that, pursuant to the resolution he had mentioned to me, he had spent the preceding day in an abstraction from all worldly concerns; that to prevent interruption he had in the morning ordered _Frank_ [his servant] not to admit any one to him, and, the better to enforce the charge, had added these awful words, _for your master is preparing himself to die_. He then mentioned to me, that in the course of this exercise he found himself relieved from the disease which had been growing upon him, and was becoming very oppressive, viz. the _dropsy_, by the gradual evacuation of water, to the amount of _twenty pints_, a like instance whereof he had never before experienced." Sir John Hawkins ascribes this immense discharge of water to the influence of Dr. Johnson's prayers; but he neglects to take notice, that these prayers were answered, in this instance, as they are in many others, in a perfect consistence with the common and established laws of nature. To satisfy myself that this discharge of water, in the case of Dr. Johnson, was produced by the fasting only, I recommended it, soon after I read the above account, to a gentlewoman whom I was then attending in an ascites. I was delighted with the effects of it. Her urine, which for some time before had not exceeded half a pint a-day, amounted to _two quarts_ on the day she fasted. I repeated the same prescription once a week for several weeks, and each time was informed of an increase of urine, though it was considerably less in the last experiments than in the first. Two patients in an ascites, to whom I prescribed the same remedy, in the Pennsylvania hospital, the one in the winter of 1790, and the other in the winter of 1792, exhibited proofs in the presence of many of the students of the university, equally satisfactory of the efficacy of fasting in suddenly increasing the quantity of urine. IX. _Fear._ This passion is evidently of a debilitating nature, and, therefore, it has frequently afforded an accidental aid in the cure of dropsies, of too much action. I suspect, that the fear of death, which was so distinguishing a part of the character of Dr. Johnson, added a good deal to the efficacy of fasting, in procuring the immense discharge of water before-mentioned. In support of the efficacy of fear simply applied, in discharging water from the body in dropsies, I shall mention the following facts.