he country with the
friends who, after the loss of the Thrales, could give him most domestic
comfort, he came back to London to die. He made his will, and settled a
few matters of business, and was pleased to be told that he would be
buried in Westminster Abbey. He uttered a few words of solemn advice to
those who came near him, and took affecting leave of his friends.
Langton, so warmly loved, was in close attendance. Johnson said to him
tenderly, _Te teneam moriens deficiente manu_. Windham broke from
political occupations to sit by the dying man; once Langton found Burke
sitting by his bedside with three or four friends. "I am afraid," said
Burke, "that so many of us must be oppressive to you." "No, sir, it is
not so," replied Johnson, "and I must be in a wretched state indeed
when your company would not be a delight to me." "My dear sir," said
Burke, with a breaking voice, "you have always been too good to me;" and
parted from his old friend for the last time. Of Reynolds, he begged
three things: to forgive a debt of thirty pounds, to read the Bible, and
never to paint on Sundays. A few flashes of the old humour broke
through. He said of a man who sat up with him: "Sir, the fellow's an
idiot; he's as awkward as a turnspit when first put into the wheel, and
as sleepy as a dormouse." His last recorded words were to a young lady
who had begged for his blessing: "God bless you, my dear." The same day,
December 13th, 1784, he gradually sank and died peacefully. He was laid
in the Abbey by the side of Goldsmith, and the playful prediction has
been amply fulfilled:--

Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur istis.

The names of many greater writers are inscribed upon the walls of
Westminster Abbey; but scarcely any one lies there whose heart was more
acutely responsive during life to the deepest and tenderest of human
emotions. In visiting that strange gathering of departed heroes and
statesmen and philanthropists and poets, there are many whose words and
deeds have a far greater influence upon our imaginations; but there are
very few whom, when all has been said, we can love so heartily as Samuel
Johnson.

CHAPTER VI.

JOHNSON'S WRITINGS.

It remains to speak of Johnson's position in literature. For reasons
sufficiently obvious, few men whose lives have been devoted to letters
for an equal period, have left behind them such scanty and inadequate
remains. Johnson, as we have seen, worked only under the pressur