I

LETTER LXX.

Jan. 6, 1734.

Never think of you and can never write to

you, now, without drawing many of those fhort fighs of which we have formerly talk'd: The reflection both of the friends we have been depriv'd of by Death, and of those from whom we are separated almoft as eternally by Abfence, checks me to that degree that it takes away in a manner the pleasure (which yet I feel very fenfibly too) of thinking I am now converfing with you. You have been filent to me as to your Works; whether those printed here are, or are not genuine? but one, I am fure, is yours; and your method of concealing yourself puts me in mind of the Indian bird I have read of, who hides his head in a hole, while all his feathers and tail stick out. You'll have immediately by feveral franks (even before 'tis here publish'd) my Epistle to Lord Cobham, part of my Opus Magnum, and the laft Effay on Man, both which, I conclude, will be grateful to your bookfeller, on whom you please to bestow them fo early. There is a woman's war declar'd against me by a certain Lord; his weapons are the fame which women and children ufe, a pin to scratch, and a fquirt to befpatter; I writ a

fort

you

fort of answer, but was afhamed to enter the lifts with him, and after fhewing it to fome people, fupprefs'd it: otherwife it was fuch as was worthy of him and worthy of me. I was three weeks this autumn with Lord Peterborow, who rejoices in your doings, and always speaks with the greatest affection of you. I need not tell who else do the fame; you may be fure almost all those whom I ever fee, or defire to fee. I wonder not that B- paid you no fort of civility while he was in Ireland: he is too much a half-wit to love a true wit, and too much half-honeft, to esteem any entire merit. I hope and think he hates me too, and I will do my best to make him: he is fo infupportably infolent in his civility to me when he meets me at one third place, that I must affront him to be rid of it. That strict neutrality as to public parties, which I have constantly obferv'd in all my writings, I think gives me the more title to attack fuch men, as flander and belye my character in private, to those who know me not. Yet even this is a liberty I will never take, unless at the fame time they are Pests to private society, or mischievous members of the public, that is to fay, unless they are enemies to all men as well as to me -Pray write to me when you can : If ever I can come to you, I will: if not, may Providence be our friend and our guard thro'

this

this fimple world, where nothing is valuable,

but fenfe and friendship. health attend your years, years be added to you.

Adieu, dear Sir, may and then may many

P.S. I am juft now told, a very curious Lady intends to write to you to pump you about some poems faid to be yours. Pray tell her that you have not answered me on the fame queftions, and that I fhall take it as a thing never to be forgiven from you, if you tell another what you have conceal'd from me.

LETTER LXXI.

Sept. 15, 1734.

I'

Have ever thought you as fenfible as any man I knew, of all the delicacies of friendfhip, and yet I fear (from what Lord B. tells me you faid in your laft letter) that you did not quite understand the reason of my late filence. I affure you it proceeded wholly from the tender kindness I bear you, When the heart is full, it is angry at all words that cannot come up to it; and yoù are now the man in all the world I am moft troubled to write to, for you are the friend I have left whom I am

most grieved about. Death has not done worse to me in feparating poor Gay, or any other, than disease and abfence in dividing us. I am afraid to know how you do, fince moft accounts I have, give me pain for you, and I am unwilling to tell you the condition of my own health. If it were good, I would fee you; and yet if I found you in that very condition of deafness, which made you fly from us while we were together, what comfort could we derive from it? In writing often I fhould find great relief, could we write freely; and yet, when I have done fo, you feem by not answering in a very long time, to feel either the fame uneafiness as I do, or to abstain, from fome prudential reafon. Yet I am fure, nothing that you and I wou'd fay to each other (tho' our own fouls were to be laid open to the clerks of the postoffice) could hurt either of us so much, in the opinion of any honeft man or good subject, as the intervening, officious, impertinence of those Goers between us, who in England pretend to intimacies with you, and in Ireland to intimacies with me. I cannot but receive any that call upon me in your name, and in truth they take it in vain too often. I take all opportunities of justifying you against these Friends, efpecially thofe who know all you think and

write, and repeat your flighter verses. It is generally on fuch little fcraps that Witlings feed, and 'tis hard the world fhould judge of our house-keeping from what we fling to our dogs, yet this is often the confequence. But they treat you ftill worfe, mix their own with yours, print them to get money, and lay them at your door. This I am fatiffied was the cafe in the Epiftle to a Lady; it was just the same hand (if I have any judgment in ftyle) which printed your Life and Character before, which you so strongly dif avow'd in your letters to Lord Carteret, myself, and others. I was very well informed of another fact, which convinced me yet more; the fame perfon who gave this to be printed, offer'd to a bookfeller a piece in profe as yours, and as commiffioned by you, which has fince appear'd, and been own'd to be his own. I think (I fay once more) that I know your hand, tho' you did not mine in the Effay on Man. I beg your pardon for not telling you, as I should, had you been in England: but no fecret can crofs your Irish Sea, and every clerk in the poft-office had known it. I fancy, tho' you loft fight of me in the first of those Essays, you saw me in the second. The defign of concealing myself was good, and had its full effect;