you for reafons that most others have little to do with, and would be the fame although you had never touched a pen, further than with writing to me. I am gathering up my luggage, and preparing for my journey. I will endeavour to think of you as little as I can; and when I write to you, I will ftrive not to think of you. This I intend in return to your kindness; and further, I know no body has dealt with me fo cruelly as you; the confequences of which usage I fear will last as long as my life; for fo long fhall I be, in fpite of my heart, entirely your's. MA Aug. 22. 1726 "Any a fhort figh you coft me the day Meft you, and many more you will coft me, till the day you return. I really walked about like a man banished and when I came home, found it no home. "Tis a fenfation like that of a limb lopped off; one is trying every ninute unawares to ufe it, and finds it is not. I may fay you have used me more cruelly than you have done any other man; you have made it more impoffible for me to live at eafe without you. Habitude itself would have done that, if I had lefs friendfhip in my nature than I have. Befides my natural memory of you, you have made a local one, which prefents you to me in every place I fre quent. Ifhall never more think of Lord Cobham's, the woods of Ciceter, or the pleafing prospect of Byberry, but your idea must be joined with them; nor fee one feat in my own garden, or one room in my own house, without a phantom of you, fitting or walking before me. I travelled with you to Chefter, I felt the extreme heat of the weather, the inns, the roads, the confinement and closenefs of the uneafy coach, and wished a hundred times I had either a deanery or a horse in my gift. In real truth, I have felt my foul peevith ever ince with all about me, from a warm uneafy defire after you. I am gone out of myfelf to no purpose, and cannot catch you. Inbiat in pedes was not more proper ly applied to a poor dog after a hare, than to me with regard regard to your departure. I wish I could think no more of it, but lie down and fleep till we meet again, and let that day (how far foever off it be) be the morrow. Since I cannot, may it be my amends, that every thing you wish may attend you where you are, and that you may find every friend you have there in the state you with him or her; fo that your visits to us may have no other effect, than the progress of a rich man to a remote eftate, which he finds greater than he expected ; which knowledge only ferves to make him live happier where he is, with no difagreeable profpect if ever he should chufe to remove. May this be your ftate till it become what I with. But indeed I cannot exprefs the warmth with which I wish you all things, and myfelf you. Indeed you are ingraved elsewhere than on the cups you fent me, (with fo kind an infcription), and I might throw them into the Thames without injury to the giver. I am not pleased with them, but take them ve ry kindly too: and had I fufpected any fuch usage from you, I fhould have enjoyed your company less than I really did; for at this rate I may fay, Nec tecum poffum vivere, nec fine te. I will bring you over just fuch another prefent, when } go to the deanery of St Patrick's; which I promise you. to do, if ever I am enabled to return your kindness. Donarem pateras, &c. Till then I'll drink (or Gay fhall drink) daily healths to you, and I'll add to your infcription the old Roman vow for years to come, VO. TIS X. VOTIS XX. My mother's age gives me authority to hope it for your's. Adieu. LETTER XVIII. Sept. 3. 1726, Your's 'Our's to Mr Gay gave me greater fatisfaction than to me (though that ga gave me a great deal); for to hear that you were fafe at your journey's end, exceeds the account of your fatigues while in the way to it: otherwise believe me, every title of each is important to me, which fets any one thing before my eyes that that happens to you. I writ you a long letter, which I guess reached you the day after your arrival. Since then I had a conference with Sir, who expreffed his defire of having feen you again before you left us. He faid, he obferved a willingness in you to live among us; which I did not deny; but at the fame time told him, you had no fuch defign in your coming this time, which was merely to fee a few of thofe you loved but that indeed all thofe wifhed it, and particularly Lord Peterborow and myself, who wished you loved Ireland lefs, had you any reason to love England more. I faid nothing but what I think would induce any man to be as fond of you as I; plain truth, did they know either it or you. I can't help thinking (when I confider the whole fhort lift of our friends), that none of them, except you and I, are qualified for the mountains of Wales. The Doctor goes to cards, Gay to court; one lofes money, one lofes his time: another of our friends la. bours to be unambitious, but he labours in an unwilling foil. One lady you like has too much of France to be fit for Wales another is too much a fubject to