you have the fineft profpect in the world, know how we pafs the time at Naples? Our chief entertainment is the devotion of our neighbours: befides the gaiety of their churches (where folks go to fee what they call una Bella Devotione, 1. e, a fort of religious opera) they make fire works almoft every week out of devotion: the streets are often hung with arras out of devotion; and (what is ftill more strange) the ladies invite gentlemen to their houses, and treat them with mufic and sweetmeats, out of devotion; in a word, were it not for this devotion of its inhabitants, Naples would have little elfe to recommend it, befides the air and fituation. Learning is in no very thriving ftate here, as indeed no where elfe in Italy; however, among many pretenders, fome men of tafte are to be met with, A friend of mine told me, not long fince, that being to vifit Salvina at Florence, he found him reading your Homer; he liked the notes extremely, and could find no other fault with the verfion, but that he thought it approached too near a paraphrafe; which fhews him not to be fufficiently acquainted with our language. I wish you health to go on with that noble work, and when you have that, I need not wish you fuccefs. You will do me the justice to believe, that whatever relates to your welfare is fincerely wished by your, &c. § 130. The Earl of OXFORD to Mr. POPE. Brampton-Caftle, Nov. 6, 1721. Sir, I received your packet, which could not but give me great pleasure, to see you preferve an old friend in your memory; for it muft needs be very agree. able to be remembered by those we highly value. But then how much fhame did it caufe me, when I read your very fine verses inclosed! My mind reproached me how far fhort I came of what your great friendship and delicate pen would partially defcribe me. You afk my confent to publish it: to what ftraights doth this reduce me! I look back indeed to thofe evenings I have ufefully and pleafantly fpent with Mr. Pope, Mr. Parnelle, Dean Swift, the Doctor, &c. I fhould be glad the world knew you admitted me to your friendfhip; and fince your affection is too hard for your judgment, I am contented to let the world know how well Mr. Pope can write upon a barren fubject. I return you an exact copy of the verses, that I may keep the original as a teftimony of the only error you have been guilty of. I hope very fpeedily to embrace you in London, and to affure you of the particular efteem and friendship wherewith I am your, &c. $131. From Mr. BLOUNT to Mr. POPE. Nov. 11, 1715: It is an agreement of long date be tween you and me, that you should do with my letters juft as you pleased, and anfwer them at your leifure; and that is as foon as I fhall think you ought. I have fo true a taste of the fubftantial part of your friendship, that I wave all ceremonials; and am fure to make you as many vifits as I can, and leave you to return then whenever you pleafe, affuring you they fhall at all times be heartily welcome to me. The many alarms we have from your parts have no effect upon the genius that reigns in our country, which is happily turned to preferve peace and quiet among us. What a difmal fcene has there been opened in the north! What ruin have thofe unfortunate rafh gentlemen drawn upon themfelves and their miferable followers! and perchance upon many others too, who upon no account would be their followers. However, it may look ungenerous to reproach people in diftrefs. I don't remember you and I ever ufed to trouble ourselves about politics; but when any matter happened to fall into our difcourfe, we used to condemn all undertakings that tended towards disturbing the peace and quiet of our country, as contrary to the notions we had of morality and religion, which oblige us on no pretence whatfoever to violate the laws of charity. How many lives have there been loft in hot blood, and how many more are there like to be taken off in cold! If the broils of the nation affect you, come down to me; and, though we are farmers, you know Eumæus made his friends welcome. You fhall here worship the echo at your ease; indeed we are forced to do fo, becaufe we can't hear the first report, and therefore are obliged to listen to the fecond; which, for fecurity fake, I do not always believe neither. : 'Tis a great many years fince I fell in love with the character of Pomponius Atticus I long'd to imitate him a little, and have contriv'd hitherto to be, like him, engaged in no party, but to be a faithful friend to fome in both: I find myself very well in this way hitherto, and live in a certain peace of mind by it, which, I am perfuaded, brings a man more content than all the perquifites of wild ambition. I with