Page images
PDF
EPUB

Eclogues to Lord Bolingbroke? I am an ill Judge at this distance; and befides, am, for my cafe, utterly ignorant of the commoneft things that pass in the world; but if all Courts have a fameness in them (as the Parfons phrase it) things may be as they were in my time, when all employments went to Parliament-mens Friends, who had been useful in Elections, and there was always a huge Lift of names in arrears at the Treafury, which would at least take up your feven years expedient to discharge even one half. I am of opinion, if you will not be offended, that the fureft course would be to get your Friend who lodgeth in your house to recommend you to the next chief Governor who comes over here for a good civil employment, or to be one of his Secretaries, which your Parliament-men are fond enough of, when there is no room at home. The wine is good and reasonable; you may dine twice a week at the Deanry-house; there is a fett of company in this town fufficient for one man; folks will admire you, because they have read you, and read of you; and a good employment will make you live tolerably in London, or fumptuously here; or if you divide between both places, it will be for your health.

I wish I could do more than fay I love you. I left you in a good way both for the late Court,

Court, and the fucceffors; and by the force of too much honesty or too little fublunary wifdom, you fell between two ftools. Take care of your health and money; be less modest and more active; or else turn Parson and get a Bifhoprick here: Would to God they would fend us as good ones from your fide!

I am ever, &c.

I

LETTER VII.

Mr. POPE to Dr. SWIFT.

Jan. 12, 1723.

Find a rebuke in a late Letter of yours, that both ftings and pleaseth me extremely. Your faying that I ought to have writ a Postscript to my friend Gay's, makes me not content to write less than a whole Letter; and your feeming to take his kindly, gives me hopes you will look upon this as a fincere effect of Friendship. Indeed as I cannot but own the Laziness with which you tax me, and with which I may equally charge you, for both of us have had (and one of us hath both had and given) a Surfeit of writing; so I

i Alluding to his large work on Homer.

[blocks in formation]

really thought you would know yourself to be fo certainly intitled to my Friendship, that it was a poffeffion you could not imagine stood in need of any further Deeds or Writings to affure you of it.

Whatever you seem to think of your withdrawn and feparate ftate at this distance, and in this Abfence, Dean Swift lives ftill in England, in every place and company where he would chufe to live, and I find him in all the Conversations I keep, and in all the Hearts in which I defire any share.

We have never met these

many years without mention of you. Befides my old Acquaintance, I have found that all my friends of a later date are fuch as were yours before: Lord Oxford, Lord Harcourt, and Lord Harley may look upon me as one entailed upon them by you: Lord Bolingbroke is now returned (as I hope) to take Me with all his other Hereditary Rights: and, indeed, he seems grown fo much a Philofopher, as to fet his heart upon fome of them as little, as upon the Poet you gave him. It is fure my ill fate, that all those I most loved, and with whom I moft lived, must be banished: After both of you left England, my conftant Hoft was the Bishop of Rochefter. Sure this is a nation that is curfedly * Dr. Atterbury.

[ocr errors]

afraid of being over-run with too much Politenefs, and cannot regain one great Genius, but at the expence of another. I tremble for my Lord Peterborow (whom I now lodge with) he has too much Wit, as well as Courage, to make a folid General : and if he efcapes being banished by others, I fear he will banish himself. This leads me to give you fome account of the manner of my life and Converfation, which has been infinitely more various and diffipated, than when you knew me and cared for me; and among all Sexes, Parties, and Profeffions. A Glut of Study and Retirement in the first part of my life cast me into this; and this, I begin to fee, will throw me again into Study and Retirement.

[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

I

The Civilities I have met with from oppofite Setts of people, have hinder'd me from bęing violent or four to any Party; but at the fame time the Obfervations and Experiences I cannot but have collected, have made me lefs fond of, and lefs furprized at, any: I am therefore the more afflicted and the more angry at the Violences and Hardships I fee practised by either. The merry Vein you knew me in, is funk into a Turn of Reflection, that has made the world pretty indifferent to me; and yet have acquired a Quietnefs of mind which by fits improves into a certain degree of Chearfulnefs, enough to make me just so good humoured as to with that world well. My Friendfhips are encreased by new ones, yet no part of the warmth I felt for the old is diminished. Averfions I have none, but to Knaves (for Fools I have learned to bear with) and fuch I cannot be commonly civil to; for I think those men are next to Knaves who converse with them. The greatest Man in power of this fort shall hardly make me bow to him, unless I had a perfonal obligation, and that I will take care not to have. The top pleasure of my life is one I learned from you both how to gain and how to use the Freedom of Friendship with men much my Superiors. To have pleased great men, according to Horace, is a praife; but not to

« EelmineJätka »