Pleading in mitigation before Lord Ellenborough
that he attended public worship in the country, he received the rebuke,
"as if there were no God in town.'"
[1260] Reynolds records:--'During his last illness, when all hope was at
an end, he appeared to be quieter and more resigned. His approaching
dissolution was always present to his mind. A few days before he died,
Mr. Langton and myself only present, he said he had been a great sinner,
but he hoped he had given no bad example to his friends; that he had
some consolation in reflecting that he had never denied Christ, and
repeated the text, "Whoever denies me, &c." [_St. Matthew_ x. 33.] We
were both very ready to assure him that we were conscious that we were
better and wiser from his life and conversation; and that so far from
denying Christ, he had been, in this age, his greatest champion.'
Taylor's _Reynolds_, ii. 459.
[1261] Hannah More (_Memoirs_ i. 393) says that Johnson, having put up a
fervent prayer that Brocklesby might become a sincere Christian, 'caught
hold of his hand with great earnestness, and cried, "Doctor, you do not
say _Amen_.
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