The Complete Poems of Samuel Johnson

Contents

A Note from the General Editors

Preface

Abbreviations

Chronology

Johnson’s Poems

1. On a Daffodill

2. Translation of Horace, Odes, 1.22

3. Epilogue to The Distrest Mother

4. Translation from Virgil, Eclogues, 1

5. Translation from Virgil, Eclogues, 5

6. Translation of Horace, Odes, 2.9

7. Translation of Horace, Odes, 2.14

8. Translation of Horace, Odes, 2.20

9. Translation of Horace, Epodes, 2

10. Translation of Horace, Epodes, 11

11. Translation from Homer, Iliad, Book 6

12. Translation of Addison's 'Battle of the Pygmies and Cranes'

13. Festina Lente

14. Upon the Feast of St. Simon and St. Jude

15. To a Young Lady on her Birthday

16. A School or College Exercise

17. Aurora est Musis Amica

18. Mea Nec Falernae, &c

19. A Translation of Dryden’s Epigram on Milton

20. Translation of Pope's ‘Messiah’

21. The Young Author

22. To Laura

23. To Miss Hickman Playing on the Spinet

24. Ode on a Lady Leaving her Place of Abode

25. On Colley Cibber

26. On a Lady's Presenting a Sprig of Myrtle to a Gentleman

27. Ode on Friendship

28. To a Lady Who Spoke in Defence of Liberty

29. To Sylvanus Urban

30. To Richard Savage

31. On a Riddle by Eliza

32. To Elizabeth Carter

33. London

34. To Eliza Plucking Laurels in Pope's Garden

35. To Lady Firebrace

36. On Thomas Birch

37. To Posterity

38. Prologue to Garrick’s Lethe

39. Epitaph on Claudy Phillips, a Musician

40. Translation of a Welsh Epitaph on Prince Madoc

41. Translations of Two Greek Epigrams

42. Translation of Pope's Verses on His Grotto

43. Prologue Spoken at the Opening of the Theatre in Drury-Lane

44. The Vanity of Human Wishes

45. A New Prologue to ‘Comus’

46. Translations of Mottoes and Quotations in The Rambler

47. The Ant

48. Translations of Mottoes and Quotations in The Adventurer

49. Translation of Verses from Crashaw

50. Risposta del Johnson

51. On Lord Anson

52. Translations from Boethius

53. Prologue to The Good Natur'd Man

54. Translation of ‘Busy, curious, thirsty fly’

55. In Theatro

56. Parodies of The Hermit of Warkworth

57. Epitaph on Hogarth

58. Translation of Psalm 117

59. Motto for a Goat

60. Γνῶθι σεαυτόν (Gnothi seauton [Know Thyself])

