inspired hope and patience under them. The support which she administered was of such a sort as might have been expected from an angel; while I, when my turn came, was too much overwhelmed with the affliction of a weak mortal. My loss comprehends every thing that was most valuable to me upon earth. I have lost the manager, whose vigilant attention to my worldly affairs, and exact method in ordering my family, preserved my mind at liberty to pursue my studies without loss of time or distraction of thought. I have lost my almoner, who knew and understood the wants of the poor better than I did; and was always ready to supply them to the best of our ability. I have lost my counsellor, who generally knew what was best to be done in difficult cases, and to whom I always found it of some advantage to submit my compositions; and whose mind being little disturbed with passions, was always inclined to peaceable and Christian measures. I have lost my example, who always observed a strict method of daily devotion, from which nothing could divert her, and whose patience under every kind of trial seemed invincible. She was blessed with the rare gift of an equal, cheerful temper, and preserved it under a long course of ill-health, I may say, for forty years. To have reached her age would to her have been impossible, without that quiet, humble spirit which never admitted of murmuring or complaining, either in herself or others; and patient, quiet sufferers were the favourite objects of her private charities. It might be of use to some good people, to know that she formed her mind after the rules of the excellent Bishop Taylor, in his Holy Living and Dying-an author of whom she was a great admirer, in company with her dear friend Bishop Horne. I have lost my companion, whose conversation was sufficient of itself if the world was absent to the sur

prise of some of my neighbours, who remarked how much of our time we spent in solitude, and wondered what we could find to converse about. But her mind was so well furnished, and her objects so well selected, that there were few great subjects in which we had not a common interest. I have lost my best friend, who, regardless of herself, studied my ease and advantage in every thing. These things may be small to others, but they are great to me; and though they are gone as a vision in the night, the memory of them will always be upon my mind during the remainder of my journey, which I must now travel alone. Nevertheless, if the word of God be my companion, and his Holy Spirit my guide, I need not be solitary till I shall once more join my departed saint, never more to be separated; which God grant in his good time, according to his word and promise in our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

From your faithful and afflicted

W. J.

60. Dr. Johnson to Mr. James Elphinston.

DEAR SIR,-You have, as I find by every kind of evidence, lost an excellent mother; and I hope you will not think me incapable of partaking of your grief. I have a mother, now eighty-two years of age, whom, therefore, I must soon lose, unless it please God that she rather should mourn for me.

I read the letters in which you relate your mother's death to Mrs. Strahan, and I think I do myself honour, when I tell you that I read them with tears; but tears are neither to you nor to me of any farther use when once the tribute of nature has been paid. The business of life summons us away from useless

grief, and calls us to the exercise of those virtues of which we are lamenting our deprivation.

The greatest benefit which one friend can confer upon another, is to guard, and excite, and elevate his virtues. This your mother will still perform, if you diligently preserve the memory of her life and of her death: a life, so far as I can learn, useful, wise, and innocent; and a death, resigned, peaceful, and holy. I cannot forbear to mention, that neither reason nor revelation denies you to hope that you may increase your happiness by obeying her precepts; and that she may in her present state look with pleasure upon every act of virtue to which her instructions or example have contributed. Whether this be more than a pleasing dream, or a just opinion of separate spirits, is, indeed, of no great importance to us, when we consider ourselves as acting under the eye of God: yet surely there is something pleasing in the belief, that our separation from those whom we love is merely corporeal; and it may be a great incitement to virtuous friendship, if it can be made probable that that union which has received the Divine approbation shall continue to eternity. There is one expedient by which you may in some degree continue her presence. If you write down minutely what you remember of her from your earliest years, you will read it with great pleasure, and receive from it many hints of soothing recollection, when time shall remove her yet farther from you, and your grief shall be matured to veneration. To this, however painful for the present, I cannot but advise you, as to a course of comfort and satisfaction in the time to come; for all comfort and all satisfaction is sincerely wished you by,

'Dear Sir, your most obliged, most obedient,

And most humble servant,

SAM. JOHNSON.

61. Bishop Patrick to Mrs. Gauden.

Covent Garden, Aug. 9, 1665.

MY DEAR FRIEND, I was loath to tell you in my last (which I wrote on Monday) how solicitous I was for you, lest it should affect you too much, and make your own fears grow greater than they were; but though I perceive it was not without cause that I had these cares for you (which were the fruit of my thoughts about you the day before, when it seems you were in labour), yet now I am at the greater ease to hear how graciously God hath dealt with me. It makes my heart a great deal lighter, I assure you, than it was before, and will serve for an antidote in this dangerous season; for, you know, Solomon saith, "A merry heart doth good like a medicine." I believe it will give me much joy every day to reflect upon your preservation, and to hope for your perfect recovery, which I beseech Him to vouchsafe, who hath begun to deal so mercifully with you. I know not how it will please Him to deal with me; but He who hath in part delivered you from what you feared of yourself, may do the same in relation to your friends. There is some danger, no doubt, in this place, and it increases a little; but I am not in any fear, which will make the danger less. There died, as you will see to-morrow in the bills, twenty in this parish, whereof sixteen of the plague. This, I know, will debar me of the liberty of seeing you; and I submit to that restraint. For though you will be inclined, I believe, to give me that freedom, yet it will not be either civil or kind to accept of your grant, till we be in a better condition of health. If you think there is any danger from these papers which you receive, the fire, I suppose, will expel it, if you let them see it before they come to your

hands. You see how cautious I am grown, which you will impute to the love I bear my friends, whose very fancies I am loath in the least to disturb, though it were to do myself the greater pleasure. I beseech you, therefore, do not hinder your recovery by any fears or sad thoughts concerning me. If I could persuade you to it, I would seriously endeavour to make you look upon me as one that is not so much worth as you may imagine, and of no great concern to the world. But since that will be a work too laborious, and it is like impossible, I may remove your trouble about me by other thoughts, which are, that I am in the hands of the same God who lately delivered you. He is the Lord of the world; and I looked upon him this morning as having a vast dominion and several countries under his government; from one of which to another he sometimes thinks good to remove his subjects, but always for the enriching of themselves, though they may think it to be to their loss. I professing myself one of them, and devoting myself to his service, hope well, that if I make a remove (for I look upon death as no more), I shall be placed in some other part of his kingdom so commodiously that it will be much to my advantage.

62. The same to the same.

Sept. 2, 1665.

MY FRIEND, I know that you long to hear again how I do; and therefore, though I wrote on Tuesday, yet I cannot but spend a little time to give you satisfaction, notwithstanding the other business that is upon me. I think myself now, by the goodness of God, to be as well as when you left me, though the