The world's nad bufinefs now is o'er, "And I refent these pranks no more. 46 I to fuch blockheads fet my wit? Bit, or "a bite, a bite!" was once the fashionable cant wit and phrafe of the times; and Swift, we fee, condefcended to adopt it. It has fince given way to the hum, or humbug; which, in its turn, has been fucceeded by a variety of kindred nonfenfe. Let us now return to our noble Author. In Letter LXXI. we find his Lordfhip figuring away in the character of a reviewer; and we refpectfully veil our bonnets to our illuftrious Brother: (Addrefied to Mr. S. at Berlin.) Oa. 4, 1752. I confider you now as at the court of Auguftus, where, if ever the defire of pleafing animated you, it must make you exert all the means of doing it. You will fee there, full as well, I dare fay, as Horace did at Rome, how ftates are defended by arms, adorned by manners, and improved by laws. Nay, you have an Horace there, as well as an Auguftus; I need not name Voltaire qui nil molitur inepté, as Horace himself faid of another poet. I have lately read over all his works, that are published, though I had read them more than once before. I was induced to this by his Siècle de Louis XIV. which I have yet read but four times. In reading over all his works, with more attention I fuppofe than before, my former admiration of him is, I own, turned into aftonishment. There is no one kind of writing in which he has not excelled. You are so fevere a Claffic, that I queftion whether you will allow me to call his Henriade an Epic poem, for want of the proper number of Gods, Devils, Witches, and other abfurdities, requifite for the machinery: which machinery is (it feems) neceffary to conftitute the Epopée. But whether you do or not, I will declare (though poffibly to my own fhame) that I never read any Epic poem with near fo much pleasure. I am grown old, and have poffibly loft a great deal of that fire, which formerly made me love fire in others at any rate, and however attended with fmoke: but now I must have all fenfe, and cannot, for the fake of five righteous lines, forgive a thousand abfurd ones. In this difpofition of mind, judge whether I can read all Homer through tout de fuite. I admire his beauties; but, to tell you the truth, when he flumbers I fleep. Virgil, I confefs, is all fenfe, and therefore I like him better than his model; but he is often languid, especially in his five or fix laft books, during which I am obliged to take a good deal of fnuff. Befides I profefs myself an ally of Turnus's, against the pious neas, who, like many foi difant pious people, does the most flagrant injuftice and violence, in order to execute what they impudently call the will of Heaven. But what will you fay, when I tell you truly, that I cannot poffibly read our countryman Milton through. I acknowledge him to have fome moft fublime paffages, fome prodigious flashes of light; but then you must acknowledge, that light is often followed by darkness wifible, to "to ufe his own expreffion. Befides, not having the honour to be acquainted with any of the parties in his Poem, except the Man and the Woman, the characters and fpeeches of a dozen or two of Angels, and of as many Devils, are as much above my reach as my entertainment. Keep this fecret for me; for if it fhould be known, I fhould be abused by every tasteless Pedant, and every solid Divine in England. Whatever I have faid to the difadvantage of these three Poems, holds much stronger against Taffo's Gierufalemme: it is true he has very fine and glaring rays of poetry; but then they are only meteors, they dazzle, then disappear, and are fucceeded by falfe thoughts, poor concetti, and abfurd impoffibilities; witnefs the Fish and the Parrot, extravagancies unworthy of an Heroic Poem, and would much better have become Ariotto, who profeffes le coglionerie. I have never read the Lufiade of Camoens, except in a profe tranflation, confequently I have never read it at all, fo fhall fay nothing of it; but the Henriade is all fenfe from the beginning to the end, often adorned by the jufteft and livelieft reflections, the most - beautiful descriptions, the nobleft images, and the fublimeft fentiments; not to mention the harmony of the verfe, in which Voltaire Bundoubtedly exceeds all the French poets: fhould you infift upon - an exception in favour of Racine, I must infift, on my part, that he at least equals him. What hero ever interested more than Henry the Fourth, who, according to the rules of Epic poetry, carries on one great and long action, and fucceeds in it at laft? What de• fcription ever excited more horror than those, first of the Maffacre, and then of the Famine, at Paris? Was love ever painted with more truth and morbidezza than in the ninth book? Not better, in my mind, even in the fourth of Virgil. Upon the whole, with all your claffical rigour, if you will but fuppofe St. Louis a God, a Devil, or a Witch, and that he appears in perfon, and not in a dream, the Henriade will