ftrong, than that of friendship. But I fear there will be no way left me to tell you this great truth, that I remember you, that I love you, that I am grateful to you, that I entirely esteem and value you: no way but that one, which needs no open warrant to authorize it, or fecret conveyance to fecure it; which no bills can preclude, and no Kings prevent; a way that can reach to any part of the world where you may be, where the very whisper or even the wish of a friend must not be heard, or even fufpected. By this esteem and affection of you, to your I dare tell my enemies in the gates, and you, and they, and their fons, may hear of it.

way

You prove yourself, my Lord, to know me for the friend I am; in judging that the manner of your Defence, and your Reputation by it, is a point of the highest concern to me: and affuring me, it shall be fuch, that none of your friends fhall blush for you. Let me further prompt you to do yourself the best and most lasting justice; the inftruments of your Fame to posterity will be in your own hands. May it not be, that Providence has appointed you to fome great and useful work, and calls you to it this severe way? You may more eminently and more effectually ferve the public even now, than in the stations you have fo honourably filled. Think of Tully, Bacon, and Clarendon1: Is it not the latter, the disgraced

part

9 Clarendon indeed wrote his beft works in his banishment: but the best of Bacon's were written before his disgrace; and the beft of Cicero's after his return from exile.

W.

part of their lives, which you most envy, and which you would choose to have lived?

I am tenderly fenfible of the wish you express, that no part of your misfortune may pursue me. But God knows, I am every day less and lefs fond of my native country, (fo torn as it is by Party-rage,) and begin to confider a friend in exile as a friend in death; one gone before, where I am not unwilling nor unprepared to follow after; and where (however various or uncertain the roads and voyages of another world may be) I cannot but entertain a pleafing hope that we may meet again.

I faithfully affure you, that in the mean time there is no one, living or dead, of whom I fhall think oftener or better than of you. I fhall look upon you as in a state between both, in which you will have from me all the paffions and warm wishes that can attend the living, and all the respect and tender sense of lofs, that we feel for the dead. And I fhall ever depend upon your constant friendship, kind memory, and good offices, though I were never to fee or hear the effects of them: like the truft we have in benevolent fpirits, who, though we never fee or hear them, we think, are conftantly ferving us, and praying for us.

Whenever I am wishing to write to you, I shall conclude you are intentionally doing so to me. And every time that I think of you, I will believe you are thinking of me. I never fhall fuffer to be forgotten

(nay

(nay to be but faintly remembered) the honour, the pleasure, the pride I must ever have, in reflecting how frequently you have delighted me, how kindly you have diftinguished me, how cordially you have advised me! In converfation, in ftudy, I fhall always want you, and wifh for you: in my most lively, and in my most thoughtful hours, I fhall equally bear about me, the impreffions of you: and perhaps it will not be in this life only, that I shall have cause to remember and acknowledge the friendship of the Bishop of Rochester.

LETTER XXIII.

то THE SAME.

May 17, 1723.

ONCE NCE more I write * to you as I promised, and this once, I fear, will be the laft! the Curtain will foon be drawn between my friend and me, and

nothing

* There is an anecdote, fo uncommon and remarkable, lately mentioned in Dr. Maty's Memoirs of the Earl of Chesterfield, and which he gives in the very words of that celebrated nobleman, that I cannot forbear repeating it in this place :-" I went,” said Lord Chesterfield, "to Mr. Pope, one morning at Twickenham, and found a large folio Bible, with gilt clafps, lying before him upon his table; and, as I knew his way of thinking upon that book, I asked him, jocofely, if he was going to write an answer to it? It is a prefent, faid he, or rather a legacy, from my old

nothing left but to wifh you a long good-night. May you enjoy a state of repofe in this life, not unlike that

