none have been Enemies, who but were alfo Strangers to me; and as there is no great need of an Eclairciffement with fuch, whatever they writ or faid I never retaliated, not only never feeming to know, but often really neverknowing, any thing of the matter. There are very few things that give me the Anxiety of a Wish; the strongest I have would be to pafs my days with you, and a few fuch as you: But Fate has difperfed them all about the world; and I find to wifh it is as vain, as to wifh to fee the Millennium and the Kingdom of the Juft upon earth.

If I have finned in my long filence, confider there is one to whom you yourself have been as great a finner. As foon as you fee his hand, you will learn to do me justice, and feel in your heart how long a man may be filent to thofe he truly loves and respects.

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LETTER VIII.

Lord BOLINGBROKE to Dr. SWIFT.

Am not fo lazy as Pope, and therefore you muft not expect from me the fame indulgence to Lazinefs; in defending his own caufe he pleads yours, and becomes your Advocate while he appeals to you as his Judge: You will do the fame on your part; and I, and the rest of your common Friends, fhall have great Juftice to expect from two fuch righteous Tribunals: You refemble perfectly the two Alehoufe-keepers in Holland, who were at the fame time Burgomafters of the Town, and taxed one another's Bills alternately. I declare before hand I will not ftand to the award; my Title to your Friendship is good, and wants neither Deeds nor Writings to confirin it: but annual Acknowledgments at leaft are neceffary to preferve it and I begin to fufpect by your defrauding me of them, that you hope in time to difpute it, and to urge Prefcription against me. I would not fay one word to you about myself (fince it is a fubje&t on which you appear to have no curiofity) was it not to try how far the contraft between Pope's fortune and manner of life, and mine, may be carried.

I have been, then, infinitely more uniform and lefs diffipated, than when you knew me and cared for me. That Love which I ufed to scatter with fuch profufion among the female kind, has been thefe many years devoted to one object. A great many misfortunes (for fo they are called, VOL. IV. M m

though

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though fometimes very improperly) and a retirement from the world, have made that juft and nice difcrimination between my Acquaintance and my Friends, which we have feldom fagacity enough to make for ourfelves; thofe infects of various hues, which used to hum and buz about me, while I ftood in the funfhine, have difappeared fince I lived in the fhade. No man comes to a Hermitage but for the fake of the Hermit; a few philofophical Friends come often to mine, and they are fuch as you would be glad to live with, if a dull climate and duller company have not altered you extremely from what you was nine years ago.

The hoarfe voice of Party was never heard in this quiet place; Gazettes and Pamphlets are banished from it, and if the Lucubrations of Ifaac Bickerftaff be admitted, this diftinction is owing to fome ftrokes by which it is judged that this illuftrious Philofopher had (like the Indian Fohu, the Grecian Pythagoras, the Perfian Zoroafter, and others his Precurfors among the Zabians, Magians, and the Egyptian Seers) both his outward and his inward Doctrine, and that he was of no fide at the bottom. When I am there, I forget I ever was of any party myfelf; nay, I am often to happily abforbed by the abftracted reafon of things, that I am ready to imagine there never was any fuch monfter as Party. Alas, I am foon awakened from that pleafing dream by the Greek and Roman Hiftorians, by Guicciardine, by Machiavel, and Thuanus; for I have vowed to read no Hiftory of our own country, till that body of it which you promise to finish

appears.

I am under no apprehenfion that a glut of Study and Retirement should caft me back into the hurry of the world; on the contrary, the fingle regret which I ever feel, is that I fell fo late into this courfe of life; my Philofophy grows confirmed by habit, and if you and I meet again, I will extort this approbation from you: Jam non confilio bonus, fed more eo perductus, ut non tantum recte facere poffim, fed nifi recte facere non poffim. The little incivilities I have met with from oppofite fetts of people, have been so far from rendering me violent or four to any, that I think myfelf obliged to them all; fome have cured me of my fears, by fhewing me how impotent the malice of the world is others have cured me of my hopes. by fhewing how precarious popular friendships are; all have cured me of furprize in driving me out of party, they have driven me out of curfed compary; and in fupping me of Titles and Rank,

and Eftate, and fuch trinkets, which every man that will may fpare, they have given me that which no man can be happy without.

