You frightened me a little about Father Francis *; I was afraid you were going to make a funeral oration on Atterbury †, which might contain fome treafon; but the name of the Spectator made me take heart of grace again; we have recollected the story.

I fhall be glad to receive your "works" into my study; and I am preparing a place for them,

Tibi jam brachia contrahit ardens Scorpius, &c.

I doubt not but you will do an honour to my collection; though, without vanity, as poetry goes now, it would be a fort of an apotheofis for most of the present writers, Yours most affectionately,

M. BACON.

Father Francis and fifter Conftance, a tale, "from the Spectator,' vol. 2, numb. 164, turned "into verfe and enlarged by Mr. Jeffreys." See it in his " works," p. 119.

+ That bishop died in exile at Paris, February 17, 1731.

Το

To fhew you how differently the fame things may be faid by different poets, and how a great genius makes things fhine where a trifler makes them ridiculous, take thefe inftances of Cowley and Milton. I fhall quote only the verses of Cowley, and leave you to recollect thofe of Milton.

"Here a vaft hill'gainst thund'ring Baäl was thrown, "Trees and beafts on't, &c.

"One flings a mountain, and its river too,

"Torn up with't; that rains back on him that threw.”

Again.

"His fpear the trunk was of a lofty tree,

"Which nature meant, fome tall ship's mast should be."

Again.

"Their jocund shouts th' air, like a storm, did tear.”

"Tormented all the air! &c."-Milton.

LETTER

LETTER XCIV.

Mr. BACON to Mr. JEFFREY S.

DEAR SIR,

I TH

Cambridge, Dec. 10, 1732.

THANK you kindly for your entertaining letter, but must be short in my preface, having two long points to anfwer. You talk to me, as of a terra auftralis incognita, about two authors that I am particularly acquainted with; I mean, if by "father Hardin," you intend "father Har

deüin," which I fhould hardly imagine. Malebranche I was complete master of above twelve years ago, and, of what you call "jargon," I dare fay, I understand as much as the author himself did. I know full well all his faults, and had, many years fince, a defiga to have extracted his good things, by way of ana, and left the bad behind. His fcheme about "ideas,

Like Menagiana, Hactiana, &c.

"union with GOD," &c. is unintelligible nonfenfe, come from what father it will; but he must be a critic in confequences indeed, that can extract atheism out of nonsense. But, not to run down Malebranche neither; for a knowledge of human nature, in all its branches, the imagi nation, the fenfes, the inclinations, and the paffions, no man has fhewn a greater and more comprehensive understanding. And for ftyle, he is the most noble, the most magnificent, and the clearest writer, I may very near fay, that ever I read. Is Plato, whofe fucceffor Malebranche is, despised, because his principles are unintelligible, when the beauty of imagination is fo great in his works? Malebranche has likewife written against imagination with the finest imagination that can be. As to the objection of " atheism," I always thought him bigottedly fuperftitious, and that, like his mafter, Plato, he was as proper a man as could be, to have discovered the Trinitarian notion, before it was revealed, by mere ftrength of thinking out of the way. But the clergy, I am afraid, of all na

tions, have an arch-chemic power to produce atheism in what foil they please; or elfe not even a Jefuit could have charged fo devout a man as Malebranche, with it; a man, who thought of nothing, but the love of GOD, and moral duties, all his life; and fhewed a contempt for all things elfe. Confequences, especially where principles are dark, may be wire-drawn any how.

I have a long article for you about father Hardouin, if he be the man you mean; but I durft not venture to affront you fo much, as to fuppofe you can want information upon the fubject of the famous editor of Pliny, the great chronologer, medalift, geographer, and ftill more famous for his scheme to prove all the ancient au thors, (fathers and all) fuppofititious *. I never heard of any father Hardin fo late as you speak of.

F. Hardouin excepted Cicero's works, Virgil's georgics, Horace's fatires, and epiftles, and Pliny's natural history. M. Le Clerc, in a letter to Mr. Addifon,