400 Essay on
��his deceased wife, from that time to the end of his days, the world is sufficiently acquainted. On Easter-day. 22d April, 1764, his memorandum says: 'Thought on Tetty, poor dear Tetty T ! with my eyes full. Went to Church. After sermon I recommended Tetty in a prayer by herself; and my father, mother, brother, and Bathurst, in another. I did it only once, so far as it might be lawful for me.' In a prayer, January 23, 1759, the day on which his mother was buried, he commends, as far as may be lawful, her soul to God, imploring for her whatever is most beneficial to her in her present state 2 . In this habit he persevered to the end of his days. The Rev. Mr. Strahan, the editor of the Prayers and Meditations, observes, ' That Johnson, on some occasions, prays that the Almighty may have had mercy on his wife and Mr. Thrale : evidently supposing their sentence to have been already passed in the Divine Mind ; and, by conse quence, proving, that he had no belief in a state of purgatory, and no reason for praying for the dead that could impeach the sincerity of his profession as a Protestant.' Mr. Strahan adds, ' That, in praying for the regretted tenants of the grave, Johnson conformed to a practice which has been retained by many learned members of the Established Church, though the Liturgy no longer admits it. If where the tree falleth, there it shall be'* ; if our state, at the close of life, is to be the measure of our final sentence, then prayers for the dead, being visibly fruitless, can be regarded only as the vain oblations of superstition. But of all superstitions this, perhaps, is one of the least unamiable, and most incident to a good mind. If our sensations of kindness be intense, those, whom we have revered and loved, death cannot wholly seclude from our concern. It is true, for the reason just mentioned, such evidences of our surviving affection may be thought ill-judged ; but surely they are generous, and some natural tenderness is due even to a superstition, which thus
to bear the sight of this stone ? ' he her death. Letters, ii. 429.
wrote to his friend Ryland. 'In x Ante, p. n, n. i.
your company I hope I shall.' Let- 2 Ante, pp. 23, 29 ; Life, i. 240.
ters, ii. 429. See also ib. ii. 411; 3 Ecclesiastes xi. 3 ; for Johnson's
Life, i. 241, n. ; iv. 351, 394. He explanation of the text, see Life, iv.
gave the wrong date of the year of 225.
originates
�� �
