That

of one hand hang impediments to the other1, like use. lefs dependents, who only take up room, and never are active and affiftant to our wants: I fhall never be much the better for 'em.I congratulate you first upon what you call your Coufin's wonderful Book, which is publica trita manu at present, and I prophecy will be hereafter the admiration of all men. countenance with which it is received by fome ftatefmen, is delightful; I wish I could tell you how every fingle man looks upon it, to obferve which has been my whole diverfion this fortnight. I have never been a night in London fince you left me, till now for this very end, and indeed it has fully answered my expectations.

I find no confiderable man very angry at the book: fome indeed think it rather too bold, and too general a Satire: but none, that I hear of, accuse it of particular reflections; (I mean no perfons of confequence, or good judgment; the mob of Critics, you know, always are defirous to apply Satire to those they envy for being above them;) fo that you needed not to have been fo fecret upon this head. Motte received the

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This was occafioned by a bad accident as he was returning home in a friend's chariot; which in paffing a bridge was overturned, and thrown with the horses into the river. The glaffes being up, and Mr. Pope unable to break them, he was in immediate danger of drowning, when the poftillion, who had just recovered himfelf, beat the glafs which lay uppermoft to pieces: a fragment of which cut one of Mr. Pope's hands very dan gerously. W.

copy (he tells me) he knew not from whence, nor from whom, dropped at his houfe in the dark, from a Hackney-coach: by computing the time, I found it was after you left England, fo, for my part, I suspend my judgment.

I am pleased with the nature and quality of your Present to the Princefs. The Irish ftuff* you fent to Mrs. H. her R. H. laid hold of, and has made up for her own ufe. Are you determined to be national in every thing, even in your civilities? You are the greatest Politician in Europe at this rate; but as you are a rational Politician, there is no great fear of you, you will never fucceed.

Another thing in which you have pleased me, was what you fay to Mr. P. by which it seems to me that you value no man's civility above your own dignity, or your own reason. Surely, without flattery, you are now above all parties of men, and it is high time to be fo, after twenty or thirty years obfervation of the great world.

Nullius addictus jurare in verba magiftri.

I question

*The Dean at this time courted the Princefs, and was in hopes of getting his Irish Deanery changed for fome preferment in England. But the Ministry were afraid to bring him on this fide the water. Sir Robert Walpole dreaded his abilities. I once heard a perfon, high in office, exprefs his wonder that Ministers fhould much regard what writers faid of them, and how they reprefented them. I anfwered him only by reading a paffage in Lord Shaftesbury's Advice to an Author. Characteristics, vol. i. p. 225.

I question not, many men would be of your intimacy, that you might be of their interest: but God forbid an honeft or witty man should be of any, but that of his country. They have fcoundrels enough to write for their paffions and their designs; let us write for truth, for honour, and for pofterity. If you must needs write about Politics at all, (but perhaps it is full as wife to play the fool any other way,) furely it ought to be so as to preserve the dignity and integrity of your character with those times to come, which will most impartially judge of you.

I wish you had writ to Lord Peterborow, no man is more affectionate towards you. Don't fancy none but Tories are your friends; for at that rate I must be, at most, but half your friend, and fincerely, I am wholly fo. Adieu, write often, and come foon, for many wifh you well, and all would be glad of your company.

LETTER XX.

FROM DR. SWIFT.

Dublin, November 17, 1726.

I AM just come from anfwering a letter of Mrs. H—ʼs, writ in fuch myftical terms, that I fhould never

have found out the meaning, if a Book had not been fent me called Gulliver's Travels, of which you fay fo much in yours. I read the Book over, and in the fecond volume obferved feveral paffages, which appear to be patched and altered, and the style of a different fort (unless I am much mistaken). Dr. Arbuthnot likes the Projectors least'; others, you tell me, the Flying Island; fome think it wrong to be fo hard upon whole Bodies or Corporations, yet the general opinion is, that reflections on particular perfons are most to be blamed: fo that in these cases, I think the best method is to let cenfure and opinion take their courfe. A Bishop here faid, that book was full of improbable lies, and for his part, he hardly believed a word of it; and fo much for Gulliver.

Going

* This was the fact, which is complained of and redressed in the Dublin Edition of the Dean's works. W.

1. Because he understood it to be intended as a fatire on the W.

Royal Society.

VOL. IX.

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Going to England is a very good thing, if it were not attended with an ugly circumstance of returning to Ireland. It is a fhame you do not perfuade your Ministers to keep me on that fide, if it were but by a court expedient of keeping me in Prifon for a Plotter; but at the fame time I must tell you, that fuch journies very much shorten my life, for a month here is longer than fix at Twickenham.

How comes friend Gay to be fo tedious? another man can publish fifty thousand Lies fooner than he can fifty Fables.

I am just going to perform a very good office, it is to affift with the Archbishop, in degrading a Parfon who couples all our beggars,, by which I fhall make one happy man: and decide the great question of an indelible character in favour of the principles in fashion; this I hope you will represent to the Ministry in my favour, as a point of merit; fo farewel till I

return.

I am come back, and have deprived the Parfon, who by a law here is to be hanged the next couple he marries: he declared to us that he refolved to be hanged, only desired that when he was to go to the gallows the Archbishop would take off his Excommunication. Is not he a good Catholic? and yet he is but a Scotch-man. This is the only Irifh event I ever troubled you with, and I think it deferves notice. —Let me add, that, if I were Gulliver's friend, I would defire all my acquaintance to give out that his

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