ed 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 confirm it: but annual Acknowledgments at least are neceflary 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 Prescription against me. I would not fay one word to you about myself (fince it is a subject 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 used to scatter with fome profufion among the female kind, has been these many years devoted to one object. A great many misfortunes (for fo they are called, though fometimes very improperly) and a retirement from the world, have made that just and nice difcrimination between my Acquaintance and my Friends, which we have feldom fagacity enough to make for ourselves; those infects of various hues, which used to hum and buz about me while I ftood in the funfhine, have disappeared 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 strokes by which it is judged that this illuftrious Philofopher had (like the Indian Fohu, the Grecian Pythagoras, the Perfian Zaroafter, and

2.

others

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 myself; nay, I am often fo happily abforbed by the abftracted reafon of things, that I am ready to imagine there never was any fuch monster as Party. Alas, I am foon awakened from that pleafing dream by the Greek and Ro man 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 fhould 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 course 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 fo far from rendering me violent or four to any, that I think my felf 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 company; and in ftripping me of Titles and Rank, and Estate, and fuch trinkets, which every man that will may (pare, they have given me that which no man can be happy without...

See the first note on Lett. V. of this Vo'.

Reflection

Reflection and habit have rendered the world fo indifferent to me, that I am neither afflicted nor rejoiced, angry nor pleased at what happens in it, any farther than perfonal 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; I am fometimes gay, but I am never fad. I have gained new friends, and have loft fome old one's; my acquifitions of this kind give me a good deal of pleasure, because they have not been made lightly: I know no vows fo folemn as thofe of friendfhip, and therefore a pretty long noviciate of acquaintance should methinks precede them: My loffes of this kind give me but little trouble, I contributed 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 distance 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 seen before a fword-cutler's fhop in Germany; but even in these constrained poftures the witty Rascal 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 almoft 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 asked, and which he will fend

you,

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.

R

LETTER IX.

From Dr. SWIFT.

Dublin, Sept. 20, 1723.

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 a mighty difference betwixt Friendship and Love, for a lover (as I have heard) is always fcribling to his mistress. If I could permit myself 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. I left you in a period of life when one year does more execution than three at yours, to which if you add the dulness of the air, and of the people, it will make a terrible fum. I have no very ftrong faith in you 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 mundi & fuga fæculi, unlefs a Poet grows weary of too much applause, as Ministers do of too much weight of business.

Your happiness is greater than your Merit, in chufing your Favourites fo indifferently among either Party: this you owe partly to your Education, VOL. IX.

D

and

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 wiser and happier, because 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 this quantum, and he cannot give to one without robbing another. I very well know to whom I would give the first places in my Friendship, but they are not in the way: I am condemned to another scene, and therefore I diftribute it in Pennyworths to those about me, and who difplease me leaft; and fhould do the fame to my fellow prifoners if I were condemned to jayl. I can likewife 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 so troublefome, 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 suppose you mean the Fools you are content to fee fometimes, when they happen to be modeft; which was not frequent among them while I was in the world.

Yet they are the Christian notions,

I would