paper, I am, my dearest friend, yours entirely, as long as I can write, or fpeak, or think. J. SWIFT. I LETTER LXXXVII. From Dr. SWIFT, Dublin, July 23, 1737. SENT a letter to you some weeks ago, which my Lord Orrery inclosed in one of his, to which I receiv'd as yet no answer, but it will be time enough when his Lordfhip goes over, which will be, as he hopes, in about ten days, and then he will take with him "all the letters I preferv'd of yours, which are not above twenty-five. I "find there is a great chafm of fome years, but "the dates are more early than my two last jour neys to England, which makes me imagine, that "in one of those journeys I carried over another "Cargo." But I cannot trust my memory half an hour; and my disorders of deafnefs and giddinefs increase daily. So that I am delining as faft as it is eafily poffible for me, if I were a dozen years older. We have had your volume of letters, which, I am told, are to be printed here: Some of those who highly esteem you, and a few who know you perfonally, are grieved to find you make no diftinction between the English Gentry of this Kingdom, and the favage old Irifh (who are only the vulgar, and fome Gentlemen who live in the Irifh parts of the Kingdom) but the English Colonies, who are three parts in four, are much more civilized than many Counties in England, and speak better Eng lish, and are much better bred. And they think it very hard, that an American who is of the fifth generation from England, fhould be allowed to preserve that title, only because we have been told by fome of them that their names are entered in fome parish in London. I have three or four Coufins here who were born in Portugal, whofe parents took the fame care, and they are all of them Londoners. Dr. Delany, who, as I take it, is of an Irish family, came to vifit me three days ago, on purpose to complain of those paffages in your Letters; he will not allow fuch a difference between the two climates, but will affert that North-Wales, Northumberland, Yorkshire, and the other Northern Shires have a more cloudy ungenial air than any part of Ireland. In fhort, I am afraid your friends and admirers here will force you to make a Palinody. As for the other parts of your volume of Letters, my opinion is, that there might be collected from them the best System that ever was wrote for the Conduct of human life, at least to shame all reafonable men out of their Follies and Vices. It is fome recommendation of this Kingdom, and of the tafte of the people, that you are at leaft as highly celebrated here as you are at home. If you will blame us for Slavery, Corruption, Atheism, and fuch trifles, do it freely, but include England, only with an addition of every other Vice. I wish you would give orders against the corruption of English by thofe Scriblers, who fend us over their trah in Profe and Verfe, with abominable curtailings and quaint modernisms.I now am daily expecting an end of life: I have loft all fpirit, and every fcrap of health; I fometimes recover a little of my hearing, but my head is ever out of order. While I have any ability to hold a commerce with you, I will never be filent, and this chancing to be be a day that I can hold a pen, I will drag it as long as I am able. Pray let my Lord Orrery fee you often; next to yourself I love no man fo well; and tell him what I fay, if he vifits you. I have now done, for it is evening, and my head grows worse. May God always protect you, and preferve you long, for a pattern of Piety and Virtue. Farewel, my deareft and almoft only conftant friend. I am ever, at least in my esteem, honour, and affection to you, what I hope you expect me to be, Yours, &c. LETTER LXXXVIII. From Dr. SWIFT. My dear Friend, Dublin, Aug. 8, 1738. HAVE yours of July 25, and first I defire I you will upon my 25' a man worn with years, and funk by public as well as perfonal vexations. I have entirely loft my memory, uncapable of converfation by a cruel deafnefs, which has lafted almost a year, and I defpair of any cure. I fay not this to encrease your compaffion (of which you have already too great a part) but as an excufe for my not being regular in my Letters to you, and fome few other friends. I have an ill name in the Poft-office of both Kingdoms, which makes the Letters addreffed to me not seldom mifcarry, or be opened and read, and then sealed in a bungling manner before they come to my hands. Our friend Mrs. B. is very often in my thoughts, and high in my esteem; I defire, you will be the meffenger of my humble thanks and service to her. That fupe rior univerfal Genius you defcribe, whose handwriting I know towards the end of your Letter, hath made me both proud and happy; but by what he writes I fear he will be too foon gone to his Foreft abroad. He began in the Queen's time to be my Patron, and then defcended to be my Friend. It is a great favour of Heaven, that your health grows better by the addition of vears. I have abfolutely done with Poetry for feveral years paft, and even at my beft times I could produce nothing but trifles: I therefore reject your compliments on that score, and it is no compliment in me; for I take your fecond Dialogue that you lately fent me, to equal almost any thing you ever writ; although I live fo much out of the world, that I am ignorant of the facts and perfons, which, I prefume, are very well known from Temple-bar to St. James's; (I mean the Court exclufive.) ઃઃ "I can faithfully affure you, that every letter you have favour'd me with, thefe twenty years and more, are fealed up in bundles, and delivered to Mrs. W a very worthy, rational, "and judicious Coufin of mine, and the only re"lation whofe vifits I can fuffer: All thefe Letters "fhe is directed to fend fafely to you upon my "decease." My Lord Orrery is gone with his Lady to a part of her estate in the North: She is a perfon of very good understanding as any I know of her fex. Give me leave to write here a fhort anfwer to my Lord B's letter in the laft page of yours. My dear Lord, I am infinitely obliged to your Lordship for the honour of your letter, and kind remembrance of I do here confefs, that I have more obligations to your Lordship than to all the world befides. You never deceived me, even when you were a great great Minifter of State: and yet I love you ftill more, for your condefcending to write to me, when you had the honour to be an Exil. I can hardly hope to live till you publish your History, and am vain enough to wish that my name could be fqueez'd in among the few Subalterns, quorum pars parvi fui: If not, I will be revenged, and contrive fome way to be known to futurity, that I had the honour to have your Lordfhip for my best Patron; and I will live and die, with the higheft veneration and gratitude, your moft obedient, &c. P. S. I will here in a Poftfcript correct (if it be poffible) the blunders I have made in my letter. I fhewed my Coufin the above letter, and the affures me, that a great Collection of * your my letters to me, you, are put up and fealed, and in fome very fafe hand t. I am, my most dear and honoured Friend, entirely yours, It is now Aug. 24, J. SWIFT. 'Tis written juft thus in the Original. The Book that is now printed feems to be part of the Collection here fpoken of, as it contains not only the Letters of Mr. Pope but of Dr. Swift, both to him and Mr. Gay, which were return'd him after Mr. Gay's death: tho' any men... tion made by Mr. P. of the Return or Exchange of Letters has been induftriously fuppreft in the Publication, and only appears by fome of the Answers. The Earl of ORRERY to Mr. POPE. I am more and more convinced that your letters are neither loft nor burnt: but who the Dean means by a fafe hand in Ireland, is beyond my power of gueffing, tho' I am |
