It appears from a note subjoined, that this was composed when he ’purposed to apply vigorously to study, particularly of the Greek and Italian tongues.’

Such a purpose, so expressed, at the age of sixty-seven, is admirable and encouraging; and it must impress all the thinking part of my readers with a consolatory confidence in habitual devotion, when they see a man of such enlarged intellectual powers as Johnson, thus in the genuine earnestness of secrecy, imploring the aid of that Supreme Being, ’from whom cometh down every good and every perfect gift.’

1777:  AETAT. 68.]—­In 1777, it appears from his Prayers and Meditations, that Johnson suffered much from a state of mind ’unsettled and perplexed,’ and from that constitutional gloom, which, together with his extreme humility and anxiety with regard to his religious state, made him contemplate himself through too dark and unfavourable a medium.  It may be said of him, that he ‘saw god in clouds.’  Certain we may be of his injustice to himself in the following lamentable paragraph, which it is painful to think came from the contrite heart of this great man, to whose labours the world is so much indebted:  ’When I survey my past life, I discover nothing but a barren waste of time with some disorders of body, and disturbances of the mind, very near to madness, which I hope He that made me will suffer to extenuate many faults, and excuse many deficiencies.’  But we find his devotions in this year eminently fervent; and we are comforted by observing intervals of quiet, composure, and gladness.

On Easter-day we find the following emphatick prayer: 

’Almighty and most merciful Father, who seest all our miseries, and knowest all our necessities, look down upon me, and pity me.  Defend me from the violent incursion [incursions] of evil thoughts, and enable me to form and keep such resolutions as may conduce to the discharge of the duties which thy providence shall appoint me; and so help me, by thy Holy Spirit, that my heart may surely there be fixed, where true joys are to be found, and that I may serve thee with pure affection and a cheerful mind.  Have mercy upon me, O god, have mercy upon me; years and infirmities oppress me, terrour and anxiety beset me.  Have mercy upon me, my Creator and my Judge. [In all dangers protect me.] In all perplexities relieve and free me; and so help me by thy Holy Spirit, that I may now so commemorate the death of thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ, as that when this short and painful life shall have an end, I may, for his sake, be received to everlasting happiness.  Amen.’

’Sir Alexander Dick to Dr. Samuel Johnson.

’Prestonfield, Feb. 17, 1777.