be an Epic poem, according to the ftricteft ftatute laws of the Epopée; but in my court of equity it is one as it is. I could expatiate as much upon all his different works, but that I fhould exceed the bounds of a letter, and run into a differtation. How delightful is his History of that Northern Brute, the King of Sweden! for I cannot call him a Man; and I should be forry to have him pafs for a Hero, out of regard to those true heroes; fuch as Julius Cæfar, Titus, Trajan, and the prefent King of Pruffia; who cultivated and encouraged arts and fciences; whofe animal courage was accompanied by the tender and focial fentiments of humanity; and who had more pleasure in improving, than in defroying their fellowcreatures. What can be more touching, or more interesting; what more nobly thought, or more happily expreffed, than all his dramatic pieces? What can be more clear and rational than all his philofophical letters? And what ever was fo graceful, and gentle, as all his little poetical trifles? You are fortunately à portée of verifying, by your knowledge of the man, all that I have faid of his works. Monfieur de Maupertuis (whom I hope you will get acquainted with) is, what one rarely meets with, deep in philofophy and mathematics, and yet honnéte et amiable homme; Algarotti is young Fontenelle. Such men must neceffarily give you the defire of pleafing 6 them; them; and if you can frequent them, their acquaintance will furnish you the means of pleafing every body else.' In Letter LXXIV. we find another remark or two on the works of Voltaire, which we fhall extract, as being properly fupplemental to the foregoing letter: I have lately read, with great pleasure, Voltaire's two little hiftories of les Croisades, and l'Esprit humain; which I recommend to your perufal, if you have not already read them. They are bound up with a moft poor performance, called Micromégas, which is faid to be Voltaire's too; but I cannot believe it, it is fo very unworthy of him it confifts only of thoughts ftolen from Swift, but miserably mangled and disfigured. But his Hiftory of the Croisades fhows, in a very short and trong light, the most immoral and wicked scheme, that was ever contrived by knaves, and executed by madmen and fools, against humanity. There is a strange, but never-failing relation, between honeft madmen and skilful knaves; and wherever one meets with collected numbers of the former, one may be very fure that they are fecretly directed by the latter. The Popes, who have generally been both the ableft and the greatest knaves in Europe, wanted all the power and money of the Eaft: for they had all that was in Europe already. The times and the minds favoured their defign, for they were dark and uninformed; and Peter the Hermit, at once a knave and a madman, was a fine papal tool for fo wild and wicked an undertaking. I wish we had good hiftories of every part of Europe, and indeed of the world, written upon the plan of Voltaire's de l' Esprit humain; for, I own, I am provoked at the contempt which most hiftorians fhow for humanity in general; one would think by them, that the whole human fpecies confifted but of about a hundred and fifty people, called and dignified (commonly very undefervedly too) by the titles of Emperors, Kings, Popes, Generals, and Minifters.'. The series of Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his fon, is closedby No. CXCVII. of the prefent volume. The laft is dated Oct. 17, 1768; foon after which a period was put to the paternal folicitude, expectations, and wishes of the noble Writer, by the death of Mr. Stanhope *,-the sole object of all. Nine letters to the widow of his above son, and one to her two fons, Charles and Philip Stanhope, are added to the above-mentioned feries. To thele are fubjoined the following mifcellaneous pieces, viz. 1. Some Account of the Government of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces. This piece is the more valuable, as the particulars which it contains are founded in his Lordship's perfonal acquaintance with the fubject. 11. Maxims. Of thefe maxims, his Lordfhip himself thus fpeaks, in one of his letters to his fon : I have thrown together the inclofed obfervations on men and things; for I have no merit as to the invention; I am no fyftem Mr. Stanhope died on the 16th of November following. monger; monger; and, instead of giving way to my imagination, I have only confulted my memory; and my conclufions are all drawn from facts, not from fancy. Moft maxim-mongers have preferred the prettinef to the juftnefs of a thought, and the turn to the truth; but I have refufed myfelf to every thing that my own experience did not justify and confirm. I wish you would confider them feriously, and feparately, and recur to them again pro re natâ in fimilar cafes. Young men are as apt to think themselves wife enough, as drunken men are to think themselves fober enough. They look upon spirit to be a much better thing than experience; which