On the morning of Tuesday 17 June 1783, Johnson (in his 73rd year) awoke to discover that he had suffered a stroke and had been deprived of the power of speech. He wrote the following note to his neighbour, Edmund Allen:

There is something iconic about this moment in Johnson's life: it tells of a long series of afflictions, both mental and physical; it tells of his courage in facing a death that always troubled him; and it tells of his wry humour – for a few days later (19 June 1783) he described the stroke to Hester Thrale by writing: “I was alarmed, and prayed God, that however he might afflict my body he would spare my understanding. This prayer, that I might try the integrity of my faculties I made in Latin verse. The lines were not good, but I knew them not to be very good, I made them easily, and concluded myself to be unimpaired in my faculties” (Letters, IV, 151).