Page:Johnsonian Miscellanies II.djvu/213

 very sorry that the state of my health prevents my compliance with your request ; but my nerves are so shattered that I feel as if I should be quite confounded by your presence, and instead of promoting, should only injure the cause in which you desire my aid. Permit me therefore to write what I should wish to say were I present. I can easily conceive what would be the subjects of your inquiry. I can conceive that the views of your self have changed with your condition, and that on the near approach of death, what you once considered mere peccadillos have risen into mountains of guilt, while your best actions have dwindled into nothing. On whichever side you look you see only positive transgressions or defective obedience ; and hence, in self-despair, are eagerly inquiring 'What shall I do to be saved ? ' I say to you, in the language of the Baptist, ' Behold the Lamb of God ! ' &c. &c.

When Sir John Hawkins came to this part of Mr. W.'s letter, the Dr. interrupted him, anxiously asking, ' Does he say so ? Read it again ! Sir John.' Sir John complied : upon which the Dr. said, * I must see that man ; write again to him.' A second note was accordingly sent: but even this repeated solicitation could not prevail over Mr. Winstanley's fears. He was led, however, by it to write again to the Doctor, renewing and en larging upon the subject of his first letter ; and these communi cations, together with the conversation of the late Mr. Latrobe z , who was a particular friend of Dr. Johnson, appear to have been blessed by God in bringing this great man to the renunciation of self, and a simple reliance on Jesus as his Saviour, thus also communicating to him that peace which he had found the world could not give, and which when the world was fading from his view, was to fill the void, and dissipate the gloom, even of the valley of the shadow of death. Memoirs, i. 376.

H. MORE to her sister.

Hampton 2, 1785.

Mr. Pepys wrote me a very kind letter on the death of Johnson, thinking I should be impatient to hear something relating to his last hours. Dr. Brocklesby, his physician, was with him; he

1 A Moravian. Life, iv. 410. 2 At Mrs. Garrick's house.

said

�� �