they call coldness. They are but half mistaken; for though fpirit, without experience, is dangerous, experience, without fpirit, is languid and defective. Their union, which is very rare, is perfection: you may join them, if you please; for all my experience is at your fervice.' A fample or two of the fruits of Lord C.'s experience may. not be unacceptable to the curious reader: As Kings are begotten and born like other men, it is to be prefumed that they are of the human fpecies; and, perhaps, had they the fame education, they might prove like other men. But, flattered from their cradles, their hearts are corrupted, and their heads are turned, fo that they feem to be a fpecies by themselves. No King ever faid to himself, Homo fum, nihil humani a me alienum puto. Flattery cannot be too ftrong for them; drunk with it from their infancy, like old drinkers, they require drams. They perfer a perfonal attachment to a public fervice, and reward it better. They are vain and weak enough to look upon it as a free-will offering to their merit, and not as a burnt facrifice to their power. • A difference of opinion, though in the mereft trifles, alienates little minds, especially of high rank. It is full as easy to commend as to blame a great man's cook, or his taylor: it is fhorter too; and the objects are no more worth difputing about, than the people are worth difputing with. It is impoffible to inform, but very easy to difplease them. The reputation of generofity is to be purchafed pretty cheap ; it does not depend fo much upon a man's general expence, as it does upon his giving handfomely where it is proper to give at all. A man, for inftance, who should give a fervant four fillings, would pafs for covetous, while he who gave him a crown, would be reckoned generous: fo that the difference of those two oppofite characters, turns upon one fhilling. A man's character, in that particular, depends a great deal upon the report of his own fervants; a mere trifle above common wages, makes their report favourable. 'Take care always to form your establishment fo much within your income, as to leave a fufficient fund for unexpected contingencies, and a prudent liberality. There is hardly a year, in any man's life, in which a fmall fum of ready money may not be employed to great advantage.' III. Political Maxims of the Cardinal de Retz, in his Memoirs; with Lord Chesterfield's Remarks. 5 IV. Con IV. Confiderations on the Repeal of the LIMITATION, relative to Foreigners, in the ACT OF SETTLEMENT. V. Axioms in Trade. VI. To the KING's Most Excellent MAJESTY. The humble Petition of Philip Earl of Chesterfield, Knight of the Most Nable - Order of the Garter. An excellent piece of pleafantry.. VII. Fragments, of Letters to his Son. VIII. Three Letters, to different Perfons. IX. An elegant poetical Compliment to Lord C. from Mr. Jerningham. X. Lord C.'s Letter to Mr. Jerningham, in acknowledgment of the aforementioned Compliment. XI. Three other Letters. Interfperfed through the letters to Mr. Stanhope, are many. anecdotes and characteristic sketches of eminent perfons, his Lordship's cotemporaries; among which we find the names of, firft, Lord AL-M-LE. This Nobleman's good fortune and progrefs in the great world, are inftanced as proofs of what may be done by addrefs, manners, and graces only. What do you think,' fays Lord C. made our friend Lord Al-m-le, colonel of a regiment of guards, governor of Virginia, groom of the ftole, and embaffador to Paris; amounting in all to fixteen or feventeen thousand pounds a year? Was it his birth? No; a Dutch gentleman only. Was it his estate? No, he had none. Was it his learning, his parts, his political abilities and application? You can answer thefe queftions as eafily, and as foon, as I can ask them. What was it then? Many people wondered, but I do not; for I know, and will tell you. It was his air, his addrefs, his manners, and his graces. He pleafed, and by pleafing became a favourite; and by. becoming a favourite became all that he has been fince. Show me any one inftance, where intrinfic worth and merit, unaffifted by exterior accomplishments, have raised any man fo high.' In the fame letter is the following character of a person of high rank in a neighbouring kingdom. You know the Duc de Richelieu, now Maréchal Gordon bleu, Gentilhomme de la Chambre, twice embassador, &c. By what means? Not by the purity of his character, the depth of his knowledge, or any uncommon penetration and fagacity. Women alone formed and raifed him. The Dutchefs of Burgundy took a fancy to him, and had him before he was fixteen years old; this put him in fashion among the beau monde: and the late Regent's eldest daughter, now Madame de Modene, took him next, and was near marrying him. Thefe early connections with women of the firft diftinction, gave him thofe manners, graces, and addrefs, which you fee he has; and which, can affure you, are all that he has; for, ftrip him of them, and he |