' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 354. Of him
it might have been said in Cowper's words:--
'Scripture is still a trumpet to his fears.'
_The Task: The Winter Morning Walk_, 1. 611. See _ante_, iii. 294.
[923] The Reverend Mr. Ralph Churton, Fellow of Brazen-Nose College,
Oxford, has favoured me with the following remarks on my Work, which he
is pleased to say, 'I have hitherto extolled, and cordially approve.'
'The chief part of what I have to observe is contained in the following
transcript from a letter to a friend, which, with his concurrence, I
copied for this purpose; and, whatever may be the merit or justness of
the remarks, you may be sure that being written to a most intimate
friend, without any intention that they ever should go further, they are
the genuine and undisguised sentiments of the writer:--
'Jan. 6, 1792.
'Last week, I was reading the second volume of Boswell's _Johnson_, with
increasing esteem for the worthy authour, and increasing veneration of
the wonderful and excellent man who is the subject of it. The writer
throws in, now and then, very properly some serious religious
reflections; but there is one remark, in my mind an obvious and just
one, which I think he has not made, that Johnson's "morbid melancholy,"
and constitutional infirmities, were intended by Providence, like St.
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