LETTER XIX.

DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE.

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 1 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 return,† you are at least sure of quiet. You know how well I loved both Lord Oxford

* 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.

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 come 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.

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 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 eclipset which happened on the first of August.

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 rhymest 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

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.

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

Bowles.

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

Warton.

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

You are to understand that I live in the corner

* 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.

+ 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.

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 surprized 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 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 muttonpie, 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.

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.

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.

LETTER XX.*

DR. PARNELLE TO MR. POPE.†

(July, 1715.)

I AM writing to you a long letter, but all the tediousness I feel in it is, that it makes me during the time think more intently of my being far from you. I fancy, if I were with you, I could remove some of the uneasiness which you may have felt from the opposition of the world, and which you should be ashamed to feel, since it is but the testimony which one part of it gives you, that your merit is unquestionable. What would you have otherwise, from ignorance, envy, or those tempers which vie with you in your own way? I know this in mankind, that when our ambition is unable to

* This, and the three extracts following, concerning the translation of the first Iliad, set on foot by Mr. Addison, Mr. Pope has omitted in his first edition. Pope.

+ When Pope published Parnelle's charming translation of the Pervigilium Veneris, which certainly was not written by Catullus, but is of a later date, he did not print the Latin verses as if they were trochaics. It were to be wished we had as good a translation of that noble and spirited poem, so singular in its kind, the Atys, the numbers of which are so expressive of distraction and enthusiasm.

Warton.