When fainting nature call'd for aid, And hov'ring death prepar'd the blow, His vig'rous remedy display'd The pow'r of art, without the show. In mis'ry's darkest cavern known, His useful care was ever nigh, Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan, And lonely want retir'd to die. No summons, mock'd by chill delay, No petty gain, disdain'd by pride; The modest wants of ev'ry day The toil of ev'ry day supply'd. His virtues walk'd their narrow round, Nor made a pause, nor left a void; And sure the eternal master found The single talent well-employ'd. The busy day--the peaceful night, Unfelt, uncounted, glided by; His frame was firm--his pow'rs were bright, Though now his eightieth year was nigh. Then, with no fiery throbbing pain, No cold gradations of decay, Death broke, at once, the vital chain, And freed his soul the nearest way. [a] These stanzas, to adopt the words of Dr. Drake, "are warm from the heart; and this is the only poem, from the pen of Johnson, that has been bathed with tears." Levet was Johnson's constant and attentive companion, for near forty years; he was a practitioner in physic, among the lower class of people, in London. Humanity, rather than desire of gain, seems to have actuated this single hearted and amiable being; and never were the virtues of charity recorded in more touching strains. "I am acquainted," says Dr. Drake, "with nothing superior to them in the productions of the moral muse." See Drake's Literary Life of Johnson; and Boswell, i. ii. iii. iv.--ED. EPITAPH ON CLAUDE PHILLIPS, AN ITINERANT MUSICIAN[a]. Phillips! whose touch harmonious could remove The pangs of guilty pow'r, and hapless love, Rest here, distress'd by poverty no more, Find here that calm thou gay'st so oft before; Sleep, undisturb'd, within this peaceful shrine, Till angels wake thee, with a note like thine. [a] These lines are among Mrs. Williams's Miscellanies: they are, nevertheless, recognised as Johnson's, in a memorandum of his handwriting, and were probably written at her request. This Phillips was a fiddler, who travelled up and down Wales, and was much celebrated for his skill. The above epitaph, according to Mr. Boswell, won the applause of lord Kames, prejudiced against Johnson as he was. It was published in Mrs. Williams's Miscellanies, and was, at first, ascribed to Garrick, from its appearing with the signature G.--Garrick, however, related, that they were composed, almost impromptu, by Johnson, on hearing some lines on the subject, by Dr. Wilkes, which he disapproved. See Boswell, i. 126, where is, likewise, preserved an epigram, by Johnson, on Colley Cibber and George the second, whose illiberal treatment of artists and learned men was a constant theme of his execration. As it has not yet been inserted among Johnson's works, we will present it to the readers of the present edition, in this note.