XII.

I

LETTER

From Dr SWIFT.

Sept. 29. 1725.

Am now returning to the noble-fcene of Dublin, into the grand monde, for fear of burying my parts ;. to fignalize myself among curates and vicars, and cor rect all corruptions crept in relating to the weight of bread and butter, through thofe dominions where I go. vern. I have employed my time (befides ditching) in finishing, correcting, amending, and tranfcribing my travels, in four parts complete, newly augmented, and intended for the prefs when the world fhall deserve them, or rather when a printer fhall be found brave e nough to venture his ears. I like the fcheme of our meeting after diftreffes and difperfions: but the chief end I propose to myself in all my labours, is to vex the world, rather than divert it; and if I could compass. that defign without hurting my own perfon or fortune,. I would be the most indefatigable writer you have ever feen, without reading. I am exceedingly pleafed that you have done with tranflations. Lord Treasurer Oxford often lamented, that a rafcally world fhould lay you under a neceffity of mifemploying your genius for fo long a time. But fince you will now be fo much better employed, when you think of the world, give it one lash the more at my requeft. I have ever hated all nations, profeffions, and communities; and all my love is towards individuals. For instance, I hate the tribe of lawyers; but I love Counsellor fuch a one, and Judge fuch a one. 'Tis fo with phyficians, (I will not speak of my own trade), foldiers, English, Scotch, French, and the reft. But principally I hate and deteft that animal called man, although I heartily love John, Peter,, Thomas, and fo forth. This is the fyftem upon which I have governed myself many years, (but do not tell), and fo I fhall go on till I have done with them. I have got materials towards a treatife, proving the fallity.

* Gulliver's travels.

of

of that definition, animal rationale, and to fhew it should be only rationis capax. Upon this great foundation of mifanthropy (though not in Timon's manner) the whole building of my travels is erected; and I never will have peace of mind till all honeft men are of my opinion. By confequence you are to embrace it immediately, and procure that all who deferve my esteem may do fo too. The matter is fo clear, that it will admit of no difpute;

nay, I will hold a hundred pounds, that you and I agree

in the point.

I did not know your Odyffey was finished, being yet in the country, which I fhall leave in three days. I thank you kindly for the prefent, but fhall like it three fourths the lefs, for the mixture you mention of other hands; however, I am glad you faved yourself fo much drudgery. I have been long told by Mr Ford of your great atchievements in building and planting, and especially of your fubterranean paffage to your garden,where by you turned a blunder into a beauty, which is a piece of ars poetica.

I have almost done with Harridans, and shall foon be come old enough to fall in love with girls of fourteen. The lady whom you describe to live at court, to be deaf, and no party-woman, 1 take to be Mythology, but know not how to moralize it. She cannot be Mercy; for Mercy is neither deaf, nor lives at court: Juftice is blind, and perhaps deaf; but neither is fhe a court-lady: Fortune is both blind and deaf, and a court, lady; but then fhe is a moft damnable party-woman, and will never make me easy, as you promife. It must be Riches, which anfwers all your defcription. I am glad fhe vifits you; but my voice is fo weak, that I doubt fhe will never hear me.

Mr Lewis fent me an account of Dr Arbuthnot's illnefs; which is a very sensible affliction to me, who, by living fo long out of the world, have loft that hardnefs of heart contracted by years and general converfation. I am daily lofing friends, and neither feeking nor getting others. Oh, if the world had but a dozen of Arbuthnots in it, I would burn my travels! But however he is not without fault. There is a paffage in Bede, highly commending the piety and learning of the

Irish in that age; where, after abundance of praifes, he overthrows them all, by lamenting that, alas! they kept Eafter at a wrong time of the year. So our Doctor has every quality and virtue that can make a man amiable or useful; but, alas, he hath a fort of flouch in his walk! I pray God protect him, for he is an excellent Christian, though not a Catholic.

I hear nothing of our friend Gay, but I find the court keeps him at hard meat. I advised him to come over here with a Lord Lieutenant. Philips writes little flams (as Lord Leicester called thofe fort of verses) on Mifs Carteret. A Dublin blacksmith, a great poet, hath imitated his manner in a poem to the faid Mifs. Philips is a complainer; and on this occasion I told Lord Carteret, that complainers never succeeded at court, though railers do.