pleasure join with you in wifhing, nay, I am not afhamed to fay, in praying for the welfare, temporal and eternal, of all man kind. How much more affectionately then fhall I do fo for you, fince I am in a moft particular manner, and with all fincerity, your, &c. $132. From the Same. Nov. 27, 1717. The question you propofed to me is what, at prefent, I am the most unfit man in the world to anfwer, by my lofs of one of the best of fathers. He had liv ed in fuch a courfe of temperance as was enough to make the longest life agreeable to him, and in fuch a course of piety as fufficed to make the most fudden death fo alfo. Sudden indeed it was however, I heartily beg of God to give me fuch a one, provided I can lead fuch a life. I leave him to the mercy of God, and to the piety of a religion that extends beyond the grave; fi qua eft ea cura, &c. He has left me to the ticklith management of fo narrow a fortune, that any one falfe ftep would be fatal. My mother is in that difpirited state of refignation, which is the effect of long life, and the lofs of what is dear to us. We are really each of us in want of a friend of fuch an humane turn as your-, felf, to make almost any thing defirable to us. I feel your abfence more than ever, at the fame time I can lefs express my regards to you. than ever; and I fhall make this, which is the most fincere letter I ever writ to you, the fhorteft and fainteft perhaps of any you ever received. 'Tis enough if you reflect, that barely to remember any perfon, when one's mind is taken up with a fen-. fible forrow, is a great degree of friendfhip. I can fay no more but that I love you, and all that are yours; and that I with it may be very long before any of yours fhall feel for you what I now feel for my father. Adieu! I mind of better and more quiet to be had in a corner of the world (undisturb'd, innocent, ferene, and fenfible) with fuch as you. Let no accefs of any diftruft make you think of me differently in a cloudy day from what you do in the moft fanfhiny weather. Let the young ladies be affured I make nothing new in my gardens, without withing to fee the print of their fairy fteps in every part of them. I have put the laft hand to my works of this kind, in happily finishing the fubterraneous way and grotto: there found a spring of the cleareft wa. ter, which falls in a perpetual rill, that echoes through the cavern day and night. From the river Thames you fee through my arch up a walk of the wildernefs, to a kind of open temple, wholly compofed of fhells in the ruftic manner; and from that distance, under the temple, you look down through a flop. ing arcade of trees, and fee the fails on the river paffing fuddenly, and vanifhing, as through a perfpective glafs, When you fhut the doors of this grotto, it becomes on the inftant, from a luminous room, a camera obfcura; on the walls of which all objects of the river, hills, woods, and boats, are forming a moving picture in their visible radiations and when you have a mind to light it up, it affords you a very different fcene; it is finifhed with fhells interfperfed with pieces of looking-glafs in angular forms; and in the cieling is aftar of the fame material, at which, when a lamp (of an orbicular figure of thin alabafter) is hung in the middle, a thoufand pointed rays glitter, and are reflected over the place. There are connected to this grotto, by a narrow paffage, two porches, one towards the river, of fmooth ftones, full of light, and open; the other towards the garden, fhadowed with trees, rough with fhells, flints, and iron ore. The bottom is paved with fimple pebble, as is alfo the adjoining walk up the wilderness to the temple, in the natural tafte, agreeing not ill with the little dripping murmur, and the aquatic idea of the whole place. It wants nothing to complete it but a good fatue with an infcription, like that beautiful antique one which you know I am so fond of; Hujus nympha loci, facri cuftodia fontis, Dormio dum blandæ fentio murmur aquæ. Parce meum, quifquis tangis cava marmora, fomnum Rumpere; five bibas, five lavere tace. Nymph of the grot, this facred fpring I keep, You'll think I have been very poetical in this defcription, but it is pretty near the truth. I wish you were here to bear teftimony how little it owes to art, either the place itfelf, or the image I give of it. I am, &c. 134. Mr. POPE to the Bishop of ROCHESTER. May, 1723. Once more I write to you, as I promifed, and this once, I fear, will be the laft! The curtain will foon be drawn between my friend and me, and nothing left but to wish you a long good night. May you enjoy a ftate of repofe in this life, not unlike that fleep of the foul which fome