R CMD check, NOTEs, & S4-dependent packages

As I was running "R CMD check" on one of my older packages
(matlab), I was attempting to fix one of the NOTEs which
bitches about attempting to change the search path using
require().

In my case, I am repeating a package dependency for "methods"
package in my .onLoad() function. Can this scenario (based
on something B. Ripley discussed many years ago) no longer
occur? Just another R package anachronism? Was I really
modifying the search path by repeating a DESCRIPTION dependency?


.onLoad <- function(libname, pkgname) {
    ## In case namespace is loaded (via import) by package that
    ## doesn't depend on S4 methods and used in a session with
    ## non-default set of packages.
    require(methods)

    ?
}