much recollection. I wish it partly for my own fake. We have lived little together of late, and we want to be phyficians for one another. It is a remedy that agreed very well with us both, for many years, and I fancy our conftitutions would mend upon the old medicine of ftudiorum fimilitudo, &c. I believe we both of us want whetting; there are feveral here who will do you that. good office, merely for the love of wit, which feems to be bidding the town a long and last adieu. I can tell you of no one thing worth reading, or feeing; the whole age feems refolved to juftify the Dunciad, and it may ftand for a public epitaph or monumental infcription like that at Thermopyla, on a whole people perished! There may indeed be a wooden image or two of poetry fet up, to preserve the memory that there once were bards in Britain; and (like the giants at Guildhall) show the bulk and bad tafte of our ancestors: at present the poor Laureat and Stephen Duck serve for this purpofe; a drunk fot of a parson holds forth the emblem of infpiration, and an honeft induftrious thresher not unaptly re-, prefents pains and labour. I hope this phenomenon of of Wiltshire has appeared at Amesbury, or the Duchefs will be thought infenfible to all bright qualities and exalted geniuses, in court and country alike. But he is a harmless man, and therefore I am glad. This is all the news talked of at court, but I will please you better to hear that Mrs. Howard talks of you, though not in the fame breath with the Thresher, as they do of me. By the way, have you feen or converfed with Mr. Chubb, who is a wonderful phænomenon of Wilfhire? I have read through his whole volume † with an admiration of the writer; though not always with approbation of the doctrine. I have paffed juft three days in * Eufden. This was his 4to volume, written before he had given any figns of thofe extravagancies which have fince rendered him fo famous. As the court fet up Mr. Duck for the rival of Mr. Pope, the city at the fame time confidered Chubb, as one who would eclipfe Locke. The modefty of the court-poet kept him fober in a very intoxicating fituation, while the vanity of this new-fathioned philofopher affifted his fage admirers in turning his head. in London in four months, two at Windfor, half an one at Richmond, and have not taken one excurfion into any other country. Judge now whether I can live in my library. Adieu. Live mindful of one of your first friends, who will be fo till the laft. Mrs. Blount deferves your remembrance, for fhe never forgets you, and wants nothing of being a friend *. I beg the Duke and her Grace's acceptance of my fervices: the contentment you exprefs in their company pleafes me, though it be the bar to my own, in dividing you from us. I am ever very truly SIR LETTER XXIII. Your, &c. Oct. 2, 1732. IR Clem. Cottrel tells me you will fhortly come to town. We begin to want comfort in a few friends about us, while the winds whiftle, and the waters roar. The fun gives us a parting look, but it is but a cold one; we are ready to change thofe diftant favours of a lofty beauty, for a grofs material fire that warms and comforts more. I wish you could be here till your family come to town you will live more innocently, and kill fewer harmless creatures, nay none, except by your proper deputy, the butcher. It is fit for confcience fake, that you fhould come to town, and that the Duchefs fhould ftay in the country, where no innocents of another species may fuffer by her. I hope the never goes to church: the Duke fhould lock you both up, and less harm would be done. I advise you to make man your game, hunt and beat about here for coxcombs, and trufs up rogues in fatire: I fancy they will turn to good account, if you can produce them fresh, or make them keep: and their relations will come, and buy their bodies of you. The Alluding to thofe lines in the epiftle On the Character of Women Verse 159, 160, vol. ii. "with ev'ry pleafing, ev'ry prudent part, The death of Wilks leaves Cibber without a colleague, abfolute and perpetual dictator of the ftage, though indeed while he lived he was but as Bibulus to Cæfar. However, ambition finds fomething to be gratified with in a mere name; or elfe, God have mercy upon poor ambition! Here is a dead vacation at prefent, no politics at court, no trade in town, nothing stirring but poetry. Every man, and every boy, is writing verfes on the Royal Hermitage: I hear the Queen is at lofs which to prefer; but for my own part, I like none fo well as Mr. Poyntz's in Latin. You would oblige my Lady Suffolk if you tried your Muse on this occafion. I am fure I would do as much for the Duchefs of Queenfberry, if the defired it. Several of your friends affure me it is expected from you: one fhould not bear in mind, all one's life, any little indignity one receives from a court; and therefore I am in hopes, neither her Grace will hinder you, nor you decline it. The volume of mifcellanies is juft published, which concludes all our fooleries of that kind. All your friends remember you, and, I affure you, no one more than Your, &c. I LETTER XXIV. From Mr. GAY to Mr. POPE. 08. 