further
notice of you; but a Scotchman, Sir, though you vote nineteen times
against him, will accost you with equal complaisance after each time,
and the twentieth time, Sir, he will get your vote.'

'Talking on the subject of toleration, one day when some friends were
with him in his study, he made his usual remark, that the State has a
right to regulate the religion of the people, who are the children of
the State[39]. A clergyman having readily acquiesced in this, Johnson,
who loved discussion, observed, "But, Sir, you must go round to other
States than our own. You do not know what a Bramin has to say for
himself[40]. In short, Sir, I have got no further than this: Every man
has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a
right to knock him down for it. Martyrdom is the test[41]."'

'A man, he observed, should begin to write soon; for, if he waits till
his judgement is matured, his inability, through want of practice to
express his conceptions, will make the disproportion so great between
what he sees, and what he can attain, that he will probably be
discouraged from writing at all[42]. As a proof of the justness of this
remark, we may instance what is related of the great Lord Granville[43];
that after he had written his letter, giving an account of the battle of
Dettingen, he said, "Here is a letter, expressed in terms not good
enough for a tallow-chandler to have used.'"

'Talking of a Court-martial that was sitting upon a very momentous