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I cannot pretend to have these people honeftly faved under fome hundred pounds, whether you confider the difficulty of fuch a work, or the extreme love and tenderness I bear them, which will infallibly make me push this charity as far as I am able. There is but one more whofe falvation I infift upon, and then I have done; but indeed it may prove of fo much greater charge than all the reft, that I will only lay the cafe before you and the miniftry, and leave to their prudence and generosity, what fum they shall think fit to bestow upon it.

The perfon I mean, is Dr. Swift, a dignified clergyman, but one, who, by his own confeffion, has compofed more libels than fermons. If it be true, what I have heard often affirmed by innocent people, That too much wit is dangerous to falvation, this unfortunate gentleman must certainly be damned to all eternity. But I hope his long experience in the world, and frequent converfation with great men, will caufe him (as it has fome others) to have lefs and lefs wit every day. Be it as it will, I fhould not think my own foul deserved to be faved, if I did not endeavour to fave his for I have all the obligations in nature to him. He has brought me into better company than I cared for, made me merrier when I was fick than I had a mind to be, and put me upon making poems, on purpose that he might alter them, &c.

I once thought I could never have discharged my debt to his kindness; but have lately been informed, to my unfpeakable comfort, that I have more than paid it all. For Monf. de Montagne has affured me, "that the perfon who receives a bene"nefit, obliges the giver :" for fince the chief endeavour of one friend is to do good to the other, he who adminifters both the matter and occafion, is the man who is liberal. At this rate it is poffible Dr. Swift should be ever out of

my debt,

as matters stand already; and for the future, he may expect daily more obligations from

His most faithful, affectionate,

humble fervant,

A. POPE.

I have finished The Rape of the Lock; but I believe I may stay here till Christmas, without hindrance of business.

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June 18. 1714. Whatever apologies it might become me to make

at any other time for writing to you, I fhall ufe none now, to a man who has owned himself as fplenetic as a cat in the country. In that circumftance, I know by experience, a letter is a very ufeful, as well as amufing thing. If you are too bufied in ftate-affairs to read it, yet you may find entertainment in folding it into divers figures; either doubling it into a pyramidical, or twifting it into a ferpentine form: or, if your difpofition fhould not be fo mathematical, in taking it with you to that place where men of ftudious minds are apt to fit longer than ordinary; where, after an abrupt divifion of the paper, it may not be unpleasant to try to refit and rejoin the broken lines together. All thefe amufements I am no ftranger to in the country: and doubt not but, by this time, you begin to relish them in your prefent contemplative fituation. VOL. IX.

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I re

I remember a man who was thought to have fome knowledge in the world, ufed to affirm, that no people in town ever complained they were forgotten by their friends in the country. But my increafing experience convinces me he was miftaken; for I find a great many here grievously complaining of you upon this fcore. I am told further, that you treat the few you correfpond with, in a very arrogant ftyle; and tell them, you admire at their infolence in disturbing your meditations, or even inquiring of your retreat: but this I will not pofitively affert, because I never rereived any fuch infulting epiftle from you. My Lord Oxford says, you have not written to him once fince you went. But this perhaps may be only policy in him or you; and I, who am half a Whig, muft not entirely credit any thing he affirms. At Button's it is reported you are gone to Hanover, and that Gay goes only on an embaffy to you. Others apprehend fome dangerous ftate-treatise from your retirement; and a wit who affects to imitate Balfac, fays that the ministry now are like thofe Heathens of old, who received their oracles from the woods. The gentlemen of the Roman Catholic perfuafion are not unwilling to credit me, when I whisper, that you are gone to meet fome Jefuits commiffioned from the court of Rome, in order to fettle the most convenient methods to be taken for the coming of the pretender. Dr. Arbuthnot is fingular in his opinion, and imagines your only defign is to attend at full leisure to the life and adventures of Scriblerus *. This

* Some time before the death of Queen Anne, when her minifters were quarrelling, and the Dean could not reconcile them, he retired to a friend's house in Berkshire, and never faw them after. Dub.edit.

*This project (in which the principal perfons engaged were. Dr. Arbuthnot, Dr. Swift, and Mr. Pope) was to write a complete fatire in profe upon the abufes in every branch of science, comprised in the hiftory of the life and writings of Scriblerus. Of which only fome detached parts and fragments were done; fuch as, The Memoirs

"of

279 This indeed must be granted of greater importance than all the rest; and I wish I could promife fo well. of you. The top of my own ambition is to contribute to that great work, and I fhall tranflate Homer by the by. Mr. Gay has acquainted you what progrefs I have made in it. I can't name Mr. Gay, without all the acknowledgements which I fhall ever owe you on his account. If I writ this in verfe, I would tell you, you are like the fun; and while men imagine you to be retired or absent, are hourly exerting your influence, and bringing things to maturity for their advantage. Of all the world, you are the man (without flattery) who serve your friends with the leaft oftentation; it is almost ingratitude to thank you, confidering your temper; and this is the period of all my letter which I fear you will think the moft impertinent. I am, with the trueft affection,

Your's, &c.

MY

LETTER

III.

From Dr. SWIFT to Mr. POPE..

Dublin, June 28. 1715.

My Lord Bishop of Clogher * gave me your kind letter, full of reproaches for not writing. I am naturally no very exact correfpondent; and when I leave a country without probability of

"of Scriblerus, The Travels of Gulliver, The Treatife of the Profound, The literal criticism on Virgil," &c. Wa b.

* Dr. St. George Afh, formerly a fellow of Trinity college, Dub lin, (to whom the Dean was pupil), afterwards Bishop of Clogher, and tranflated to the fee of Derry in 1716-17. Dub. edit.

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returning

returning, I think as feldom as I can of what I loved or esteemed in it, to avoid the defiderium which of all things makes life most uneafy. But you must give me leave to add one thing; that you talk at your cafe, being wholly unconcerned in public events: for if your friends the Whigs continue, you may hope for fome favour: if the Tories return, you are at leaft fure of quiet. You know how well I loved both Lord Oxford and Bolinbroke, 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, et verfus tecum meditare canoros. - Do you imagine I can be eafy, when I think of the probable confequences of thefe 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 eclipfe, but it was that eclipfe which happened on the 1st 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 rhimes 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 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 +.

Put these two last observations together, and it will appear, tha

Mr'

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