’Whilst confined by his last illness, it was his regular practice to have the church-service read to him, by some attentive and friendly Divine.  The Rev. Mr. Hoole performed this kind office in my presence for the last time, when, by his own desire, no more than the Litany was read; in which his responses were in the deep and sonorous voice which Mr. Boswell has occasionally noticed, and with the most profound devotion that can be imagined.  His hearing not being quite perfect, he more than once interrupted Mr. Hoole, with “Louder, my dear Sir, louder, I entreat you, or you pray in vain[1243]!”—­and, when the service was ended, he, with great earnestness, turned round to an excellent lady who was present, saying, “I thank you, Madam, very heartily, for your kindness in joining me in this solemn exercise.  Live well, I conjure you; and you will not feel the compunction at the last, which I now feel[1244].”  So truly humble were the thoughts which this great and good man entertained of his own approaches to religious perfection[1245].

’He was earnestly invited to publish a volume of Devotional Exercises[1246]; but this, (though he listened to the proposal with much complacency, and a large sum of money was offered for it,) he declined, from motives of the sincerest modesty.

’He seriously entertained the thought of translating Thuanus[1247].  He often talked to me on the subject; and once, in particular, when I was rather wishing that he would favour the world, and gratify his sovereign, by a Life of Spenser[1248], (which he said that he would readily have done, had he been able to obtain any new materials for the purpose,) he added, “I have been thinking again, Sir, of Thuanus:  it would not be the laborious task which you have supposed it.  I should have no trouble but that of dictation, which would be performed as speedily as an amanuensis could write.”

It is to the mutual credit of Johnson and Divines of different communions, that although he was a steady Church-of-England man, there was, nevertheless, much agreeable intercourse between him and them.  Let me particularly name the late Mr. La Trobe, and Mr. Hutton[1249], of the Moravian profession.  His intimacy with the English Benedictines, at Paris, has been mentioned[1250]; and as an additional proof of the charity in which he lived with good men of the Romish Church, I am happy in this opportunity of recording his friendship with the Reverend Thomas Hussey[1251], D.D.  His Catholick Majesty’s Chaplain of Embassy at the Court of London, that very respectable man, eminent not only for his powerful eloquence as a preacher, but for his various abilities and acquisitions.  Nay, though Johnson loved a Presbyterian the least of all, this did not prevent his having a long and uninterrupted social connection with the Reverend Dr. James Fordyce, who, since his death, hath gratefully celebrated him in a warm strain of devotional composition[1252].