want, although he had ten thousand a year; and the cafe is parallel in every degree of life. When I reafon thus on the cafe of fome abfent friends, it frequently takes away. all the quiet of my mind. I think it indecent to be merry, or take fatisfaction in any thing; while those who presided in councils, or armies, and by whom I had the honour to be beloved, are either in humble folitude, or attending, like Hannibal, in foreign courts, donec Bithyno libeat vigilare tyranno. My health (a thing of no moment) is fomewhat mended; but, at best, I have an ill head and an aching heart. Pray God fend you foon back to your country in peace and honour, that İ may once more fee him cum quo morantem fepe diem fregi, &c.

LETTER XXX.

To Lord BOLINGBROKE.

MY LORD,

December 19, 1719.

FIRST Congratulate with you upon growing rich; for I hope our friend's information is true. Omne folum diti patria. Euripides makes the Queen Jocaita afk her VOL. XVI. exiled

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exiled fon, how he got his victuals? But, who ever expected to fee you a trader, or dealer in flocks? I thought to have seen you where you are, or perhaps nearer: But diis aliter vifum. It may be with one's country as with a lady: If the be cruel and ill-natured, and will not receive us, we ought to confider that we are better without her. But, in this cafe, we may add, fhe has neither virtue, honour, nor juftice. I have gotten a mezzotinto (for want of a better) of Ariftippus, in my drawing-room: The motto at the top is, Omnis Ariftippum, &c. and at the bottom, Tanta fædus cum gente ferire, commiffum juveni. But, fince what I heard of Missisippi, I am grown fonder of the former motto. You have heard that Plato followed merchandize three years, to fhew he knew how to grow rich as well as to be a philofopher: And, I guess, Plato was then about forty, the period which the Italians prescribe for being wife, in order to be rich at fifty. Senes ut in otia tuta recedant. I have known fomething of courts and minifters longer than you, who knew them fo many thoufand times better; but I do not remember to have ever heard of or feen one great genius, who had long fuccefs in the minif

try:

try: And, recollecting a great many, in my memory and acquaintance, those who had the fmootheft time were, at beft, men of middling degree in understanding. But, if I were to frame a romance of a great minifter's life, he fhould begin it as Ariftippus has done; then be fent into exile, and employ his leifure in writing the memoirs of his own administration; then be recalled, invited to refume his fhare of power, act as far as was decent; at laft, retire to the country, and be a pattern of hofpitality, politenefs, wisdom, and virtue. Have you not observed, that there is a lower kind of difcretion and regularity, which feldom fails of raising men to the highest ftations in the court, the church, and the law? It must be fo: For Providence, which defigned the world should be governed by many heads, made it a bufinefs within the reach of common underftandings; while one great genius is hardly found among ten millions. Did you never observe one of your clerks cutting his paper with a blunt ivory knife? Did you ever know the knife to fail going the true way? Whereas, if he had ufed a razor, or a pen-knife, he had odds against him of fpoiling a whole fheet. I have twenty

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times

times compared the motion of that ivory
implement to those talents that thrive beft
at court. Think
Think upon Lord Bacon, Wil-
liams, Strafford, Laud, Clarendon, Shaftef-
bury, the last Duke of Buckingham*; and,
of my own acquaintance, the Earl of Ox-
ford and yourself: All great geniuses in
their feveral ways; and, if they had not
been fo great, would have been lefs unfor-
tunate. I remember but one exception,
and that was Lord Sommers, whofe timo--
rous nature, joined with the trade of a
common lawyer, and the consciousness of
a mean extraction, had taught him the re-
gularity of an alderman, or a gentleman-
ufher. But, of late years, I have even re-
fined upon this thought: For I plainly fee,
that fellows of low intellectuals, when
they are gotten at the head of affairs, can
fally into the higheft exorbitances, with
much more fafety, than a man of great
talents can make the leaft ftep out of the
way. Perhaps it is for the fame reafon,
that men are more afraid of attacking a
vicious than a mettlefome horfe: But I ra-
ther think it owing to that inceffant envy,
wherewith the common rate of mankind
purfues all fuperior natures to their own.

* Villiers Duke of Buckingham.

And,

And, I conceive, if it were left to the choice of an ass, he would rather be kicked by one of his own fpecies than a better. If you will recollect that I am towards fix years older than when I faw you laft, and twenty years duller, you will not wonder to find me abound in empty fpeculations: I can now exprefs in an hundred words what would formerly have cost me ten. I can write epigrams of fifty diftichs, which might be fqueezed into one. I have gone the round of all my ftories three or four times with the younger people, and begin them again. I give hints how fignificant a person I have been, and no body believes me: I pretend to pity them, but am inwardly angry. I lay traps for people to defire I would fhew them fome things I have written, but cannot fucceed; and wreak my fpite, in condemning the taste of the people and company where I am. But it is with place, as it is with time. If I boaft of having been valued three hundred miles off, it is of no more ufe than if I told how handfome I was when I was young. The worst of it is, that lying is of no ufe; for the people here will not believe one half of what is true. If I can prevail on any one to perfonate a hearer

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and