In 1764 he issued his edition of Shakspeare, in eight octavo volumes, of
which the best that can be said is, that it is not valuable as a
commentary. A commentator must have something in common with his author;
there was nothing congenial between Shakspeare and Johnson.
It was in 1773, that, urged by Boswell, he made his famous _Journey to the
Hebrides_, or Western Islands of Scotland, of which he gave delightful
descriptions in a series of letters to his friend Mrs. Thrale, which he
afterwards wrote out in more pompous style for publication. The letters
are current, witty, and simple; the published work is stilted and
grandiloquent.
It is well known that he had no sympathy with the American colonies in
their struggle against British oppression. When, in 1775, the Congress
published their _Resolutions_ and _Address_, he answered them in a
prejudiced and illogical paper entitled _Taxation no Tyranny_.
Notwithstanding its want of argument, it had the weight of his name and of
a large party; but history has construed it by the _animus_ of the writer,
who had not long before declared of the colonists that they were "a race
of convicts, and ought to be thankful for anything we allow them short of
hanging.
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