therefore I have not yet forgiven any of those triflers that let them escape and run those hazards. I am going on at the old rate, and want you and the Dean prodigiously, and am in hopes of making you a visit this summer, and of hearing from you both now you are together. Fortescue, I am sure, will be concerned that he is not in Cornhill, to set his hand to these presents, not only as a witness, but as a

Serviteur très-humble,
C. JERVAS.

It is so great an honour to a poor Scotchman to be remembered at this time o' day, especially by an inhabitant of the Glacialis Ierne, that I take it very thankfully, and have with my good friends remembered you at our table in the chop-house in Exchange-Alley. There wanted nothing to complete our happiness but your company, and our dear friend the Dean's: I am sure the whole entertainment would have been to his relish. Gay has got so much money by walking the streets', that he is ready to set up his equipage: he is just going to the Bank to negotiate some exchange bills. Mr. Pope delays his second volume of his Homer till the martial spirit of the rebels is quite quelled, it being judged that the first part did some harm that way. Our love again and again to the dear Dean; fuimus Tories; I can say no more.

ARBUTHNOT.

When a man is conscious that he does no good himself, the next thing is to cause others to do some. I may claim some merit this way, in hastening this

The poem of Trivia, or the Art of Walking the Streets, by Gay.Bowles.

This letter, which has hitherto appeared without a date, was probably written towards the latter part of 1715.

VOL. VIII.

D

testimonial from your friends above writing: their love to you indeed wants no spur, their ink wants no pen, their pen wants no hand, their hand wants no heart, and so forth (after the manner of Rabelais, which is betwixt some meaning and no meaning); and yet it may be said, when present thought and opportunity is wanting, their pens want ink, their hands want pens, their hearts want hands, &c. till time, place, and conveniency concur to set them a-writing, as at present a sociable meeting, a good dinner, warm fire, and an easy situation do, to the joint labour and pleasure of this epistle.

Wherein, if I should say nothing, I should say much, (much being included in my love) though my love be such, that if I should say much, I should yet say nothing, it being (as Cowley says) equally impossible either to conceal, or to express it.

If I were to tell you the thing I wish above all things, it is to see you again; the next is to see here your treatise of Zoilus with the Batrachomuomachia, and the Pervigilium Veneris, both of which poems are master-pieces in several kinds; and I question not the prose is as excellent, in its sort, as the Essay on Homer. Nothing can be more glorious to that great author than that the same hand which raised his best statue, and decked it with its old laurels, should also hang up the scare-crow of his miserable critic, and gibbet up the carcase of Zoilus, to the terror of the witlings of posterity. More, and much more, upon this, and a thousand other subjects, will be the matter of my next letter, wherein I must open all the friend to you. At this time I must be content with telling you I am faithfully, your most affectionate and humble servant,

A. POPE.

LETTER XIX.

DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE.

2

Dublin, June 28, 1715.

My Lord Bishop of Clogher gave me your kind letter full of reproaches for my not writing. I am naturally no very exact correspondent, and, when I leave a country without a probability of returning, I think as seldom as I can of what I loved or esteemed in it, to avoid the desiderium which of all things makes life most uneasy. But you must give me leave to add one thing, that you talk at your ease, being wholly unconcerned in public events: for, if your friends the Whigs continue, you may hope for some favour; if the Tories return3, you are at least sure of quiet. You know how well I loved both Lord Oxford and Bolingbroke, and how dear the Duke of Ormond is to me *. Do you imagine I can be easy while their enemies are endeavouring to take off their heads? I nunc et versus tecum meditare canoros. Do you imagine I can be easy, when I think of the probable consequences of these proceedings, perhaps upon the very peace of the

2 Dr. St. George Ash, formerly a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, (to whom the Dean was a pupil,) afterwards Bishop of Clogher, and translated to the See of Derry in 1716-17. It was he who married Swift to Mrs. Johnson, 1716, and performed the ceremony in a garden.-Bowles.

3 In a manuscript letter of Lord Bolingbroke, it is said, "That George the First set out from Hanover with a resolution of oppressing no set of men that would be quiet subjects. But, as soon as he came into Holland, a contrary resolution was taken, at the earnest importunity of the Allies, and particularly of Heinsius, and of some of the Whigs. Lord Townshend came triumphantly to acquaint Lord Somers with all the measures of proscription and of persecution which they intended, and to which the king had at last consented. The old peer asked him what he meant, and shed tears on the foresight of measures like those of the Roman Triumvirate."-Warton.