7, 1732. Am at last returned from my Somersetshire expedition, but fince my return 1 cannot fo much boaft of my health as before I went; for I am frequently out of order with my colical complaints, fo as to make me uneafy and difpirited, though not to any violent degree. The reception we met with, and the little excurfions we made were every way agreeable. I think the country abounds with beautiful profpects. Sir William Wyndham is at prefent amufing himself with some real improvements, and a great many vifionary caftles. We VOL. VI. C were were, often entertained with fea-views and fea-fifh, and were at fome places in the neighbourhood, among which I was mightily pleased with Dunster caftle near Minehead. It ftands upon a great eminence, and hath a profpect of that town, with an extenfive view of the Bristol channel, in which are feen two fmall islands called the Steep Holms and Flat Holms, and on the other fide we could plainly diftinguish the divifions of fields on the Welch coaft. All this journey I performed on horfeback, and I am very much difappointed that at prefent I feel myself fo little the better for it. I have indeed followed riding and exercife for three months fucceffively, and really think I was as well without it; fo that I begin to fear the illness I have fo long and fo often complained of, is inherent in my constitution, and that I have nothing for it but patience * As to your advice about writing panegyric, it is what I have not frequently done. I have indeed done it fometimes against my judgment and inclinations, and I heartily repent of it. And at prefent, as I have no defire of reward, and fee no just reason of praise, I think I had better let it alone. There are flatterers good enough to be found, and I would not interfere in any gentle. man's profeffion. I have feen no verses on these fublime occafions; fo that I have no emulation: let the patrons enjoy the authors, and the authors their patrons, for I know myself unworthy. I am, &c. LETTER * Mr. Gay died the November following at the Duke of Queenfberry's house in London, aged 46 years.-See Mr. Pope's epitaph on him, vol. ii. p. 320. I LETTER XXV. Mr. CLELAND to Mr. GAY †. Dec. 16, 1731 AM aftonished at the complaints occafioned by a late epifle to the Earl of Burlington; and I fhould be afflicted were there the leaft juft ground for them. Had the writer attacked Vice, at a time when it is not only tolerated but triumphant, and fo far from being concealed as a defect, that it is proclaimed with oftentation as a merit; I should have been apprehenfive of the confequence had he fatirized gamefters of a hundred thousand pounds fortune, acquired by fuch methods as are in daily practice, and almost universally encouraged; had he over-warmly defended the religion of his country, against fuch books as come from every prefs, are publickly vended in every fhop, and greedily bought by almost every rank of men; or had he called our excellent weekly writers by the fame names which they openly beflow on the greateft men in the miniftry, and out of the miniftry, for which they are all unpunished, and most rewarded: in any of these cafes, indeed, I might have judged him too prefumptuous, and perhaps have trembled for his rafhnefs. I could not but hope better for this small and modeft epiftle, which attacks no vice whatfoever; which deals only in folly, and not folly in general, but a fingle fpecies of it; that only branch, for the oppofite excellency to which, the Noble Lord to whom it is written must neceffarily be celebrated. I fancied it might escape cenfure, efpecially feeing how tenderly thefe follies are treated, and really less accused than apologized for. Yet hence the poor are cloth'd, the hungry fed, The lab'rer bears, Is this fuch a crime, that to impute it to a man must This was written by the fame hand that wrote the Letter to the Publisher, prefixed to the Dunciad, vol. iii. |