them. If therefore you are ever moved on my Account by that Spirit, which I take to be as familiar to you as a Quotidian Ague, I mean the Spirit of Goodness, pray never flint it, in any fear of obliging me to a Civility beyond my natural Inclination: I dare trust you, Sir, not only with my Folly when I write, but with my Negligence when I do not; and expect equally your Pardon for either.

If I knew how to entertain you thro' the reft of this Paper, it fhould be spotted and diverfified with Conceits all over; you fhould be put out of Breath with Laughter at each Sentence, and pause at each Period, to look back over how much Wit you had pafs'd. But I have found by Experience, that People now a-days regard Writing as little as they do Preaching: The most we can hope is to be heard, just with Decency and Patience, once a Week, by Folks in the Country: Here in Town we hum over a Piece of fine Writing, and we whistle at a Sermon. The Stage is the only Place we seem alive at; there indeed we stare, and roar, and clap Hands for K. George and the Government. As for all other Virtues but this Loyalty, they are an obfolete Train, fo ill-drefs'd, that Men, Women, and Children, hifs 'em out of all good Company. Humility knocks fo fneakingly at the Door,

that

that every Footman out-raps it, and makes it give way to the free Entrance of Pride, Prodigality, and Vain-glory.

My Lady Scudamore, from having rufticated in your Company too long, really behaves herself scandaloufly among us: She pretends to open her Eyes for the Sake of feeing the Sun, and to fleep because it is Night; drinks Tea at nine in the Morning, and is thought to have faid her Prayers before; talks without any manner of Shame of good Books, and has not feen Cibber's Play of the Non-juror. I rejoiced the other Day to fee a Libel on her Toilette, which gives me fome Hope that you have at leaft a Tafte of Scandal left you, in Defect of all other Vices.

Upon the whole Matter, I heartily with you well; but as I cannot entirely defire the Ruin of all the Joys of this City, fo all that remains is to wifh you wou'd keep your Happiness to your felves, that the happiest here may not die with Envy at a Bliss which they cannot attain to. I am, &c.

Dear Sir,

To the fame.

May 1, 1720.

OU'LL think me very full of my felf, when after a long Silence (which

YOU

however

1

however to say Truth has rather been employ'd to contemplate of you, than to forget you) I begin to talk of my own Works. I find it is in the finishing a Book, as in concluding a Seffion of Parliament, one always thinks it will be very foon, and finds

it

very late. There are many unlook'd for Incidents to retard the clearing any publick Account, and fo I fee it is in mine. I have plagued myself, like great Minifters, with undertaking too much for one Man, and with a Defire of doing more than was expected from me, have done lefs than I ought.

For having defign'd four very laborious and uncommon forts of Indexes to Homer, I'm forc'd, for want of Time, to publish two only; the Design of which you will own to be pretty, tho' far from being fully' executed. I've also been oblig'd to leave unfinish'd in my Desk the Heads of two Effays, one on the Theology and Morality of Homer, and another on the Oratory of Homer and Virgil. So they muft wait for future Editions, or perifh; and (one Way or other, no great Matter which) dabit Deus his quoque finem.

you

I think of you every Day, I affure you, even without fuch good Memorials of as your Sifters, with whom I fometimes talk of and find it one of the most agreeable of all Subjects to them. My Lord

you,

Digby must be perpetually remember'd by all who ever knew him, or knew his Children. There needs no more than an Acquaintance with your Family, to make all Elder Sons wifh they had Fathers to their Lives-end.

I can't touch upon the Subject of filial Love, without putting you in mind of an old Woman, who has a fincere, hearty, old-fashion'd Refpect for you, and conftantly blames her Son for not having writ to you oftner, to tell fo. you

I very much wish (but what fignifies my wifhing? myLady Scudamore wishes, your Sifter's wifh) that you were with us, to compare the beautiful Contraft this Seafon aftords us, of the Town and the Country. No Ideas you could form in the Winter can make you imagine what Twickenham is (and what your Friend Mr. Johnson of Twickenham is) in this warmer Seafon. Our River glitters beneath an unclouded Sun, at the fame time that its Banks retain the Verdure of Showers: Our Gardens are offering their firft Nofegays; ourTrees, like new Acquaintance brought happily together, are ftretching their Arms to meet each other, and growing nearer and nearer eyery Hour: The Birds are paying their thanksgiving Songs for the new Habitations I have made 'em: My Building rises

high

high enough to attract the Eye and Curiofity of the Paffenger from the River,where, upon beholding a Mixture of Beauty and Ruin, he enquires what Houfe is falling, or what Church is rifing? So little tafte have our common Tritons of Vitruvius whatever Delight the true, unfeen, poetical Gods of the River may take, in reflecting on their my Tufcan Porti

cos, or Ionic Pilafters.

But (to defcend from all this Pomp of Style) the beft Account I can give of what I am building, is, that it will afford me a few pleafant Rooms for fuch a Friend as or a cool Situation for an Hour or two for Lady Scudamore, when the will do me the Honour (at this Publick House on the Road) to drink her own Cyder.

The Moment I am writing this, I am furprized with the account of the Death of a Friend of mine; which makes all I have here been talking of, a meer Jeft! Buildings, Gardens, Writings, Pleafures, Works, of whatever ftuff Man can raife! none of them (God knows) capable of advantaging a Creature that is mortal, or of fatiffying a Soul that is immortal! Dear Sir,

am

Your most faithful Servant.

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