4 The warmth of Swift in favour of his friends is natural and interesting. He disdained the idea of not meeting manfully whatever might be brought against him, though he knew the public mind was inflamed. Bolingbroke thought it best to abscond.-Bowles.

nation, but certainly of the minds of so many hundred thousand good subjects? Upon the whole, you may truly attribute my silence to the eclipse, but it was that eclipse which happened on the first of August.

5

6

I borrowed your Homer from the bishop (mine is not yet landed) and read it out in two evenings. If it pleaseth others as well as me, you have got your end in profit and reputation; yet I am angry at some bad rhymes and triplets, and pray in your next do not let me have so many unjustifiable rhymes to war and gods. I tell you all the faults I know, only in one or two places you are a little obscure; but I expected you to be so in one or two and twenty. I have heard no soul talk of it here, for indeed it is not come over; nor do we very much abound in judges, at least I have not the honour to be acquainted with them. Your notes are perfectly good, and so are your preface and essay. You are pretty bold in mentioning Lord Bolingbroke in that preface. I saw the Key to the Lock but yesterday I think you have changed it a good deal, to adapt it to the present times.

God be thanked I have yet no parliamentary business, and if they have done with me, I shall never seek their acquaintance. I have not been very fond of them for some years past, not when I thought them tolerably good; and therefore, if I can get leave to be absent, I shall be much inclined to be on that side, when there is a parliament on this; but truly I

5 There was a great eclipse at this time. He alludes to the death of the queen, the 1st of August.-Bowles.

6 He was frequently carping at Pope for bad rhymes in many other parts of his works. His own were remarkably exact.-Warton.

7 Given to him by Parnelle; and with which Pope told Mr. Spence, he was never well satisfied, though he corrected it again and again.—Warton. 8 Put these two last observations together, and it will appear, that Mr. Pope was never wanting to his friends for fear of party, nor would he insult a ministry to humour them. He said of himself, and I believe he said truly, that he never wrote a line to gratify the animosity of any one party at the expense of another. See the Letter to a Noble Lord.-Warburton.

9

must be a little easy in my mind before I can think of Scriblerus.

You are to understand that I live in the corner of a vast unfurnished house; my family consists of a steward, a groom, a helper in the stable, a footman, and an old maid, who are all at board wages, and when I do not dine abroad, or make an entertainment (which last is very rare), I eat a mutton-pie, and drink half a pint of wine. My amusements are, defending my small dominions against the archbishop, and endeavouring to reduce my rebellious choir. Perditur hæc inter misero lux. I desire you will present my humble service to Mr. Addison, Mr. Congreve, Mr. Rowe, and Gay. I am, and will be always extremely

Yours, &c.

Never was exhibited so strong and lamentable a picture of disappointed ambition, as in these letters of the dean. When we consider the fidelity and ability with which he served the queen's last ministry, we are surprised that they gave him no higher preferment, but banished him, as it were, to Ireland. The fact is, that he had so insuperably disgusted many grave divines, and the Queen herself, by his Tale of a Tub, that she never would hear of his advancement in the church*. And this disgust was kept alive by the instigations of Archbishop Sharp, and the Duchess of Somerset, whom he had wantonly lampooned. It was in vain he wrote, to take off these impressions, his incomparable treatises, A Project for the Advancement of Religion; and the Sentiments of a Church of England Man. The truth is, his friends the ministers had it not in their power to do more for him than they did; but, as is the constant practice of all ministers, artfully concealed from him their inability to serve him, to keep him steady in his dependence on them.-Warton.

* Warton speaks here of the ministers of Queen Anne, who (particularly Oxford) expressed the greatest attachment and obligations to Swift. The subsequent cause of his disappointment is to be found (as hath been already mentioned) in Coxe's Memoirs. I cannot, however, perceive any great cause of complaint, when a person, although of eminent talents, yet being born to no patrimony, talks (at the same time that he expresses his disappointment) of having a steward, a groom, a helper in the stable, a footman, and an old maid!" "who eats a mutton-pie, and drinks half a pint of wine, when he does not dine abroad, or give an entertainment ;" and "whose amusements are, defending his small dominions against the Archbishop, and endeavouring to reduce his rebellious choir!" He may say of himself, "Perditur hæc inter misero lux;" but how many men of equal talents, if not superior virtues are there, who would think their talents amply remunerated by half his income!-Bowles.