ESC: English Studies in Canada

A U C T O R E T A U C T O R I T A S : D R . J O H N S O N ’ S V I E W S O N T H E A U T H O R I T Y O F A U T H O R S H I P JA M E S GRAY Dalhousie University I N.one in the history of literature can lay greater claim to being an authority than Samuel Johnson. Yet his own self-estimate was such that he would have spurned and perhaps even derided such an ascription; for, as I hope to show in this paper, he regarded no author as an authority,1 except in a few rather restricted senses. Let me begin by quoting some of his own definitions of the terms author and authority, both of which he traced to their Latin roots auctor and auctoritas. An author he defines in the Dictionary initially as “the first beginner or mover of any thing” or “he to whom any thing owes its original” ; secondly, as “the efficient; he that effects or produces any thing” ; thirdly, as “ the first writer of any thing” ; distinct from the translator or compiler; and, finally, as “a writer in general.” For authority he provides six definitions: (i) legal power; (2) influence, or credit; (3) power or rule; (4) support, justification, or countenance; (5) testimony; and (6) weight of testimony, or credibility. These are all from the first edition of the Dictionary. In the fourth edition, he adds “cogency of evidence,” which is close in meaning to (5) and (6). The fifth meaning, “testimony,” he illustrates with the sentence, “We urge authorities in things that need not, and introduce the testimony of ancient writers, to confirm things evidently believed.” In his Preface to the Dictionary, Johnson gives the term authorities the related sense of “quoted examples from writers who use a particular word with clarity and cogency,” but this more specialized use is not defined in the Dictionary itself. For the purpose of this paper, I shall concentrate on the third and fourth meanings ascribed to the word author (“ the first writer of any thing” and “a writer in general” ) and on a combination of his definitions of authority (power, influence, weight of testimony, and credibility), while taking the liberty of attaching to them yet another, and this time a scriptural sense of authority as “ a convincing efficacy or power” as exemplified in Matthew E n g l is h S t u d ie s in C a n a d a , x ii, 3, September 1986 7-2g : “For he [Jesus] taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.” My intention is to explore Johnson’s ideas on the extent of authorial authority, which I shall refer to, simply, as “A.A.,” without, I hope, invok­ ing any of the modern therapeutic or automotive connotations of that abbreviation. II Two surprising facts come to light at the outset. First, Johnson uses the word authority quite sparingly in his writings. It appears only once in his poetry,2 and, apart from its use in the restricted sense of “quoted authorities” in the Dictionary context, infrequently in his prose. The second surprise is that he does not equate authority with precise knowledge or correctness, or even with special expertise. Instead, he identifies it with the personal quality and reputation of the author, whether that author is right or wrong.3 For ex­ ample, in his Life of Dryden, he plainly establishes this point in a comparison between Dryden and Rymer as critics: The different manner and effect with which critical knowledge may be conveyed was perhaps never more clearly exemplified than in the performances of Rymer and Dryden. It was said of a dispute between two mathematicians, “malim cum Scaligero errare, quam cum Clavio recte sapere;” that “ it was more eligible to go wrong with one, than right with the other.” A tendency of the same kind every mind must feel at the perusal of Dryden’s prefaces and Rymer’s discourses. With Dryden we are wandering in quest of truth; whom we find...