I have lately read a letter imputed to Lord B. called a Differtation upon Parties *. I think it very masterly

written.

4

3

Pray God reward you for your kind prayers: I believe your prayers will do me more good than those of all the Prelates in both kingdoms, or any Prelates in Europe except the bishop of Marseilles. And God preserve you for contributing more to mend the world, than the whole pack of (modern) Parfons in a lump.

I am ever entirely yours.

* The best, perhaps, of all Bolingbroke's works; written with great force of reasoning, and in a stile equally spirited and elegant.

One of the feverest attacks ever made on Sir Robert Walpole, was the Dedication prefixed to this Differtation, when the papers that had been firft feparately printed in the Craftsman, were collected into one volume, octavo. After the many things that have been faid for and against his long Miniftry, his want of skill and knowledge in conducting foreign affairs was most frequently repeated. In a Letter written 1776, the King of Pruffia affirms exprefsly, that Walpole used to fay, "I leave Europe to my brother; and reserve only England to myself.” 10 5,1

LETTER LXXVI.

FROM DR. SWIFT.

September 3, 1735.

THIS letter will be delivered to you by Faulkner the

Printer, who goes over on his private affairs. This is an answer to yours of two months ago, which complains of that profligate fellow Curl. I heartily wifh you were what they call difaffected, as I am. I may fay as David did, I have finned greatly, but what have these fheep done? You have given no offence to the Ministry, nor to the Lords, nor Commons, nor Queen, nor the next in Power. For you are a man of virtue, and therefore must abhor vice and all corruption, although your difcretion holds the reins. "You need not fear any confequence in "the commerce that hath fo long paffed between us; although I never destroyed one of your letters. "But my Executors are men of honour and virtue, "who have strict orders in my will to burn every "letter left behind me." Neither did our letters contain any Turns of Wit, or Fancy, or Politics, or Satire, but mere innocent Friendship: yet I am loth that any letters, from you and a very few other friends, fhould die before me. I believe we neither of us ever leaned our head upon our left hand to study what we fhould write next; yet we have held a conftant intercourfe from your youth and my middle

age,

age, and from

your middle age it must be continued till my death, which my bad ftate of health makes me expect every month. I have the ambition, and

it is very earnest as well as in hafte, to have one Epistle inscribed to me while I am alive, and you just in the time when wit and wifdom are in the height. I must once more repeat Cicero's defire to a friend; Orna me. A month ago were fent me over by a friend of mine, the works of John Hughes, Efq. They are in verse and profe. I never heard of the man in my life, yet I find your name as a subscriber too. He is too grave a Poet for me, and, I think, among the mediocribus in profe, as well as verfe. I have the honour to know Dr. Rundle; he is indeed worth all the rest you ever sent us, but that is saying nothing, for he anfwers your character; I have dined thrice in his company. He brought over a worthy clergyman of this kingdom as his chaplain, which was a very wife and popular action. His only fault is, that he drinks no wine, and I drink nothing else.

f

This kingdom is now abfolutely starving, by the means of every oppreffion that can be inflicted on mankind-Shall I not vifit for these things? faith the Lord. You advise me right, not to trouble myfelf about the world: but oppreffion tortures me, and I cannot live without meat and drink, nor get either without money; and money is not to be had, except they will make me a Bishop, or a Judge, or a Colonel, or a Commiffioner of the Revenues. Adieu.

anfwer

LETTER LXXVII.

your question as to Mr.. Hughes, what he wanted as to genius he made up as an honest man: but he was of the clafs you think him *.

I am glad you think of Dr. Rundle as I do. He will be an honour to the Bishops, and a difgrace to one Bishop, two things you will like: but what you will like more particularly, he will be a friend and benefactor even to your un-friended, un-benefited Nation; he will be a friend to the human race, whereever he goes. Pray tell him my best wishes for his health and long life: I wifh you and he came over together, or that I were with you. I never faw a man fo feldom whom I liked fo much as Dr. Rundle.

Lord Peterborow I went to take a laft leave of, at his fetting fail for Lisbon: no Body can be more wafted, no Soul can be more alive. Immediately after the fevereft operation of being cut into the bladder for a fuppreffion of urine, he took coach,

and

*But was the Author of fuch a Tragedy as the Siege of Damafcus one of the mediocribus? Swift and Pope seem not to recollect the value and the rank of an Author who could write fuch a Tragedy. May I venture, on this occafion, to give a little table of the different forts of Poets, ranged in order according to their merits?— Writers of occafional and miscellaneous Family-things, and tea-table Mifcellanies; writers of Paftorals; of Epiftles; of Satires; of didattic Poems; of Odes; of Tragedies; of Epic Poems.

and got from Bristol to Southampton. This is a man that will neither live nor die like any other mortal.

Poor Lord Peterborow! there is another ftring loft, that would have helped to draw you hither! He ordered on his death-bed his Watch to be given me (that which had accompanied him in all his travels) with this reason, "That I might have fomething to 66 put me every day in mind of him." It was a prefent to him from the King of Sicily, whofe arms and Infignia are graved on the inner-cafe; on the outer, I have put this inscription. Victor Amadeus, Rex Sicilia, Dux Sabaudiæ, etc. etc. Carolo Mordaunt, Comiti de Peterborow, D. D. Car. Mor. Com. de Pet. Alexandro Pope moriens legavit, 1735.

q

Pray write to me a little oftener: and if there be a thing left in the world that pleases you, tell it one who will partake of it. I hear with approbation and pleasure, that your prefent care is to relieve the most helpless of this world, thofe objects which most want our compaffion, though generally made the fcorn of their fellow-creatures, fuch as are lefs innocent than they. You always think generously; and of all charities, this is the moft difinterested, and leaft vainglorious, done to fuch as never will thank you, or can praise you for it.