601.
[1224] Mr. Green related that when some of Johnson's friends desired that Dr. Warren should be called in, he said they might call in whom they pleased; and when Warren was called, at his going away Johnson said, 'You have come in at the eleventh hour, but you shall be paid the same with your fellow-labourers. Francis, put into Dr. Warren's coach a copy of the English Poets.' CROKER. Dr. Warren ten years later attended Boswell in his last illness. Letters of Boswell, p. 355. He was the great-grandfather of Col. Sir Charles Warren, G.C.M.G., F.R.S., Chief Commissioner of Police.
[1225] This bold experiment, Sir John Hawkins has related in such a manner as to suggest a charge against Johnson of intentionally hastening his end; a charge so very inconsistent with his character in every respect, that it is injurious even to refute it, as Sir John has thought it necessary to do. It is evident, that what Johnson did in hopes of relief, indicated an extraordinary eagerness to retard his dissolution. BOSWELL. Murphy (Life, p. 122) says that 'for many years, when Johnson was not disposed to enter into the conversation going forward, whoever sat near his chair might hear him repeating from Shakespeare [Measure for Measure, act iii. sc. i]:--
"Ay, but to die and go we know not where; To lie in cold obstruction and to rot; This sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clot; and the delighted spirit To bathe in fiery floods."
And from Milton [Paradise Lost, ii. 146]:--
"Who would lose Though full of pain this intellectual being?"'
Johnson, the year before, at a time when he thought that he must submit to the surgeon's knife (ante, p. 240), wrote to Mrs. Thrale:--'You would not have me for fear of pain perish in putrescence. I shall, I hope, with trust in eternal mercy lay hold of the possibility of life which yet remains.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 312. Hawkins records (Life, p. 588) that one day Johnson said to his doctor:--'How many men in a year die through the timidity of those whom they consult for health! I want length of life, and you fear giving me pain, which I care not for.' Another day, 'when Mr. Cruikshank scarified his leg, he cried out, "Deeper, deeper. I will abide the consequence; you are afraid of your reputation, but that is nothing to me." To those about him, he said, "You all pretend to love me, but you do not love me so well as I myself do." 'Ib. p. 592. Windham (Diary, p. 32) says that he reproached Heberden with being timidorum timidissimus. Throughout he acted up to what he had said:--'I will be conquered, I will not capitulate.' Ante, P. 374.
[1226] Macbeth, act v. sc. 3.
[1227] Satires, x. 356. Paraphrased by Johnson in The Vanity of Human Wishes, at the lines beginning:--
'Pour forth thy fervours for a healthful mind, Obedient passions and a will resigned.'
[1228] Johnson, three days after his stroke of palsy (ante, p. 230), wrote:--'When I waked, I found Dr. Brocklesby sitting by me. He fell to repeating Juvenal's ninth satire; but I let him see that the province was mine.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 274.
[1229] Johnson, on his way to Scotland, 'changed horses,' he wrote, 'at Darlington, where Mr. Cornelius Harrison, a cousin-german of mine, was perpetual curate. He was the only one of my relations who ever rose in fortune above penury, or in character above neglect.' Piozzi Letters, i. 105. Malone, in a note to later editions, shews that Johnson shortly before his death was trying to discover some of his poor relations.
[1230] Mr. Windham records (Diary, p. 28) that the day before Johnson made his will 'he recommended Frank to him as to one who had will and power to protect him.' He continues, 'Having obtained my assent to this, he proposed that Frank should be called in; and desiring me to take him by the hand in token of the promise, repeated before him the recommendation he had just made of him, and the promise I had given to attend to it.
[1231] Johnson wrote five years earlier to Mrs. Thrale about her husband's will:--'Do not let those fears prevail which you know to be unreasonable; a will brings the end of life no nearer.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 72.
[1232] 'IN THE NAME OF GOD. AMEN. I, SAMUEL JOHNSON, being in full possession of my faculties, but fearing this night may put an end to my life, do ordain this my last Will and Testament. I bequeath to GOD, a soul polluted with many sins, but I hope purified by JESUS CHRIST. I leave seven hundred and fifty pounds in the hands of Bennet Langton, Esq.; three hundred pounds in the hands of Mr. Barclay and Mr. Perkins, brewers; one hundred and fifty pounds in the hands of Dr. Percy, Bishop of Dromore; one thousand pounds, three per cent. annuities, in the publick funds; and one hundred pounds now lying by me in ready money: all these before-mentioned sums and property I leave, I say, to Sir Joshua Reynolds, Sir John Hawkins, and Dr. William Scott, of Doctors Commons, in trust for the following uses:--That is to say, to pay to the representatives of the late William Innys, bookseller, in St, Paul's Church-yard, the sum of two hundred pounds; to Mrs.