|| Bolingbroke, and how dear the § Duke of Ormond is to me: Do you imagine I can be eafy while their enemies are endeavouring to take off their heads? * I nunc, & verfus tecum meditare canoros Do you imagine I can be eafy when I think of the probable confequences of these proceedings, perhaps upon the very peace of the nation, but certainly of the minds of fo many hundred thousand good fubjects? Upon the whole, you may truly attribute my filence to the eclypfe, but it was that eclypfe which happened on the first of Auguft.

I borrowed your Homer from the Bishop (mine is not yet landed) and read it out in two evenings. If it pleaseth others as well as me, you have got your end in profit and reputation: Yet I am angry at fome bad Rhymes and Triplets, and pray in your next do not let me have fo many unjustifiable Rhymes to war and gods. I tell you all the faults I know, only in one or two places you are a little obfcure but I expected you to be fo in one or two and twenty. I have heard no foul talk of it here, for indeed it is not come over, nor do we very much abound in judges; at least I have not the

B 3

;

|| Henry St. John. § James Butler, Duke of Ormond, who went to France in the Year 1715, and lived at Avignon, where he died in 1745, being the last Duke of that antient Family, by whofe Death the Title became extinct.

*Go now and meditate the tuneful Song. + Queen Anne died Auguft 1, 1714.

.

the honour to be acquainted with them. Your Notes are perfectly good, and fo are your-Preface and Effay. You were pretty bold in mentioning Lord Bolingbroke in that Preface. I faw the Key to the Lock but yesterday: I think you have changed it a good deal, to adapt it to the prefent times.

;

God be thanked I have yet no parliamentary bufinefs and if they have none with me, I fhall never seek their acquaintance. I have not been very fond of them for some years past, not when I thought them tolerably good, and therefore if I can get leave to be abfent, I fhall be much inclined to be on that fide, when there is a parliament on this: but truly I must be a little eafy in my mind before I can think of Scriblerus.

You are to understand that I live in the corner of a vaft unfurnished house, my family confifteth of a steward, a groom, a helper in the ftable, a foot-man, and an old maid, who are all at board-wages, and when I do not dine abroad, or make an entertainment, (which laft is very rare) I eat a mutton-pye, and drink half a pint of. wine: My amusements are defending my small dominions against the ArchBishop, and endeavouring to reduce my rebellious Choir. *Perditur hæc inter mifero lux.

I defire you will present my humble fervice to Mr. Addison, Mr. Congreve, and Mr. Rowe, and Gay. I am, and will be always, extreamly yours, &c. LET

* Thus all my Hours of Light and Life are loft,

I

LETTER III.

Mr. POPE to Dr. SWIFT.

June 20, 1716.

Cannot fuffer a friend to cross the Irish feas without bearing a teftimony from me of the constant esteem and affection I am both obliged and inclined to have for you. It is better he should tell you than I, how often you are in our thoughts and in our cups, and how I learn to fleep lefs and drink more, whenever you are named among us. I look upon a friend in Ireland as upon a friend in the other world, whom (popifhly-speaking) I believe constantly welldifpofed towards me, and ready to do me all the good he can, in that state of separation, tho' I hear nothing from him, and make addreffes to him but very rarely. A proteftant divine cannot take it amifs that I treat him in the fame manner with my patron Saint.

I can tell you no news, but what you will not fufficiently wonder at, that I fuffer many things as an Author militant: whereof, in your days of probation, you have been a sharer, or you had not arrived to that triumphant state you now deservedly enjoy in the Church. As for me, I have not the leaft hopes of the Cardinalat, tho' I fuffer for my Religion in almost every weekly paper. I have begun to take a pique at the Pfalms of David (if the wicked

B 4

may

may be credited, who have printed a scandalous one in my name). This report I dare not difcourage too much, in a profpect I have at prefent of a poft under the Marquis de Langallerie, wherein if I can but do fome figual fervice against the Pope, I may be confiderably advanced by the Turks, the only religious people I dare confide in. If it fhould happen hereafter that I fhould write for the holy law of Mahomet, I hope it may make no breach between you and me; every one must live, and I beg you will not be the man to manage the controversy against me. The Church of Rome I judge (from many modern fymptoms, as well as ancient prophecies) to be in a declining condition; that of England will in a short time be scarce able to maintain her own family: fo Churches fink as generally as banks, in Europe, and 'tis time to look out for fome better fecurity.

I don't know why I tell you all this, but that I always loved to talk to you; and this is not a time for any man to talk to the purpose. Truth is a kind of contraband commodity which I would not venture to export, and therefore the only thing tending that dangerous way which I fhall fay, is, that I am and always will be with the utmoft fincerity,

Yours, &c.

LETTER

LETTER IV.

From Dr. SwIFT to Mr. POPE.

Aug. 30, 1716.

Had the Favour of yours by Mr. F. of whom, before any other Question relating to your Health, or Fortune, or Succefs as a Poet, I enquired your Principles, in the common Form,

Is he a Whig or a Tory?" I am forry to find they are not fo well tallied to the present Juncture as I could wifh. I always thought the Terms of Facto and Jure had been introduced by the Poets, and that Poffeffion of any Sort in Kings was held an unexceptionable Title in the Courts of Parnaffus. If you do not grow a perfect good Subject in all its prefent Latitudes, I fhall conclude you are become rich, and able to live without Dedications to Men in Power, whereby one great Inconvenience will follow, that you and the World and Pofterity will be utterly ignorant of their Virtues. For, either your Brethren have miferably deceived us thefe hundred Years paft, or Power conferreth Virtue, as naturally as five of your popifh Sacraments do Grace.- You fleep lefs and drink more. But your Mafter Horace was Vini fomnique benignus And as I take it, both are proper your Trade. Trade. As to mine, there are a thousand poetical

*

* Indulgent to himself in Sleep and Wine.

for