which appear to be patch'd and altered, and the ftyle of a different fort (unless I am much mistaken) Dr. Arbuthnot likes the Projectors leaft f; others, you tell me, the Flying ifland; fome think it wrong to be fo hard upon whole Bodies or Corporations, yet the general opinion is, that reflections on particular perfons are most to be blam'd: fo that in these cafes, I think the best method is to let cenfure and opinion take their course. A Bishop here said, that book was full of improbable lies, and for his part, he hardly believed a word of it; and fo much for Gulliver.

Going to England is a very good thing, if it were not attended with an ugly circumftance of return. ing to Ireland. It is a fhame you do not perfuade your Minifters to keep me on that fide, if it were but by a court expedient of keeping me in prison for a Plotter; but at the fame time I must tell you, that fuch journeys very much shorten my life, for a month here is longer than fix at Twickenham.

How comes friend Gay to be fo tedious? another man can publish fifty-thousand Lies fooner than he can fifty Fables.

I am juft going to perform a very good office, it is to affift with the Archbishop, in degrading a Parfon who couples all our beggars, by which I fhall make one happy man: and decide the great queftion of an indelible character in favour of the principles in fashion; this I hope you will reprefent to the Miniftry in my favour, as a point of merit; fo farewell till I return.

I am come back, and have deprived the parfon, who by a law here is to be hanged the next couple

*This was the fact, which is complained of and redreffed in the Dublin Edition of the Dean's works. Becaufe he understood it to be intended as a fatire on the Royal Society.

he marries: he declared to us that he refolved to be hanged, only defired that when he was to go to the gallows, the Archbishop would take off his Excommunication. Is not he a good Catholic?_and yet he is but a Scotch-man. This is the only Irish event I ever troubled you with, and I think it deferves notice-Let me add, that, if I were Gulliver's friend, I would defire all my acquaintance to give out that his copy was bafely mangled, and abused, and added to, and blotted out by the Printer; for fo to me it feems, in the fecond volume particularly.

Adieu.

I

I

LETTER XXI.

From Dr. SWIFT.

December 5, 1726,

Believe the hurt in your hand affects me more than it does yourself, and with reafon, because may probably be a greater lofer by it. What have Accidents to do with those who are neither jockeys, nor fox-hunters, nor bullies, nor drunkards? And yet a rascally Groom shall gallop a foundred horse ten miles upon a causeway, and get home fafe.

I am very much pleas'd that you approve what was fent, because I remember to have heard a great man fay, that nothing required more judgment than making a prefent; which when it is done to those of high rank, ought to be of fomething that is not readily got for money. You oblige me, and at the fame time do me juftice in what you obferve as to Mr. P. Befides, it is too late in life for me to act otherwife, and therefore I follow a very eafy

road

road to virtue, and purchase it cheap. If you will give me leave to join us, is not your life and mine a ftate of power, and dependence a state of slavery? We care not three pence whether a Prince or Minifter will fee us or no: We are not afraid of having ill offices done us, nor are at the trouble of guarding our words for fear of giving offence. I do agree that Riches are Liberty, but then we are to put into the balance how long our apprenticeship is to laft in acquiring them.

Since you have receiv'd the verses, I most earnestly intreat you to burn those which you do not approve, and in those few where you may not diflike fome parts, blot out the reft, and fometimes (tho' it be against the laziness of your nature) be fo kind to make a few corrections, if the matter will bear them. I have fome few of thofe things I call Thoughts moral and diverting; if you pleafe, I will fend the best I can pick from them, to add to the new volume. I have reason to chuse the method you mention of mixing the several verses, and I hope thereby among the bad Critics to be entitled to more merit than is my due.

This moment I am fo happy to have a letter from my Lord Peterborow, for which I intreat you will present him with my humble refpects and thanks, tho' he all-to-be-Gullivers me by very ftrong infinuations. Though you defpife Riddles, I am ftrongly tempted to fend a parcel to be printed by themselves, and make a nine-penny jobb for the bookfeller. There are fome of my own, wherein I exceed mankind, Mira Poemata! the most solemn that were ever seen; and some writ by others, admirable indeed, but far inferior to mine; but I will not praise myself. You approve that writer who laughs and makes others laugh; but why fhould I who hate the world, or you who do not love it, make it fo happy? therefore I refolve from

hence

henceforth to handle only ferious fubjects, nifi quid tu, docte Trebati, Diffentis.

Your's, &c.

MR

LETTER XXII.

March 8, 1726-7.

R. Stopford will be the bearer of this letter, V for whofe acquaintance I am, among many other favours, obliged to you: and I think the ac quaintance of fo valuable, ingenious, and unaffected a man, to be none of the leaft obligations.

Our Mifcellany is now quite printed. I am prodigiously pleas'd with this joint-volume, in which methinks we look like friends, fide by side, serious and merry by turns, converfing interchangeably, and walking down hand in hand to pofterity; not in the ftiff forms of learned Authors, flattering each other, and fetting the reft of mankind at nought: but in a free, unimportant, natural, easy manner; diverting others juft as we diverted our felves. The third volume confifts of Verfes, but I would chufe to print none but fuch as have fome peculiarity, and may be distinguish'd for ours, from other writers. There's no end of making Books, Solomon faid, and above all of making Mifcella nies, which all men can make. For unless there be a character in every piece, like the mark of the Elect, I fhould not care to be one of the Twelvei thousand figned.

You receiv'd, I hope, fome commendatory verfes from a Horfe and a Lilliputian, to Gulliver; and an heroic Epiftle of Mrs. Gulliver. The Book feller would fain have printed 'em before the second Edition of the Book, but I would not permit it without your approbation: nor do I much like them.

You

You fee how much like a Poet I write, and yet if you were with us, you'd be deep in Politics. People are very warm, and very angry, very little to the purpose, but therefore the more warm and the more angry: Non noftrum eft, Tantas componere lites, Iftay at Twitnam, without for much as reading news-papers, votes, or any other paltry Pamphlets: Mr. Stopford will carry you a whole parcel of then, which are fent for your diverfion, but not imitation. For my own part, methinks I am at Glubdubdrib with none but ancients and Spirits about me.

I am rather better than I ufe to be at this feafon, but my hand (tho', as you fee, it has not loft its cunning) is frequently in very aukward fenfations, rather than pain. But to convince you it is pretty well, it has done fome mifchief already, and just been firong enough to cut the other hand, while it was aiming to prune a fruit-tree,

Lady Bolingbroke has writ you a long, lively letter, which will attend this; She has very bad health,, he very good. Lord Peterborow has writ twice to you we fancy fome letters have been in tercepted, or loft by accident. About ten thousand things I want to tell you: I wish you were as im patient to hear them, for if fo, you would, you must come early this fpring. Adieu. Let me have a line from you. I am vex'd at lofing, Mr..Stopford as foon as I knew him: but I thank God I have known him no longer. If every man one begins to value muft, fettle in Ireland, pray make me know no more of them, and I forgive you this

one,

LET