fleep

friend the Bishop of Rochefter. I went to take my leave of him yesterday in the Tower, where I faw this bible upon his table. After the first compliments, the Bishop faid to me, "My friend Pope, "confidering your infirmities, and my age and exile, it is not likely “that we should ever meet again; and therefore I give you this le66 gacy to remember me by it."—" Does your Lordship abide by it "yourself?"—"I do."-"If you do, my Lord, it is but lately. May "I beg to know what new light or arguments have prevailed with you now, to entertain an opinion fo contrary to that which you enter "tained of that Book all the former part of your life?"-The Bishop replied, "We have not time to talk of these things; but take home "the Book: I will abide by it, and I recommend you to do so too, "and fo, God blefs you!"-Charity and juftice call on us, not haftily to credit fo marvellous a tale, without the strongest testimony for its truth. And, for the fake of juftice, I here infert a Letter, from a very respectable man, which I received on this subject.

66

"Rev. Sir, "You will be furprised at this address from a person who hath not the honour of being known to you, even by name; but the occafion of my writing will, I truft, plead for my freedom.

South Moulton, Devonshire, May 28, 1782.

"I have this week had the long-wifhed-for fatisfaction of reading your Effay on the Works of Pope. Mine will add nothing to the applaufe, which your writings have received from readers of taste and judgment. of this Letter is not to pay you a compliment. And I have fomething to communicate to you, you will be better pleased with.

But the defign You need it not :

which I am fure

"In quoting a certain "uncommon anecdote," refpecting Bishop Atterbury, from Dr. Maty's Memoirs of Lord Chesterfield, you very candidly acknowledge that it ought not to be credited too haftily. When I first read it in the Work from whence you have extracted it, I was much startled at it: But recollecting from what fource it iffued, I was led to fufpect its truth. The story is a very infidious one: and perfectly in Lord Chesterfield's manner!— It is airy, and gay, and arch: But no disguise can cover an Infidel's

VOL. VIII.

K

fleep of the foul which fome have believed is to fuc ceed it, where we lie utterly forgetful of that world

from

fidel's malignity. I would not judge haftily of any man's motives; nor call the veracity of any man in question without the cleareft evidence. But it is on the clearest evidence, and with the fulleft conviction, that I fcruple not to pronounce this ftory, concerning Bishop Atterbury's infidelity, to be groundless.

"The anecdote relates, that this remarkable conversation between Atterbury and Pope took place but a few days before the Bishop went into exile; whereas it appears from a Letter, dated nine months before this event, that the Bishop had, with equal piety and generofity, interested himself so far in the fpiritual welfare of his friend Mr. Pope, as to recommend to him the study of the Holy Scriptures; and foftening his zeal by his urbanity, had fo won on the esteem and affection of Pope, as to draw from him the most grateful and liberal acknowledgments. The Letter I refer to is the 19th, of the collection of thofe between Atterbury and Pope. At the conclufion is the following very remarkable paffage: "I "ought firft," fays Mr. Pope, " to prepare my mind for a better "knowledge, even of good profane writers, especially the moralists, "etc. etc. before I can be worthy of tasting that fupreme of books, and ❝ fublime of all writings, in which (as in all the intermediate ones) you may, if your friendship and charity towards me continue fo "far, be the best guide to Yours, etc."

"This Letter bears date July 27, 1722: The Bishop did not go into exile till nearly three quarters of a year afterwards. The last Letter of Pope to that Bishop previous to his exile, is dated April 20, 1723. It must have been about this time that Pope paid him a vifit in the Tower: But whether fuch a converfation took place as hath been pretended, may be fafely, for the Bishop's credit, fubmitted to the determination of every man of common sense, after reading the above extract.

"I communicated these hints laft winter to my very esteemed friend Mr. Moore, one of the Canons of the church of Exeter, and he wished me to communicate them to the Public, in order to check the infolence of certain gentlemen, who, arrogating all the good fenfe in the world to themselves, would infinuate that a man of genius, if he profeffes to be a Chriftian, must be a Hypocrite!

要