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I often think of the friends who are gone. How I miss their conversation! In tribute to them—sadly, there are many now—I recall the final days of two authors I return to again and again: the philosopher and historian David Hume and the celebrated Dr. Samuel Johnson. Both had a gift for friendship. Both died surrounded by friends.

Hume’s stoicism in the face of death was admirable. His friend Adam Smith, in a letter written after Hume’s death, recalled his perfect composure, even his cheerfulness, as he faced the approaching end foretold by his incurable illness. “His temper indeed seemed to be more happily balanced, and his conversation and amusements to run so much in their usual strain,” Smith wrote, “that, notwithstanding all bad symptoms, many people could not believe he was dying.” But Hume himself knew it, and accepted it. At one point, he told Smith of the excuses he might offer Charon, the ferryman of the dead, to postpone his departure.

“Upon further consideration,” said he, “I thought I might say to him, ‘Good Charon, I have been correcting my works for a new edition. Allow me a little time, that I may see how the Public receives the alterations.’ But Charon would answer, ‘When you have seen the effect of these, you will be for making other alterations. There will be no end of such excuses; so, honest friend, please step into the boat.’ But I might still urge, ‘Have a little patience, good Charon; I have been endeavouring to open the eyes of the Public. If I live a few years longer, I may have the satisfaction of seeing the downfall of some of the prevailing systems of superstition.’ But Charon would then lose all temper and decency. ‘You loitering rogue, that will not happen these many hundred years. Do you fancy I will grant you a lease for so long a term? Get into the boat this instant, you lazy loitering rogue.’”

Hume died in Edinburgh on August 25, 1776. “He never showed the least expression of impatience,” his physician wrote, “but when he had occasion to speak to the people about him, always did it with affection and tenderness.” Adam Smith observed: “I have always considered him, both in his lifetime and since his death, as approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly wise and virtuous man, as perhaps the nature of human frailty will permit.”

At the opposite extreme from Hume was Johnson’s attitude. In The Rambler, the journal of his younger years, he had written an essay entitled “Sorrow,” a perfect treatise on stoicism and fortitude, a hymn to life. Yet in the extraordinarily detailed account by his biographer Boswell, the phlegmatic Dr. Johnson faced his final hour with terror. He had, Boswell observed, “a very great fear of death,” and clung to any indication that he might not, in fact, be as gravely ill as he seemed. His balm was conversation with friends. One day Boswell found Edmund Burke and four or five other friends in Johnson’s company:

“I am afraid so many of us must be oppressive to you,” said Burke. “No, Sir,” Johnson replied; “it is impossible I can be so much oppressed by any thing as I am delighted with your company.” In a trembling voice, betraying his deep emotion, Burke replied: “My dear Sir, you have always been too good to me.”

On another occasion, he opened a note brought to him by his servant and said: “An odd thought strikes me: we shall receive no letters in the grave.”

Perhaps his greatest consolation was faith. But in his will he included a prayer in which he mentioned his friends: “Have mercy upon me, and pardon the multitude of my offences. Bless my friends; have mercy upon us all. Support me by thy Holy Spirit in the days of weakness, and at the hour of death; and receive me, at my death, to everlasting happiness, for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” He died on December 13, 1784.

Those remarkable lives came to an end, leaving behind an immortal body of work. Their greatest source of happiness was knowledge shared with friends. “Let no day pass without cultivating your friends,” Johnson used to say. He was right. Their conversation is the letter we shall take with us when we are no longer here.