have believed is to fucceed it, where we lie utterly forgetful of that world from which we are gone, and ripening for that to which we are to go, If y f you retain any memory of the paft, let it only image to you what has pleafed you beft; fometimes prefent a dream of an abfent friend, or bring you back an agreeable converfation. But upon the whole, I hope you will think lefs of the time paft than of the future; as the former has been lefs kind to you than the latter infallibly will be. Do not envy the world your fludies; they will tend to the benefit of men against whom you can have no complaint, I mean of all potterity; and perhaps, at your time of life, nothing elfe is worth your care. What is every year of a wife man's life, but a cenfure or critique on the past? Thofe, whofe date is the fhorteft, live long enough to laugh at one half of it: the boy defpifes the infant, the man the boy, the philofopher both, and the chriftian all. You may now begin to think your manhood was too much a puerility, and you'll never fuffer your age to be but a fecond infancy. The toys and baubles of your childhood are hardly now more below you, than those toys of our riper and of our declining years, the drums drums and rattles of ambition, and the dirt and bubbles of avarice. At this time, when you are cut off from a little fociety, and made a citizen of the world at large, you should bend your talents not to ferve a party, or a few, but all mankind. Your genius fhould mount above that mift in which its participation and neighbourhood with earth long involved it; to fhine abroad and to heaven, ought to be the bufinefs and the glory of your prefent fituation. Remember it was at fuch a time, that the greatest lights of antiquity dazzled and blazed the most, in their retreat, in their exile, or in their death: but why do I talk of dazzling or blazing? It was then that they did good, that they gave light, and that they became guides to mankind. Thofe aims alone are worthy of fpirits truly great, and fuch I therefore hope will be yours. Refentment indeed may remain, perhaps cannot be quite extin. guifhed in the nobleft minds; but revenge never will harbour there; higher principles than thofe of the firft, and better principles than thofe of the latter, will infallibly influence men, whofe thoughts and whofe hearts are enlarged, and caufe them to prefer the whole to any part of mankind, efpecially to fo fmall a part as one's fingle self. Be lieve me, my Lord, I look upon you as a fpirit entered into another life, as one juft upon the edge of immortality; where the paffions and affections must be much more exalted, and where you ought to defpife all little views and all mean retrospects. Nothing is worth your looking back; and therefore look forward, and make (as you can) the world look after you: but take care that it be not with pity, but with efteen and admiration. I am, with the greateft fincerity, and paffion for your fame, as well as happinefs, your, &c. §135. From the Bishop of RoCHESTER to Mr. POPE, on the Death of his Daughter. Montpelier, Nov. 20, 1729. I am not yet mafter enough of my felf, after the late wound I have received, to open my very heart to you, and am not content with less than that, whenever I converfe with you, My thoughts are at prefent vainly, but pleafingly employed, on what I have loft, and can never reco. ver. I know well I ought, for that reafon, to call them off to other fubjects, but hitherto I have not been able to do it. By giving them the rein a little, and fuffering them to spend their force, I hope in fome time to check and fubdue them. Multis fortuna vulneribus perculfus, huic uni me imparem fenfi, & pene fuccubui: This is weakness, not wifdom, I own; and on that account fitter to be trufted to the bofom of a friend, where I may fafely lodge all my infirmities. As foon as my mind is in fome measure corrected and calm'd, I will endeavour to follow your advice, and turn it to fomething of ufe and mo ment; if I have ftill life enough left to do any thing that is worth reading and preferving. In the mean time I shall be pleafed to hear that you proceed in what you intend, without any fuch melancholy interruption as I have met with. Your mind is as yet unbroken by age and ill accidents, your knowledge and judgment are at the height: ufe them in writing fomewhat that may teach the prefent and future times, and if not gain equally the applaufe of both, may yet raife the envy of the one, and fecure the admiration of the other. Employ not your precious moments and great talents on little men and little things; but chufe a fubject every way worthy of you, and handle it, as you can, in a manner which nobody