About three weeks before his death he received a visit, at his country house, from the reverend Mr. Schultens, his intimate friend, who found him sitting without-door, with his wife, sister, and daughter:  after the compliments of form, the ladies withdrew, and left them to private conversation; when Boerhaave took occasion to tell him what had been, during his illness, the chief subject of his thoughts.  He had never doubted of the spiritual and immaterial nature of the soul; but declared that he had lately had a kind of experimental certainty of the distinction between corporeal and thinking substances, which mere reason and philosophy cannot afford, and opportunities of contemplating the wonderful and inexplicable union of soul and body, which nothing but long sickness can give.  This he illustrated by a description of the effects which the infirmities of his body had upon his faculties, which yet they did not so oppress or vanquish, but his soul was always master of itself, and always resigned to the pleasure of its maker.

He related, with great concern, that once his patience so far gave way to extremity of pain, that, after having lain fifteen hours in exquisite tortures, he prayed to God that he might be set free by death.

Mr. Schultens, by way of consolation, answered, that he thought such wishes, when forced by continued and excessive torments, unavoidable in the present state of human nature; that the best men, even Job himself, were not able to refrain from such starts of impatience.  This he did not deny; but said, “he that loves God, ought to think nothing desirable, but what is most pleasing to the supreme goodness.”

Such were his sentiments, and such his conduct, in this state of weakness and pain:  as death approached nearer, he was so far from terrour or confusion, that he seemed even less sensible of pain, and more cheerful under his torments, which continued till the 23rd day of September, 1738, on which he died, between four and five in the morning, in the 70th year of his age.

Thus died Boerhaave, a man formed by nature for great designs, and guided by religion in the exertion of his abilities.  He was of a robust and athletick constitution of body, so hardened by early severities, and wholesome fatigue, that he was insensible of any sharpness of air, or inclemency of weather.  He was tall, and remarkable for extraordinary strength.  There was, in his air and motion, something rough and artless, but so majestick and great, at the same time, that no man ever looked upon him without veneration, and a kind of tacit submission to the superiority of his genius.

The vigour and activity of his mind sparkled visibly in his eyes; nor was it ever observed, that any change of his fortune, or alteration in his affairs, whether happy or unfortunate, affected his countenance.

He was always cheerful, and desirous of promoting mirth by a facetious and humorous conversation; he was never soured by calumny and detraction, nor ever thought it necessary to confute them; “for they are sparks,” said he, “which, if you do not blow them, will go out of themselves.”