self. Upon his own account, I could not much desire the continuance of his life under so much pain, and so many infirmities. hardened me; and I have an I do not only Years have not yet addition of weight upon my spirits since we lost him; though I saw him so seldom, and possibly if he had lived on, should never have seen him more. wish, as you ask me, that I was unacquainted with any deserving person, but almost that I never had a friend. Here is an ingenious good-humoured physician, a fine gentleman, an excellent scholar, easy in his fortunes, kind to every body, hath abundance of friends, entertains them often and liberally; they pass the evening with him at cards, with plenty of good meat and wine, eight or a dozen together; he loves them all, and they him. He has twenty of these at command; if one of them dies, it is no more than Poor Tom! he gets another, or takes up with the rest, and is no more moved than at the loss of his cat: he offends nobody, is easy with every body.-Is not this the true happy man? I was describing him to my Lady A, who knows him too, but she hates him mortally by my character, and will not drink his health; I would give half my fortune for the same temper, and yet I cannot say I love it, for I do not love my Lord who is much of the Doctor's nature. I hear Mr. Gay's second opera, which you mention, is forbid; and then he will be once more fit to be advised, and reject your advice. Adieu.. LETTER LXXX. MR. POPE TO MR. GAY. (Jan. 1728-9.) I AM glad to hear of the progress of your reco very, and the oftener I hear it, the better, when it becomes easy to you to give it me. I so well remember the consolation you were to me in my mother's former illness, that it doubles my concern at this time not to be able to be with you, or you able to be with me. Had I lost her, I would have been no where else but with you during your confinement. I have now passed five weeks without once going from home, and without any company but for three or four of the days. Friends rarely stretch their kindness so far as ten miles. My Lord Bolingbroke and Mr. Bethel have not forgotten to visit me: the rest (except Mrs. Blount once) were contented to send messages. I never passed so melancholy a time, and now Mr. Congreve's death* touches me nearly. It was twenty Our author's great regard for Congreve appears from his having dedicated to him, in preference to any great patron, his translation of the Iliad. One of the most singular circumstances in the life of Congreve is, his having been able to write such a comedy as the Old Bachelor, at the age of nineteen. Dr. Johnson accounts for this extraordinary phænomenon in the history of literature, by saying it might be done by a mind vigorous and acute, and furnished with comic characters by the perusal of other poets, without much actual commerce with mankind. And then he afterwards adds, in direct and palpable contradiction of this assertion, "that he is an years and more that I have known him. Every year carries away something dear with it, till we outlive all tendernesses, and become wretched individuals again as we begun. Adieu; This is my birth-day, and this is my reflection upon it: With added days if life give nothing new, But, like a sieve, let every pleasure through; Your, &c. original writer, who borrowed neither the models of his plots, nor the manner of his dialogue." The inexhausted and improper superabundance of his wit, on all subjects and occasions, and in all characters, (for Jeremy is as witty as his master, Valentine,) has been too often observed to be here mentioned. The Mourning Bride has been magnified, beyond its merits, by Lord Kaimes; and Dr. Johnson has strained an encomium on a speech of Almeria, in this tragedy, so high, as to say, that a more poetical paragraph cannot be selected from the whole mass of English poetry. One passage in this speech must be noticed for its affectation: she "The temple in which the scene lies, is so solemn and awful, that it looks tranquillity." How different in style and manner are the brilliant sallies in Congreve's comedies, from the purity, justness, and truth of Terence, and the Drummer! Warton. says, * These lines were originally added to the Lines on the Birthday of M. Blount: “Oh, be thou blest!" These appear in the MS. in his own hand-writing, sent to her; but are properly left out in his Works. Bowles. LETTER LXXXI. DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE. March 6, 1728-9. IF I am not a good correspondent, I have bad health; and that is as good. I passed eight months in the country, with Sir Arthur and my Lady Acheson, and had at least half a dozen returns of my giddiness and deafness, which lasted me about three weeks a-piece; and among other inconveniences, hindered me from visiting my chapter, and punishing enormities; but did not save me the charges of a visitation dinner. This disorder neither hinders my sleeping, nor much my walking: yet is the most mortifying malady I can suffer. I have been just a month in town, and have just got rid of it in a fortnight: and, when it is on me, I have neither spirits to write, or read, or think, or eat. But I drink as much as I like; which is a resource you cannot fly to when you are ill. And I like it as little as you: but I can bear a pint better than you can a spoonful. You were very kind in your care for Mr. Whaley;* but I hope you re * This respects a lawsuit between Mr. Nathaniel Whaley and the Archbishop of Armagh on the one side, and the Crown on the other, which depended in the House of Lords, on a writ of error and in which the Dean greatly interested himself. Mr. Whaley was at length successful. The shape of the question resolved into a doubt whether the death of George I. did not abate the writ. Sir W. Scott. membered that Daniel* is a damnable poet, and consequently a public enemy to mankind. But I despise the Lords' decree, which is a jest upon common sense, for what did it signify to the merits of the cause, whether George the old, or the young, were on the throne? No: I intended to pass last winter in England, but my health said no: and I did design to live a gentleman, and, as Sancho's wife said, to go in my coach to court. I know not whether you are in earnest to come hither in spring; if not, pray God you may never be in jest! Dr. Delany shall attend you at Chester, and your apartment is ready; and I have a most excellent chaise, and about sixteen dozen of the best cider in the world; and you shall command the town and kingdom, and digito monstrari, &c. And, when I cannot hear, you shall have choice of the best people we can afford, to hear you, and nurses enough; and your apartment is on the sunny side. The next paragraph strikes me dumb. You say, "I am to blame, if I refuse the opportunity of going with my Lady Bolingbroke to Aix la Chapelle." I must tell you that a foreign language is mortal to a deaf man. I must have good ears to catch up the words of so nimble a tongued race as the French, having been a dozen years without conversing among them. Mr. Gay is a scandal to * Richard Daniel, Dean of Armagh, attending as a witness on the issue of the cause. Sir W. Scott. |