61. Verses addressed to Dr. Lawrence

62. On Recovering the Use of His Eyes

63. Ode on the Isle of Skye

64. Ode Addressed to Mrs. Thrale

65. Verses upon Inchkenneth

66. Tetrastick on Goldsmith

67. On the Duke of Marlborough

68. Translation of lines in Baretti’s Easy Phraseology

69. French Distichs

70. Translation of Verses from a French Pantomime

71. Translation of an Epigram on a Dog

72. Translations from Metastasio

73. Translation of a Distich on the Duke of Modena

74. Charade!

75. Translation of a Song in Walton's Compleat Angler

76. On Chronology

77. To Mrs. Thrale, on Her Completing Her Thirty-Fifth Year

78. Translation of the beginning of ‘Rio Verde’

79. Lines Written in Ridicule of Thomas Warton’s Poems

80. Prologue to A Word to the Wise

81. Parody of Thomas Warton

82. Burlesque of Lines by Lope de Vega

83. Translation of Lines by Brockes

84. Translation of Anacreon's ‘Dove’

85. To Dr. Lawrence

86. Epilogue to　Baretti’s　Carmen Seculare of Horace

87. An Extempore Elegy

88. On Seeing a Portrait of Mrs. Montagu

89. Translations from Euripides’s Medea

90. Prayer on Christmas Day

91. On Hearing Miss Thrale Deliberate about Her Hat

92. A Short Song of Congratulation

93. Translation of Robin of Doncaster’s Epitaph

94. Translation of William Walsh’s Epigram on Chloe

95. On Mrs. Thrale

96. A Summons to Dr. Lawrence

97. An Imitation of Pope

98. Translation of the Collect for Ash Wednesday

99. Jejunium et Cibus

100. On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet

101. Anapaestics Addressed to Dr. Lawrence

102. Translations of French Verses on Skating

103. Christ to the Sinner

104. On Hope

105. Prayer on Losing the Power of Speech

106. Christianus Perfectus

107. Prayers

108. Translations from the Greek Anthology

109. A Meditation (27 February 1784)

110. The Seven Ages of the World

111. A Meditation (8 August 1784)

112. On the Stream at Stowe Mill, Lichfield

113. Jactura Temporis

114. Loading a Ship

115. The Speed of Sound

116. Geographia Metrica

117. Translation of Horace, Odes, 4.7

118. Prayer (5 December 1784)

119. Irene

Johnson’s Contributions to Poems by Others

120. Epitaph on a Duck

121. Revision of Geoffrey Walmesley’s Latin Translation of John Byrom’s ‘Colin and Phebe’

122. Revision of Samuel Madden, Boulter’s Monument

123. Translation of the Epitaph for Thomas Hanmer

124. To Miss ——— on Her Gift of a Net-Work Purse

125. To Miss ——— on her Playing upon the Harpsicord

126. Stella in Mourning

127. The Winter's Walk

128. An Ode

129. To Lyce

130. On the Death of Stephen Gray

131. The Excursion

132. Reflections on a Grave Digging in Westminster Abbey

133. Verses Addressed to Samuel Richardson

134. The Traveller, or a Prospect of Society

135. The Deserted Village

136. Sir Eldred of the Bower

137. Verses by Frances Reynolds

138. Lines in Hawkesworth’s Lost Tragedy

139. The Village

Poems of Doubtful Authorship

140. Venus in Armor

141. Translation from the Song of Solomon

142. The Logical Warehouse

143. A Song

144. An Evening Ode

145. The Vanity of Wealth

146. The Happy Life

147. Epigram on Sir Thomas More, Erasmus, and Micyllus

148. A Song for Fanny Burney

149. Translation of Epigram 25 of Callimachus

Poems Wrongly Attributed to Johnson

150. A Hinted Wish

151. Ad Ornatissimam Puellam

152. Autumn. An Ode

153. City of God

154. Epilogue Spoken at Drury Lane

155. Corrections in an Ode by Cibber

156. Epitaph on Mrs. Jane Wright

157. Epitaph on Richard Children

158. Epitaph on Savage

159. In Locupletissimum ornatissimumque Syl. Urb. Thesaurum

160. Inscription on Dr. Taylor's House at Ashbourne

161. Mrs. Piozzi's Brynbella Marriage

162. Ode to Mrs. Thrale (i)

163. Ode to Mrs Thrale (ii)

164. Ode by Dr. Samuel Johnson to Mrs. Thrale, upon their supposed approaching Nuptials

165. Lines on An Hour-Glass

166. On Lord Lovat's Execution

167. On the Gin-Act

168. Οὐκ ἔστι Διὸς κλέψαι νόον

169. Quotation of Lucan in Rambler 168

170. Song

171. The Eagle and Robin Red-Breast

172. The Midsummer Wish

173. The Patriot

174. The Three Warnings

175. Threnodia

176. To A Bush Fighter

177. To a Young Lady Embroidering

178. To Delia

179. To Doctor Goldsmith, On the Success of His Comedy, Called The Mistakes of a Night.

180. To Mr. Urban, on His Compleating the XVIIIth Volume of the Gentleman's Magazine

181. To Myrtilis. The New Year's Offring.

182. Translation of an Inscription on Selden’s Birthplace

183. Translation of Latin Verses by Bubb Dodington

184. Translation of Lord Hervey’s Latin Epitaph on Queen Caroline (1737) by Henry Hervey Aston.

185. Verses in the Idler

186. Verses on A Cottage In Wales

187. Verses on Love

188. Verses on The Approach Of Winter

189. Verses to Goldsmith

190. Verses Written in a Copy of Murphy's Life of Garrick

191. Verses Wrote on a Window of an Inn at Calais

192. Winter. An Ode

193. Vile Stanhope

Lost or Unidentified Poems by Johnson

194. Somnium

195. The Glow Worm

196. Untraced Manuscripts

197. Verses in Dodsley's Collection

198. Verses on TorrŽ's Fireworks

199. Verses to Olivia Lloyd

Appendix: The Order of Johnson's Translations from the Greek Anthology

Works Cited

Index of Titles

Index of First Lines

General Index

Biography

Robert D. Brown is Professor Emeritus of Greek and Roman Studies at Vassar College. His publications include Lucretius on Love and Sex: A Commentary on De Rerum Natura IV, 1030–1287, with Prolegomena, Text and Translation (Brill, 1987), Classical Literature and Its Reception: An Anthology (with Robert DeMaria, Jr.; Wiley-Blackwell, 2006) and Europe, c.1400–1458 by Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini (with Nancy Bisaha; The Catholic University of America Press, 2013).

Robert DeMaria, Jr. is the Henry Noble MacCracken Professor of English Literature at Vassar College. He is the author of three monographs on Samuel Johnson: Johnson's Dictionary and the Language of Learning (Oxford, 1986); The Life of Samuel Johnson: A Critical Biography (Blackwell, 1993) and Samuel Johnson and the Life of Reading (Johns Hopkins, 1997). He is the general editor of the Yale Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson; the co-editor of three volumes in that edition; and the editor of the Johnsonian News Letter.

‘The editors of the book are eminently qualified to carry out the task of curating Johnson’s poems. . . . This edition is special because it gives equal attention to Johnson’s English and his Latin and Greek poems, something never done before. . . . This impressive edition will long be definitive.’

David Venturo - Johnsonian News Letter, Volume LXXVI, No.1, March 2025