"To aggravate regret"

Via Patrick Kurp, Samuel Johnson on losing a friend:

The loss of a friend upon whom the heart was fixed, to whom every wish and endeavour tended, is a state of dreary desolation, in which the mind looks abroad impatient of itself, and finds nothing but emptiness and horrour. The blameless life, the artless tenderness, the pious simplicity, the modest resignation, the patient sickness, and the quiet death, are remembered only to add value to the loss, to aggravate regret for what cannot be amended, to deepen sorrow for what cannot be recalled. (The Idler #41)

Anecdotal Evidence: 'The Last Steps of an Inoffensive Life'