use I have, shall, or wish to make of it, is to obferve the disparity of men from themselves in a week's time: the defultory leaping and catching of new motions, new modes, new measures : and that strange spirit and life, with which men broken and difappointed resume their hopes, their follicitations, their ambitions! It would be worth your while as a Philofopher, to be bufy in these observations, and to come hither to fee the fury and bustle of the Bees this hot season, without coming fo near as to be stung by them. Your, &c.

AF

LETTER XXXII.

To the fame.

June 17, 1728.

FTER the publishing my Boyish Letters to Mr. Cromwell, you will not wonder if I fhould forfwear writing a letter again while I live; fince I do not correspond with a friend upon the terms of any other free fubject of this kingdom. But to you I can never be filent, or referved; and, I am fure, my opinion of your heart is fuch, that I could open mine to you in no manner which I could fear the whole world

fhould

fhould know. I could publish my own heart too, I will venture to fay, for any mischief or malice there is in it: but a little too much folly or weakness might (I fear) appear, to make fuch a fpectacle either inftructive or agreeable to others.

I am reduced to beg of all my acquaintance to fecure me from the like usage for the future, by returning me any letters of mine which they may have preserved; that I may not be hurt, after my death, by that which was the happinefs of my life, their partiality and affection to

me.

I have nothing of myself to tell you, only that I have had but indifferent health. I have not made a vifit to London: Curiosity and the love of Diffipation die apace in me. I am not glad nor forry for it, but I am very forry for those who have nothing else to live on.

I have read much, but writ no more. I have fmall hopes of doing good, no vanity in writing, and little ambition to please a world not very candid or deferving. If I can preserve the good opinion of a few friends, it is all I can expect, confidering how little good I can do even to them to merit it. Few people have your candour, or are fo willing to think well of another from whom they receive no benefit, and gratify no vanity. But of all the foft fenVOL. VIII. fations,

P

fations, the greatest pleasure is to give and receive mutual Truft. It is by Belief and firm Hope, that men are made happy in this life, as well as in the other. My confidence in your good opinion, and dependance upon that of one or two more, is the chief cordial drop I taste, amidst the Infipid, the Difagreeable, the Cloying, or the Dead-sweet, which are the common draughts of life. Some pleasures are too pert, as well as others too flat, to be relish'd long: and vivacity in fome cafes is worse than dulness. Therefore indeed for many years. I have not chofen my companions for any of the qualities in fashion, but almost entirely for that which is the most out-of-fashion, fincerity. Before I am aware of it, I am making your panegyric, and perhaps my own too, for next to poffeffing the best qualities is the efteeming and distinguishing those who poffefs them. I truly love and value you, and fo I stop short.

LETTER XXXIII. .

To the Earl of PETERBOROW.

MY LORD,

Aug. 24, 1728.

Prefume you may before this time be re turned, from the contemplation of many Beauties, animal and vegetable, in Gardens';

and

and poffibly fome rational, in Ladies; to the better enjoyment of your own at Bevis-Mount. I hope, and believe, all you have feen will only contribute to it. I am not fo fond of making compliments to Ladies as I was twenty years ago, or I would say there are fome very reasonable, and one in particular there. I think you happy, my Lord, in being at least half the year almost as much your own mafter as I am mine the whole year: and with all the disadvantageous incumbrances of quality, parts, and honour, as mere a gardener, loiterer, and labourer, as he who never had Titles, or from whom they are taken. I have an eye in the last of these glorious appellations to the ftyle of a Lord degraded or attainted: methinks they give him a better title than they deprive him of, in calling. him Labourer: Agricultura, fays Tully, proxima Sapientia, which is more than can be faid, by most modern Nobility, of Grace or Right Honourable, which are often proxima Stultitiæ. The Great Turk, you know, is often a Gardener, or of a meaner trade: and are there not (my Lord) fome circumftances in which you

would resemble the Great Turk? The two Paradifes are not ill connected, of Gardens and Gallantry; and fome there are (not to name my Lord B.) who pretend they are both to be had, even in this life, without turning Muffelmen.

We have as little politics here within a few miles of the Court (nay perhaps at the Court) as you at Southampton; and our Ministers, I dare fay, have less to do. Our weekly histories are only full of the feafts given to the Queen and Royal Family by their fervants, and the long and laborious walks her Majefty takes every morning. Yet if the graver Hiftorians hereafter shall be filent of this year's events, the amorous and anecdotical may make pofterity fome amends, by being furnished with the gallantries of the Great at home; and 'tis fome comfort, that if the Men of the next age do not read of us, the Women may.

From the time you have been abfent, I've not been to wait on a certain great man, thro' modefty, thro' idleness, and thro' respect. But for my comfort I fancy, that any great man will as foon forget one that does him no harm, as he can one that has done him any good. Believe me, my Lord, yours.

LET