elfe can equal or imitate. As for me, my abilities, if I ever had any, are not what they were, and yet I will endeavour to recollect and employ them. -Gelidus tardante fenecta Sanguis hebet, frigentque effato in corpore vires. However, I should be ungrateful to this place, ifl did not own that I have gained upon the gout in the fouth of France much more than I did at Paris; though even there I fenfibly improved. I be. lieve my cure had been perfected, but the earnest defire of meeting one I dearly loved, called me abruptly to Montpelier, where, after continuing two months, under the cruel torture of a fad and fruitless expectation, I was forced at laft to take a long journey to Toulouse: and even there I had mifs'd the perfon I fought, fought, had fhe not, with great spirit and courage, ventured all night up the Garonne to fee me, which the above all things defired to do before fhe died. By that means fhe was brought where I was, between feven and eight in the morning, and lived twenty hours afterwards, which time was not loft on either fide, but paffed in fuch a manner as gave great fatisfaction to both, and fuch as, on her part, every way became her circumftances and character: for fhe had her fenfes to the very laft gafp, and exerted them to give me, in thofe few hours, greater marks of duty and love than the had done in all her life-time, though he had never been wanting in either. The laft words fhe faid to me were the kindeft of all; a reflection on the goodness of God, which had allowed us in this manner to meet once more, before we parted for ever. Not many minutes after that, fhe laid herself on her pillow in a fleeping posture, where you have or have not been, can at the fame time remember to do offices of favour and kindness to the meanest of your friends; and in all the scenes you have paffed, have not been able to attain that one quality peculiar to a great man, of forgetting every thing but injuries. Of this I am a living witness against you; for being the moft infignificant of all your humble fervants, you were fo cruel as never to give me time to ask a favour, but prevented me in doing whatever you thought I defired, or could be for my credit or advantage. I have often admired at the capricioufnefs of Fortune in regard to your lordship. She hath forced courts to act against their oldest and most conftant maxims; to make you a general, becaufe you had courage and conduct; an ambaffador, because you had wifdom and knowledge in the intereft of Europe; and an admiral, on account of your skill in maritime affairs: whereas, Placidaque ibi demum morte quievit. according to the ufual method of court Judge you, Sir, what I felt, and still feel proceedings, I should have been at the on this occafion, and spare me the trou- head of the army, and you of the church, ble of defcribing it. At my age, under or rather a curate under the dean of St. my infirmities, among utter ftrangers, Patrick's. The archbishop of Dublin how fhall I find out proper reliefs and laments that he did not fee your lordship fupports? I can have none, but thofe till he was just upon the point of leavwith which reafon and religion furnishing the Bath: I pray God you may have me, and thofe I lay hold on, and grafp as fast as I can. I hope that he who laid the burden upon me (for wife and good purposes no doubt) will enable me to bear it, in like manner as I have borne others, with fome degree of fortitude and firmness. You fee how ready I am to relapse into an argument which I had quitted once before in this letter; I fhall probably again commit the fame fault, if I continue to write; and therefore I ftop short here, and with all fincerity, affection, and efteem, bid you adieu! till we meet either in this world (if God pleases) or elfe in another. found fuccefs in that journey, elfe I fhall continue to think that there is a fatality in all your lordship's undertakings, which only terminate in your own honour, and the good of the public, without the leaft advantage to your health or fortune. I remember, Lord Oxford's miniftry used to tell me, that not knowing where to write to you, they were forced to write at you. It is fo with me, for you are in one thing an evangelical man, that you know not where to lay your head, and, I think, you have no houfe. Pray, my lord, write to me, that I may have the pleasure in this country of going about, and fhewing my depending parfons a letter from $136. Dr. SWIFT to the Earl of PE- the Earl of Peterborough. I am, TERBOROUGH. My LORD, &c. I never knew or heard of any perfon fo volatile, and fo fixed as your lordship. You, while your imagination is carrying you through every corner of the world, I am, &c. |