Ever preserve fome fpice of the aldermen, and prepare against age and dulnefs, and ficknefs, and coldness, or death of friends. A whore has a refource left, that the can turn bawd; but an old decayed poet is a creature abandoned, and at mercy, when he can find none. Get me likewife Polly's mezzotinto. Lord, how the fchoolboys at Westminster, and university-lads adore you at this juncture! Have you made as many men laugh as minifters can make weep? I will excufe Sir the trouble of a letter. When ambaffadors came from Troy to condole with Tiberius upon the death of his nephew, after two years; the Emperor anfwered, that he like wife condoled with them for the untimely death of Hector. I always loved and refpected him very much, and do ftill as much as ever; and it is a return fufficient, if he pleafes to accept the offers of my most humble fervice. The Beggar's opera hath knocked down Gulliver; I hope to fee Pope's Dulnefs * knock down the Beggar's opera, but not till it hath fully done its job. To expofe vice, and make people laugh with innocence, does more public fervice than all the minifters of ftate from Adam to Walpole and fo adieu. 100 LETTER XXIX. Lord BOLINBROKE to Dr. SWIFT. Pope charges himself with this letter. He has been two days; he is now hurrying to London; he will hurry back to Twickenham in two The Dunciad. Gg 2 days * days more; and, before the end of the week, he will be, for ought I know, at Dublin. In the mean time, his Dulness grows and flourishes, asif he was there already. It will indeed be a noble work. The many will ftare at it, the few will fmile, and all his patrons, from Bickerftaff to Gulliver, will rejoice, to fee themselves adorned in that immortal piece. I hear that you have had fome return of your illnefs which carried you fo fuddenly from us, if indeed it was your own illnefs which made you in fuch hafte to be at Dublin. Dear Swift, take care of your health. I'll give you a receipt for it, à la Montagne, or, which is better, à la Bruyere. Nourifler bien votri corps; ne lefatiguer jamais; laiffer rouiller l'efprit, meuble inutil, voire outile dangereux: laiffer fenner vos cloches le matin, peur eveiller les chanoines, et pour faire dormir le Deyen d'un fommeil doux et profond, qui lui procure de beaux fonges : lever vous tard, et aller à l'églife, pour vous faire payer d'avoir bien dormi et bien dejeuné. As to myfelf, (a perfon about whom I concern myself very little), I must fay a word or two out of complaifance to you. I am in my farm, and here I ihoot ftrong and tenacious roots. I have caught hold of the earth, (to use a gardener's phrafe), and neither my enemies nor my friends will find it an eafy matter to tranfplant me again. Adieu. Let me hear from you, at least of you. I love you for a thousand things; for none more than for the just esteem and love which you have for all the fons of Adam. P. S. According to Lord Bolingkroke's account, I fhall be at Dublin in three days. I cannot help adding a word, to defire you to expect my foul there with you by that time; but as for the jade of a body that is tacked to it, I fear there will * The Danciad, be be np dragging it after. I affure you I have few friends here to detain me, and no powerful one at court abfolutely to forbid my journey. I am told the gynocracy are of opinion, that they want no better writers than Cibber, and the British journalist; fo that we may live at quiet. and apply ourfelves to our more abftrufe ftudies. The only courtiers I know, or have honour to call my friends, are John Gay and Mr. Bow'ry. The former is at prefent fo employed in the elevated airs of his opera, and the latter in the exaltation of his high dignity, (that of her Majefty's waterman), that I can scarce obtain a categorical answer from either to any thing I fay to them. But the opera fucceeds extremely, to yours and my extreme fatisfaction, of which he promises this poft to give. you a full account. I have been in a worfe condition of health than ever, and think my immortality is very near out of my enjoyment; fo it must be in you, and in pofterity, to make me what amends you can for dying young. Adieu. While I am,. I am your's. Pray love me, and take care of yourself. I LETTER XXX. March 23. 1727-8. Send youa very odd thing, a paper printed in Boston in new England, wherein you'll find a real perfon, a member of their parliament, of the name of Jonathan Gulliver. If the fame of that traveller has travelled thither, it has travelled very quick to have folks christened already by the name. of the fuppofed author. But if you object, that no child fo lately chriftened, could be arrived at years of maturity to be elected in parliament; I reply, Gg 3 reply, (to folve the riddle), that the perfon is an Anabaptift, and not christened till full age, which fets all right. Hewever it be, the accident is very fingular, that these two names fhould be united. Mr. Gay's opera has been acted near forty days running, and will certainly continue the whole feafon. So he has more than a fence about his thoufand pound*: he'll foon be thinking of a fence about his two thoufand. Shall no one of us live as we would wifh each other to live? Shall he have no annuity, you no fettlement on this fide, and I no profpect of getting to you on the other? This world is made for Cæfar,-as Cato faid; for ambitious, falfe, or flattering people, to domineer in. Nay, they would not, by their good will, leave us our very books, thoughts, or words in quiet. I defpife the world yet, I affure you, more than either Gay or you, and the court more than all the reft of the world. As for thefe fcribblers for whom you apprehend I would fupprefs my Dulness, (which, by the way, for the future, you are to call by a more pompous name, The Dunciad), how much that neft of hornets are my regard, will eafily appear to you, when you read the treatife of the Ba thos. At all adventures, yours and my name fhall ftand linked as friends to pofterity, both in verse and profe, and, as Tully calls it, in confuetudine ftudiorum. Would to God our perfons could but as well and as furely be infeparable! I find my other ties dropping from me: fome worn off, fome torn Before Mr. Gay had fenced this thoufard pounds, he had a confaltation with his friends about the difpofal of it. Mr. L. advised him to intrust it to the funds, and live upon the intereft, Dr. Ar buthnot, to intruft it to Providence, and live upon the principal; and Mr. Pope was for purchafing an annuity for life. In this uncertainty he could only fay with the old man in Terence, Feciftis probe ; Incertior fum multo, quam dudum. Warb, off, off, others relaxing daily: my greateft, both by duty, gratitude, and humanity, time is fhaking every moment, and it now hangs but by a thread! I am many years the older, for living fo much with one so old; much the more helpless, for having been fo long helped and tended by her; much the more confiderate and tender, for a daily commerce with one who required me justly to be both to her; and confequently the more melancholy and thoughtful; and the lefs fit for others, who want only in a companion or a friend, to be amufed or entertained. My conftitution too has had its fhare of decay, as well as my fpirits; and I am as much in the decline at forty, as you at fixty. I believe we should be fit to live together, could I get a little more health, which might make me not quite infupportable. Your deafnefs would agree with my dulnefs; you would not want me to fpeak when you could not hear. But God forbid you should be as deftitute of the focial comforts of life, as I must when I lofe my mother; or that ever you fhould lofe your more ufeful acquaintance fo utterly, as to turn your thoughts to fuch a broken reed as I am, who could fo ill fupply your wants. I am extremely troubled at the returns of your deafnefs; you cannot be too particular in the accounts of your health to me ; every thing you do or fay in this kind, obliges me, nay, delights me, to fee the juftice you do me in thinking me concerned in all your concerns, fo that though the pleasanteft thing you can tell me be that you are better or eafier, next to that it pleases me, that you make me the perfon you would complain to. As the obtaining the love of valuable men is the happiest end I know of this life, fo the next felicity is, to get rid of fools and fcoundrels; which I can't but own to you was one part of my design in falling upon thefe authors, whofe incapacity is not greater |
