LETTER XIV. T is with infinite fatisfaction I am IT made acquainted that your brother will at last prove your relation, and has entertain'd fuch fentiments as become him in your concern. I have been prepar'd for this by degrees, having feveral times receiv'd from Mrs. that which is one of the greatest pleasures, the knowledge that others enter'd into my own fentiments concerning you. I ever was of opinion that you wanted no more to be vindicated than to be known; and like Truth, cou'd appear no where but you must conquer. As I have often condol'd with you in your adverfities, fo I have a right which but few can pretend to, of congratulating on the prospect of your better fortunes; and I hope for the future to have the concern I have felt for you overpaid in your felicities. Tho' you modeftly fay the world has left you, yet I verily believe it is coming to you again as faft as it can: For to give the world its due, it is always very fond of Merit when 'tis paft its power to oppofe it. Therefore if you fhould take it into favour again upon its repentance, and continue in it, you would be fo far from leading leading what is commonly call'd an unfettled life (and what you with too much unjuft feverity call a vagabond Life) that the wife cou'd only look upon you as a Prince in a progrefs, who travels to gain the affections he has not, or to fix thofe he already has; which he effectually does wherever he fhews himfelf. But if you are refolv'd in revenge to rob the world of fo much example as you may afford it, I believe your defign will be vain; for even in a Monaftery your devotions cannot carry you so far towards the next world as to make This lofe the fight of you, but you'll be like a Star, that while it is fix'd to Heaven fhines over all the Earth. Wherefoever Providence fhall dispose of the most valuable thing I know, I fhall ever follow you with my fincereft wishes, and my best thoughts will be perpetually waiting upon you, when you never hear of me or them. Your own guardian Angels cannot be more conftant, nor more filent. I beg you will never ceafe to think me your friend, that you may not be guilty of that which you never yet knew to commit, an Injustice. As I have hitherto been fo in fpite of the world, fo hereafter, if it be poffible you fhou'd ever be more opposed, and more deferted, I fhould only be fo much the more Your faithful, &c. LET I LETTER XV. Can fay little to recommend the Letters I fhall write to you, but that they will be the most impartial representations of a free heart, and the trueft copies you ever faw, tho' of a very mean original. Not a feature will be foften'd, or any adavantageous light employ'd to make the ug ly thing a little lefs hideous: but you shall find it in all refpects, moft horribly like. You will do me an injuftice if you look upon any thing I fhall fay from this inftant, as a compliment, either to you or my felf: Whatever I write will be the real thought of that hour; and I know you'll no more expect it of me to perse-. vere till death in every fentiment or notion I now fet down, than you would imagine a man's face fhould never change when once his picture was drawn. > The freedom I fhall ufe in this manner of thinking aloud, may indeed prove me a fool; but it will prove me one of the best fort of fools, the honest ones. And fince what folly we have, will infallibly buoy up > at one time or other in fpight of all our art to keep it down; methinks 'tis almost foolish to take any pains to conceal it at all all, and almost knavish to do it from those that are our friends. If Momus's project had taken, of having windows in our breafts, I fhou'd be for carrying it further, and making thofe windows; cafements; that while a man fhow'd his heart to all the world, he might do fomething more for his friends, even give it them, and truft it to their handling. I think I love you as well as King Herod did Herodias (tho' I never had so much as one dance with you) and would as freely give you my heart in a difh, as he did another's head. But fince Jupiter will not have it fo, I must be content to fhew my tafte in life, as I do my tafte in painting, by loving to have as little drapery as poffible. Not that I think every body naked altogether fo fine a fight: as your felf and a few more would be; but because 'tis good to use people to what they must be acquainted with; and there will certainly come fome day of judgment or other, to uncover every foul of us. We fhall then fee that the Prues of this world ow'd all their fine figure only to their be ing ftrater-lac'd than the reft; and that they are naturally as arrant Squabs as those that never girded their loins at all. -.But a particular reafon that may engage you to write your thoughts the more freely to me, is, that I am confident no one knows knows you better; for I find, when others express their thoughts of you, they fall very fhort of mine, and I know at the fame time theirs are fuch as you would think fufficient in your favour. You may eafily imagine how defirous I must be of a correfpondence with a perfon, who had taught me long ago that it was as poffible to efteem at first fight, as to love: and who has fince ruin'd me for all the conversation of one sex, and almost all the friendship of the other. I am but too fenfible, thro' your means, that the company of men wants a certain foftness to recommend it, and that of women wants every thing else. How often have I been quietly going to take poffeffion of that tranquillity and indolence I had fo long found in the country; when one evening of your conversation has fpoil'd me for a Solitaire ! Books have loft their effect upon me, and I was convinced, fince I faw you, that there is one alive wiser than all the Sages: a plague of female wisdom! it makes a man ten times more uneafy than his own. What is very ftrange, Virtue herself (when you have the dreffing her) is too amiable for one's repofe. You might have done a world of good in your time, if you had allow'd half the fine gentlemen who have feen you to have converfed with you; they I would |
