called-what that means in English or French, I can't say—but all he says, is in so loose and slippery and trickish a way of reasoning, that I could not forbear applying the passage of Virgil to him,

Vane Ligus, frustraque animis elate superbis!
Nequicquam patrias tentasti lubricus artes-

To be serious, I hate to see a book gravely written, and in all the forms of argumentation, which proves nothing, and which says nothing; and endeavours only to put us into a way of distrusting our own faculties, and doubting whether the marks of truth and falsehood can in any case be distinguished from each other. Could that blessed point be made out (as it is a contradiction in terms to say it can), we should then be in the most uncomfortable and wretched state in the world; and I would in that case be glad to exchange my Reason, with a dog for his Instinct,

to-morrow.

LETTER VIII.

L. CHANCELLOR HARCOURT TO MR. POPE.

December 6, 1722. I CANNOT but suspect myself of being very unreasonable in begging you once more to review the inclosed. Your friendship draws this trouble on you. I may freely own to you, that my tenderness makes me exceeding hard to be satisfied with any thing which can be said on such an unhappy subject. I caused the Latin Epitaph to be as often altered before I could approve it.

When once your Epitaph is set up, there can be no alteration of it; it will remain a perpetual monument of your friendship, and I assure myself, you will so settle it, that it shall be worthy of you. I doubt whether the word, deny'd, in the third line, will justly admit of that construction which it ought to bear, (viz.) renounced, deserted, etc. deny'd is capable, in my opinion of having an ill sense put upon it, as too great uneasiness, or more good-nature, than a wise man ought to have. I very well. remember you told me, you could scarce mend those two lines, and therefore I can scarce expect your forgiveness for my desiring you to reconsider them.

Harcourt stands dumb, and Pope is forc'd to speak.

I can't perfectly, at least without farther discoursing you, reconcile myself to the first part of that line; and, the word forc'd (which was my own, and, I persuade myself, for that reason only submitted to by you) seems to carry too doubtful a construction for an Epitaph, which, as I apprehend, ought as easily to be understood as read. I shall acknowledge it as a very particular favour, if at your best leisure you will peruse the inclosed and vary it, if you think it capable of being amended, and let me see you any morning next week.

I am, etc.

91

LETTER IX.

THE BISHOP OF ROCHESTER TO MR. POPE.

September 21, 1721.

I AM now confined to my bed-chamber, and to the matted room wherein I am writing, seldom venturing to be carried down even into the parlour to dinner, unless when company, to whom I cannot excuse myself, comes, which I am not ill pleased to find is now very seldom. This is my case in the sunny part of the year: what must I expect, when

inversum contristat Aquarius annum ?

"if these things be done in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry?" Excuse me for employing a sentence of Scripture on this occasion; I apply it very seriously. One thing relieves me a little under the ill prospect I have of spending my time at the Deanery this winter; that I shall have the opportunity of seeing you oftener; though, I am afraid, you will have little pleasure in seeing me there. So much for my ill state of health, which I had not touched on, had not your friendly Letter been so full of it. One civil thing, which you say in it, made me think you had been reading Mr. Waller; and possessed of that image at the end of his copy, à la malade, had you not bestowed it on one who

5 Whom the Bishop so happily imitated in his lines on Flavia's Fan.

has no right to the least part of the character.

you

If

have not read the verses lately, I am sure you remember them because you forget nothing.

With such a grace you entertain,

And look with such contempt on pain, etc.

I mention them not upon account of that couplet, but one that follows; which ends with the very same rhymes and words (appear and clear) that the couplet but one after that does-and therefore in my Waller there is a various reading of the first of these couplets; for there it runs thus,

So lightnings in a stormy air,

Scorch more than when the sky is fair.

You will say that I am not very much in pain, nor very busy, when I can relish these amusements, and will say true; for at present I am in both these respects very easy.

you

I had not strength enough to attend Mr. Prior to his grave, else I would have done it, to have shewn his friends that I had forgot and forgiven what he wrote on me. He is buried, as he desired, at the feet of Spenser, and I will take care to make good in every respect what I said to him when living; particularly as to the Triplet he wrote for his own

• There are four or five Letters of the Bishop to Prior, in Nicol's Collection, full of affection and regard. One, in a vein of irony, containing a pleasing compliment on his Solomon and Alma. Another (vol. ii. p. 58.) abounding in hacknied quotations from Virgil: which I mention on account of a wonderful, unscholarlike comparison of a line of Virgil and Homer; the former of which he prefers,-dum spiritus hos regit artus,-to the piλa yoúvara of Homer; friendly knees, he says, whereas píla signifies no more than sua genua, or than hos joined to artus. Two

Epitaph; which, while we were in good terms, I promised him should never appear on his tomb while I was Dean of Westminster.

I am pleased to find you have so much pleasure, and (which is the foundation of it) so much health at Lord Bathurst's: May both continue till I see you! May my Lord have as much satisfaction in building the house in the wood, and using it when

severe Epigrams against Atterbury have been ascribed to Prior, and are both inserted in the late collection of his works.

"Meek Francis lies here, Friend. Without stop or stay,
As you value your peace, make the best of your way.
Though at present arrested by Death's caitiff paw,
If he stirs, he may still have recourse to the law:
And in the King's Bench should a verdict be found
That by livery and seisin his grave is his ground,
He will claim to himself what is strictly his due,
And an action of trespass will straightway ensue,
That you, without right, on his premises tread,

On a simple surmise that the owner is dead."

The other was occasioned by the funeral of the Duke of Buckingham, whom Prior survived but a few months,

"I have no hopes," the Duke he says, and dies;
"In sure and certain hopes," the Prelate cries:

Of these two learned Peers, I pr'ythee, say, man,
Who is the lying Knave, the Priest or Layman?
The Duke he stands an Infidel confest,

"He's our dear Brother," quoth the lordly Priest.
The Duke, though Knave, still "Brother dear," he cries,
And who can say, the Reverend Prelate lies?

There cannot be a stronger proof of Atterbury's restless and ambitious temper, than is exhibited in the Letter written to him by his Father, 1690, in vol. i. of Nicols's Collection, p. 11. In the British Museum, there is one Letter of Pope to Prior, in commendation of his Poem, entitled Damon, a little piece of true humour.