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Updated: May 9, 2025
Concerning the gulfe of Merosro and Canada, and new France which are in my mappes, they were taken out of a certaine sea card drawn by a certaine priest out of the description of a Frenchman, a Pilot very skilfull in those partes, and presented to the worthy Prince George of Austria, bishop of Liege: for the trending of the coast, and the eleuation of the pole, I doubt not but they are very neere the trueth: For the Charte had beside a scale of degrees of latitude passing through the middest of it, another particularly annexed to the coast of New France, wherewith the errour of the latitudes committed by reason of the variation of the compasse might be corrected.
For as there were Plants of Corn and Wine in small quantity dispersed in the Fields and Woods, before men knew their vertue, or made use of them for their nourishment, or planted them apart in Fields, and Vineyards; in which time they fed on Akorns, and drank Water: so also there have been divers true, generall, and profitable Speculations from the beginning; as being the naturall plants of humane Reason: But they were at first but few in number; men lived upon grosse Experience; there was no Method; that is to say, no Sowing, nor Planting of Knowledge by it self, apart from the Weeds, and common Plants of Errour and Conjecture: And the cause of it being the want of leasure from procuring the necessities of life, and defending themselves against their neighbours, it was impossible, till the erecting of great Common-wealths, it should be otherwise.
Johnson had accustomed himself to use the word lie , to express a mistake or an errour in relation; in short, when the thing was not so as told, though the relator did not mean to deceive. When he thought there was intentional falsehood in the relator, his expression was, 'He lies, and he knows he lies.
Thus the human mind is kept in motion without progress. Thus sometimes truth and errour, and sometimes contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal invasion.
Mr. FOX then rose, and spoke to the following purport: Sir, though the observations of the right honourable gentleman must be allowed to be ingenious, and though the eloquence with which he has delivered them, naturally excites attention and regard, yet I am obliged to declare, that I have received rather pleasure than conviction from his oratory; and that while I applaud his imagination and his diction, I cannot but conclude, that they have been employed in bestowing ornaments upon errour.
GYBBON answered: Sir, I am far from thinking a proposition sufficiently defended by an assertion that it was admitted by our predecessors; for though I have no inclination to vilify their memory, I may without scruple affirm, that they had no pretensions to infallibility, and that there are in many of our statutes instances of such ignorance, credulity, weakness, and errour, as cannot be considered without astonishment.
The errour into which I was betrayed, when custom first gave me up to my own direction, is very frequently incident to the quick, the sprightly, the fearless, and the gay; to all whose ardour hurries them into precipitate execution of their designs, and imprudent declaration of their opinions; who seldom count the cost of pleasure, or examine the distant consequences of any practice that flatters them with immediate gratification.
I asked him whether he did never desire an account of the number of supernumeraries, as I have done several ways, without which we shall be in great errour about the victuals; he says he has done it again and again, and if any mistake should happen they must thanke themselves.
These, my lords, are no doubtful facts, or conjectural calculations, they are confirmed by the most incontestable evidence, and established by all the demonstration of arithmetick; and therefore your lordships are in no danger of errour from either ignorance or uncertainty, but must determine, if you approve this bill, in opposition to all the powers of conviction, and must set aside testimony and reason at the same time.
Exulting in his intellectual strength and dexterity, he could, when he pleased, be the greatest sophist that ever contended in the lists of declamation; and, from a spirit of contradiction and a delight in shewing his powers, he would often maintain the wrong side with equal warmth and ingenuity; so that, when there was an audience, his real opinions could seldom be gathered from his talk ; though when he was in company with a single friend, he would discuss a subject with genuine fairness: but he was too conscientious to make errour permanent and pernicious, by deliberately writing it; and, in all his numerous works, he earnestly inculcated what appeared to him to be the truth; his piety being constant, and the ruling principle of all his conduct .
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