Reflection and habit have rendered the world fo indifferent to me, that I am neither afflicted nor rejoiced, angry nor pleafed at what happens in it, any further than perfo nal friendships intereft me in the affairs of it, and this principle extends my cares but a little way. Perfect Tranquillity is the general tenour of my life: good digeftions, ferene weather, and fome other mechanic fprings, wind me above it now and then, but I never fall below it; 1 am fometimes gay, but I am never fad. I have gained new friends, and have loft fome old ones; my acquifitions of this kind give me a good deal of pleafure, because they have not been made lightly: I know no vows fo foleinn as thofe of friendship, and therefore a pretty long noviciate of acquaintance fhould methinks precede them: My loffes of this kind give me but little trouble, Icontributed nothing to them, and a friend who breaks with me unjustly, is not worth preferving. As foon as I leave this Town (which will be in a few days) I fhall fall back into that course of life, which keeps knaves and fools at a great diftance from me: I have an averfion to them both, but in the ordinary course of life, I think I can bear the fenfible knave better than the fool. One must indeed with the former be in fome or other of the attitudes of those wooden men whom I have feen before a fword-cntler's fhop in Germany; but even in thefe conftrained poftures the witty Rafcal will divert me; and he that diverts me does me a great deal of good, and lays me under an obligation to him, which I am not obliged to pay him in another coin: The Fool obliges me to be almost as much upon my guard as the knave, and he makes me no amends; he numbs me like the Torpor, or he teazes me like the Fly. This is the Picture of an old Friend, and more like him than that will be which you once afked, and which he will fend you, if you continue ftill to defire it.-Adieu, dear Swift, with all thy faults I love thee intirely; make an effort, and love me on with all mine.

LETTER IX.

From Dr. SWIFT.

Dublin, Sept. 20, 1723.

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Eturning from a fummer expedition of four months on account of my health, I found a letter from you, with an appendix longer than yours from Lord Bolingbroke. I believe there is not a more miferable malady than an unwillingness to write letters to our best friends, and a man might be philofopher enough in finding out reafons for it. One thing is clear, that it fhews anmighty difference betwixt Friendship and Love, for a lover (as I have heard) is always fcribling to his miftrefs. If I could permit myfelf to believe what your civility makes you fay, that I am ftill remembered by my friends in England, I am in the right to keep myfelf here-Non fum qualis eram. Jeft you in a period of life when one year does more execution than three at yours, to which if you add the dulnefs of the air, and of the people, it will make a terrible fum. I have no very ftrong faith in your pretenders to Retirement; you are not of an age for it, nor have gone through either good or bad fortune enough to go into a corner, and form conclufions de contemptu munch & fuga faeculi, unlefs a poet grows weary of too much applause, as Minifters do of too much weight of bufinefs.

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Your happiness is greater than your merit, in chufing your favourites fo indifferently among either Party: this you owe partly to your Education, and partly to your Genius employing you in an Art in which Faction has nothing to do, for I fuppofe Virgil and Horace are equally read by Whigs and Tories. You have no more to do with the Conftitution of Church and State, than a Chriftian at Conftantinople; and you are fo much the wifer and the happier, becaufe both Parties will approve your Poetry as long as you are known to be of neither.

Your notions of friendship are new to me: I believe every man is born with his quantum, and he cannot give to one without robbing another. I very well know to whom I would give the firft places in my friendship, but they are not in the way: I am condemned to another fcene, and therefore I diftribute it in Pennyworths to thofe about me, and who difpleafe me leaft; and fhould do the fame to my fellow prisoners if I were condemned to jail. I can like

wife tolerate Knaves much better than Fools, because their knavery does me no hurt in the commerce I have with them, which however I own is more dangerous, tho' not fo troublesome, as that of Fools. I have often endeavoured to establish a Friendship among all Men of Genius, and would fain have it done: they are feldom above three or four Contemporaries, and if they could be united would drive the world before them. I think it was fo among the Poets in the time of Auguftus: but Envy, and Party, and Pride, have hindered it among us. I do not include the Subalterns, of which you are feldom without a large Tribe., Under the name of Poets and Scriblers I fuppofe you mean the Fools you are content to fee fometimes, when they happen to be modeft; which was not frequent among the while I was in the world.

I would defcribe to you my way of living, if any method could be called fo in this Country. I chufe my companions among thofe of leaft confequence and moft compliance: I read the moft trifling Books I can find, and whenever I write, it is upon the moft trifling fubjects: But riding, walking, and fleeping take up eighteen of the twenty-four hours. I procraftinate more than I did twenty years ago, and have feveral things to finifh which I put off to twenty years hence; Haec eft vita Solutorum, &c. Ifend you the compliments of a friend of yours, who hath passed four months this fummer with two grave acquaintance at his country-houfe, without ever once going to Dublin, which is but eight miles diftant; yet when he returns to London, I will engage you will find him as deep in the court of Requefts, the Park, the Operas and the Coffeehoufe, as any man there. I am now with him for a few days.

You must remember me with great affection to Dr. Arbuthnot, Mr. Congreve, and Gay. I think there are no more eodem tertio's between you and me, except Mr. Jervas, to whofe houfe I addrefs this, for want of knowing where you live: for it was not clear from your laft whether you lodge with Lord Peterborow, or he with you,

I am ever, etc,

LETTER