princes and potentates, to relish that wild tafte of liberty and poverty. Mr Congreve is too fick to bear a thin air; and fhe that leads him, too rich to enjoy any thing. Lord Peterborow can go to any climate, but never ftay in any. Lord Bathurst is too great a husbandman to like barren hills, except they are his own to improve. Mr Bethel indeed is too good and too honeft to live in the world; but yet 'tis fit, for its example, he fhould. We are left to ourselves in my opinion, and may live where we please, in Wales, Dublin, or Bermudas: and for me, I affure you I love the world fo well, and it loves me fo well, that I care not in what part of it I pass the reft of my days. I fee no funfhine but in the face of a friend. I had a glimpse of a letter of yours lately, by which I find you are (like the vulgar) apter to think well of people out of power, than of people in power; perhaps 'tis a mistake, but however there's fomething in it generous. Mr *** takes it extreme kindly, I can per ceive, and he has a great mind to thank you for that good opinion, for which I believe he is only to thank his ill fortune: for, if I am not in an error, he would rather be in power, than out. To fhew you how fit I am to live in the mountains, I will, with great truth, apply to myself an old fentence : "Thofe that are in, may abide in; and thofe "that are out, may abide out: yet to me, thofe that " are in fhall be as those that are out, and those that 66 are out fhall be as thofe that are in." I am indifferent as to all thofe matters; but I miss you as much as I did the first day, when (with a short figh) I parted. Where-ever you are, (or on the moun tains of Wales, or on the coaft of Dublin, Tu mihi, feu magni fuperas jam faxa Timavi, I am, and ever fhall be your's, &'c. A Nov. 17. 1726. Bout ten days ago a book was published here of the travels of one Gulliver, which hath been the converfation of the whole town ever fince. The whole impression fold in a week; and nothing is more divert. ing than to hear the different opinions people give of it, though all agree in liking it extremely. 'Tis generally faid that you are the author; but I am told, the bookfeller declares, he knows not from what hand it came. From the highest to the lowest it is univerfally read, from the cabinet-counfel to the nursery. The politicians to a man agree, that it is free from particular reflections, but that the fatire on general focieties of men is too fe vere. Not but we now and then meet with people of greater perfpicuity, who are in fearch for particular applications in every leaf; and 'tis highly probable we shall have keys published to give light into Gulliver's defign. Lord is the perfon who leaft approves it, blaming it as a defign of evil confequence to depreciate humaa nature; nature; at which it cannot be wondered that he takes most offence, being himself the most accomplished of his Species, and fo lofing more than any other of that praise which is due both to the dignity and virtue of a man Your friend, my Lord Harcourt, commends it very much, though he thinks in fome places the matter too far carried. The Duchefs-dowager of Marlborough is in raptures at it; fhe fays the can dream of nothing elfe fince the read it: fhe declares, that he hath now found out, that her whole life hath been loft in careffing the worst part of mankind, and treating the belt as her foes; and that if the knew Gulliver, though he had been the worst enemy the ever had, fhe would give up her prefent acquaintance for his friendship. You may fee by this, that you are not much injured by being fuppofed the author of this piece. If you are, you have difobliged us, and two or three of your best friends, in not giving us the leaft hint of it while you were with us; and in particular Dr Arbuthnot, who fays, it is ten thousand pities he had not known it, he could have added fuch abundance of things upon every fubject. Among lady-critics, fome have found out that Mr Gul liver had a particular malice to maids of honour. Thofe of them who frequent the church, fay, his defign is impious, and that it is depreciating the works of the Creator. Notwithstanding, I am told the Princefs hath read it with great pleafure. As to other critics, they think the flying ifland is the leaft entertaining; and fo great an opinion the town have of the impoffibility of Gulliver's writing at all below himself, 'tis agreed that part was not writ by the fame hand, though this hath its defenders too. It hath paffed Lords and Commons, nemine contradicente; and the whole town, men, women, and children, are quite full of it. Perhaps I may all this time be talking to you of a book you have never feen, and which hath not yet reached Ireland. If it hath not, I believe what we have * It is no wonder a man of worth fhould condemn a fatire on his fpecies; as it injures virtue, and violates truth: and as little, that a corrupt man fhould approve it, because it juftifies his principles, and tends to excufe his practice. Warb. |