Are you altogether a country-gentleman, that I muft addrefs to you out of London, to the hazard of your lofing this precious letter, which I will now conclude, although fo much paper is left? I have an ill name, and therefore fhall not fubfcribe it, but you will guess it comes from one who esteems and loves you about half as much as you deserve, I mean as much as he can.

I am in great concern at what I am just told is in fome of the news papers, that Lord Bolingbroke is much hurt by a fall in hunting. I am glad he has fo much youth and vigour left, (of which he hath not been thrif ty); but I wonder he has no more difcretion.

I

08. 15. 1725.

Am wonderfully pleafed with the fuddennefs of your kind anfwer. It makes me hope you are coming towards us, and that you incline more and more to your old friends, in proportion as you draw nearer to them, and are getting into our vortex. Here is one who was once a powerful planet, but has now (after long experi ence of all that comes of fhining) learned to be content with returning to his firft point, without the thought

or ambition of fhining at all. Here is another, who thinks one of the greatest glories of his father was to have diftinguished and loved you, and who loves you hereditarily. Here is Arbuthnot, recovered from the jaws of death, and more pleafed with the hope of seeing you again, than of reviewing a world; every part of which he has long despised, but what is made up of a few men like yourself. He goes abroad again, and is more chearful than even health can make a man; for he has a good confcience into the bargain, (which is the most catholic of all remedies, though not the most univerfal). I knew it would be a pleasure to you to hear this, and in truth that made me write so soon to you.

I am forry poor P. is not promoted in this age; for certainly if his reward be of the next, he is of all poets the most miserable. I'm also forry for another reason ; if they don't promote him, they'll fpoil the conclufion of one of my fatires, where, having endeavoured to correct the taste of the town in wit and criticifm, I end thus,

But what avails to lay down rules for fenfe?
In 's reign thefe fruitless lines were writ,
When Ambrofe Philips was prefer'd for wit!

Our friend Gay is ufed as the friends of Tories are by Whigs (and generally by Tories too). Because he had humour, he was fuppofed to have dealt with Dr Swift: in like manner as when any one had learning formerly, he was thought to have dealt with the devil. He puts his whole truft at court in that lady whom I described to you, and whom you take to be an allegorical crea ture of fancy. I wish the really were riches for his sake; though as for your's, I question whether (if you knew her) you would change her for the other.

Lord Bolingbroke had not the leaft harm by his fall. I wish he had received no more by his other fall. Lord Oxford had none by his. But Lord Bolingbroke is the most improved mind fince you saw him, that ever was improved, without shifting into a new body, or being: paulo minus ab angelis. I have often imagined to myself, that if ever all of us meet again, after so many varieties and changes, after so much of the old world and of the

old

old man in each of us has been altered, that scarce a fingle thought of the one, any more than a single atom of the other, remains just the same; I've fancied, I say, that we should meet like the righteous in the millennium, quite in peace, divefted of all our former paffions, fmiling at our paft follies, and content to enjoy the king dom of the just in tranquillity. But I find you would rather be employed as an avenging angel of wrath, to break your vial of indignation over the heads of the wretched creatures of this world; nay, would make them eat your book, which you have made, I doubt not, as bitter a pill for them as poffible.

I won't tell you what designs I have in my head (be. fides writing a fet of maxims in oppofition to all Rochefoucault's principles *) till I fee you here, face to face. Then you fhall have no reafon to complain of me, for want of a generous difdain of this world, though I have not loft my ears in yours and their fervice. Lord Oxford too (whom I have now the third time mentioned in this letter, and he deserves to be always mentioned in every thing that is addreffed to you, or comes from you) expects you: that ought to be enough to bring 'tis a better reafon than if the nation exyou hither; pected you. For I really enter as fully as you can defire, into your principle of love of individuals; and I think the way to have a public fpirit, is first to have a private one: for who can believe, (faid a friend of mine), that any man can care for a hundred thousand people, who never cared for one? No ill-humoured man can ever be a patriot, any more than a friend.

I defigned to have left the following page for Dr Arbuthnot to fill; but he is fo touched with the period in yours to me concerning him, that he intends to answer it by a whole letter. He too is bufy about a book, which I guess he will tell you of. So adieu.- -What remains worth telling you? Dean Berkley is well, and happy in the profecution of his fcheme. Lord Oxford

* This was only faid as an oblique reproof of the horrid misanthropy in the foregoing letter; and which he fuppofed might be chiefly occafioned by the Dean's fondness for Rochefoucault, whofe maxims are founded on the principle of an universal selfishness in hu man nature, Warb.

and