He owns, he was afraid Dr Swift might have carried you too far among the enemy, during the heat of the animosity; but now all is safe, and you are escaped, even in his opinion. I promised in your name, like a good godfather, not that you should renounce the devil and all his works, but that you should be delighted to find him your friend merely for his own sake; therefore prepare yourself for some civilities.

I have done Homer's head, shadowed and heightened carefully; and I inclose the outline of the same size, that you may determine whether you would have it so large, or reduced to make room for feuillage or laurel round the oval, or about the square of the busto? perhaps there is something more solemn in the image itself, if I can get it well performed.

If I have been instrumental in bringing you and Mr Addison together with all sincerity, I value myself upon it as an acceptable piece of service to such a one as I know you to be.

Yours, &c.

FROM MR POPE TO MR JERVAS.

Aug. 27, 1714.

I AM just arrived from Oxford, very well diverted and entertained there. Every one is much concerned for the queen's death. No panegyrics ready yet for the king.

I admire your whig principles of resistance exceedingly, in the spirit of the Barcelonians: I join in your wish for them. Mr Addison's verses on Liber

ty, in his letter from Italy, would be a good form of prayer in my opinion,

O Liberty! thou Goddess heavenly bright! &c.

What you mention of the friendly office you endeavoured to do betwixt Mr Addison and me, deserves acknowledgments on my part. You thoroughly know my regard to his character, and my propensity to testify it by all ways in my power. You as thoroughly know the scandalous meanness of that proceeding which was used by Philips, to make a man I so highly value, suspect my dispositions toward him. But as, after all, Mr Addison must be the judge in what regards himself, and has seemed to be no very just one to me; so, I must own to you, I expect nothing but civility from him, how much soever I wish for his friendship. As for any offices of real kindness or service which it is in his power to do me, I should be ashamed to receive them from any man who had no better opinion of my morals, than to think me a party-man: nor of my temper, than to believe me capable of maligning, or envying another's reputation as a poet. So I leave it to time to convince him as to both, to shew him the shallow depths of those half-witted creatures who misinforıned him, and to prove that I am incapable of endeavouring to lessen a person whom I would be proud to imitate, and therefore ashamed to flatter. In a word, Mr Addison is sure of my respect at all times, and of my real friendship whenever he shall think fit to know me for what I

am.

For all that passed betwixt Dr Swift and me, you know the whole (without reserve) of our correspondence. The engagements I had to him were such as the actual services he had done me, in

relation to the subscription for Homer, obliged me to. I must have leave to be grateful to him, and to any one who serves me, let him be never so obnoxious to any party nor did the tory party ever put me to the hardship of asking this leave, which is the greatest obligation I owe to it; and I expect no greater from the whig party than the same liberty A curse on the word party, which I have been forced to use so often in this period! I wish the present reign may put an end to the distinction, that there may be no other for the future than that of Honest and Knave, Fool and Man of Sense; these two sorts must always be enemies; but for the rest, may all people do as you and I, believe what they please, and be friends. I am, &c.

*

FROM DR ARBUTHNOT TO MR POPE.

London, Sept. 7, 1714.

I AM extremely obliged to you for taking notice of a poor old distressed courtier, commonly the most despisable thing in the world. This blow has so roused Scriblerus, that he has recovered his senses, and thinks and talks like other men. From being frolicksome and gay, he is turned grave and morose. His lucubrations lie neglected, among old news

* Unfortunately it did not put an end to party distinctions; but, by proscribing the tories, heightened and continued the animosity of both parties.--WARTON.

VOL. XVI.

papers, cases, petitions, and abundance of unanswerable letters. I wish to God they had been among the papers of a noble lord* sealed up: then might Scriblerus have passed for the Pretender; and it would have been a most excellent and laborious work for the Flying Post, or some such author, to have allegorized all his adventures into a plot, and found out mysteries somewhat like the " Key to the Lock."

Martin's office is now the second door on the left hand in Dover Street, where he will be glad to see Dr Parnell, Mr Pope, and his old friends; to whom he can still afford a half pint of claret. It is with some pleasure that he contemplates the world still busy, and all mankind at work for him. I have seen a letter from Dean Swift; he keeps up his noble spirit; and, though like a man knocked down, you may behold him still with a stern countenance, and aiming a blow at his adversaries. I will add no more, being in haste; only, that I will never forgive you, if you cannot use my foresaid house in Dover Street with the same freedom as you did that in St James's; for as our friendship was not begun upon the relation of a courtier, so I hope it will not end with it. I will always be proud to be reckoned amongst the number of your friends and humble servants.

TO LORD BOLINGBROKE.

MY LORD,

Dublin, Sept. 14, 1714.

I HOPE your lordship, who were always so kind to me while you were a servant, will not forget me now in your greatness. I give you this caution, because I really believe you will be apt to be exalted in your new station of retirement, which was the only honourable post that those who gave it you were capable of conferring. And as, in other employments, the circumstances with which they are given, are sometimes said to be equally valuable with the gift itself, so it was in your case. The sealing up your office, and especially without any directions from the king, discovered such sentiments of you in such persons, as would make any honest man proud to share them.

I must be so free as to tell you, that this new office of retirement will be harder for you to keep, than that of secretary: and you lie under one great disadvantage, beside your being too young; that whereas none but knaves and fools desire to deprive you of your former post, all the honest men in England will be for putting you out of this.

I go on in writing, though I know not how to send you my letter. If I were sure it would be opened by the sealers of your office, I would fill it with some terms of art, that they would better de serve, than relish.

It is a point of wisdom too hard for me, not to look back with vexation upon past management Divines tell us often from their pulpits, "that half the pains which some men take to be damned, would have compassed their salvation:" this, I am sure,