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Letter 82. From Dr. Swift to Mr. Pope An Account of feveral little Pieces or Tracts published as his; which were, or were not, genuine. Letter 83. From Dr. Swift.

On the fame Subject. Of Mr. Pope's Epiftles, and particularly that on the Ufe of Riches..

Letter 84. From Dr. Swift. Of the Paper, called, The Life and Character of Dr. Swift. Of Mr. Gay, and the Care of his Papers. Of a Libel against Mr. Pope. Of the Edition of the Dean's Works in Ireland, how printed. Letter 85: From Dr. Swift. Of writing Letters: Several of the Ancients wrote them to publish. Of his own Letters. The Care he fhall take of Mr. Pope's, to prevent their being printed.

Letter 86. From Dr. Swift. Mention again of the Chafm in the Letters. Objections in Ireland to fome Passages in Mr. Pope's Letters published in England. The Dean's own Opinion of them.

Letter 87. From Dr. Swift. Of his declining State of Health. His Opinion of Mr. Pope's Dialogue, intitled, One Thousand Seven Hundred and Thirty-eight. The intire Collection of his and Mr. Pope's Letters for Twenty Years and upwards, found, and in the Hands of a Lady, a worthy and judicious Relation of the Dean's. This a Miftake; not in hers, but in fome other fafe Hands.

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LETTERS

TO and FROM

Dr. JONATHAN SWIFT, &c.

From the Year 1714, to 1737.

LETTER I.

Mr. POPE to Dr. SWIFT.

W

June 18, 1714.

Hatever apologies it might become me to make at any other time for writing to you, I thall ufe none now to a man who has owned himself as fplenetick as a Cat, in the country. In that circumftance, I know by experience a letter is a very useful, as well as amufing thing: If you are too bufied in State-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, to light a pipe; or if your difpofition fhould not be fo mathematical, in taking it with you to that place where men of studious minds are apt to fit longer than ordinary; where after an abrupt divifion of the paper, it may not be unpleasant to try to fit and rejoin VOL. VII.

B

the

the broken lines together. All these amusements I am no ftranger to in the country, and doubt not but (by this time) you begin to relish them in your present contemplative fituation.

I remember a man, who was thought to have fome knowledge in the world, us'd to affirm, that no people in town ever complained they were forgotten by their friends in the country: but my encreafing experience convinces me he was mistaken, 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 style, and tell them you admire at their infolence in difturbing your meditations, or even enquiring of your retreat but this I will not pofitively affert, because I never received any fuch infulting Epistle from you. My Lord

*

Oxford fays 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

* Sometime before the Death of Queen Anne, when her Minifters were quarrelling, and Dr. Swift could not reconcile them, he retired to a Friend's Houfe in Berkshire, and never faw them after.

Robert Harley, Efq; formerly Speaker of the House of Commons, created Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer, by Queen Anne, May 24,

1711.

| A Coffee-boufe in London, then frequented by the Wits.

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gone to Hanover, and that Gay goes only on an Ambaffy to you. Others apprehend fome dangerous State-treatise from your retirement; and a Wit who affects to imitaté Balfac, fays, that the Ministry now are like those Heathens of old, who received their Oracles from the woods. The Gentlemen of the Roman Catholick 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 leifure to the life and adventures of Scriblerus. This indeed must be granted of greater importance, than all the reft; and I wish I could promise 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 acknowledgments 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 retir❜d or abfent, are hourly exerting your indulgence, and bringing things to maturity for their advantage.

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Of

* This Book was published by Mr. Pope, under the Title of, Memoirs of the extraordinary Life, Works, and Discoveries of Martinus Scriblerus. Printed by George Faulkner in Dublin. B 2

Of all the world, you are the man (without flattery) who ferve your friends with the least oftentation; it is almoft ingratitude to thank you, confidering your temper; and this is the period of all my letter, which I fear you will think the most impertinent. I am with the trueft affection, Yours, &c.

LETTER

II.

From Dr. SWIFT to Mr. POPE.

My

Dublin, June 28, 1715.

Y* Lord Bishop of Clogher gave me your kind letter full of reproaches *for my not writing. I am naturally no very exact correfpondent, and when I leave a country without probability of returning, I think as feldom as I can of what I loved or esteemed in it, to avoid the Defiderium which of all things maketh life most uneasy. But you must give me leave to add one thing, that you talk at your cafe, being wholly unconcerned in publick 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 Bolingbroke,

* Dr. St. George Afh, formerly a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, (to whom the Dean was a Pupil) afterwards Bishop of Clogher, and tranflated to the See of Derry in 1716-17. || Robert Harley.

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