LETTER XV. Sept. 13, 1725. I SHOULD be ashamed to own the receipt of a very kind letter from you, two whole months from the date of this; if I were not more afhamed to tell a lye, or to make an excufe, which is worse than a lye (for being built upon fome probable circumftance, it makes ufe of a degree of truth to falfify with, and is a lye you could like, it would be esteemed an obligation (if you have time as the season improves) to look upon them and command any. I shall take the first favourable opportunity to inquire when it may be leaft inconvenient to wait on you, which will be a true fatisfac I have many true thanks to pay you, for the two joints of the giant's causeway, which I found yesterday at my return to Twitnam, perfectly fafe and entire. They will be a great ornament to my grotto, which confifts wholly of natural productions, owing nothing to the chiffel or polish; and which it would be much my ambition to entice you one day to look upon. I will firft wait on you at Chelfea, and embrace with great pleasure the fatisfaction you can better than any man afford me, of fo extenfive a view of Nature, in her most curious works. I am, with all respect, SIR, Your most obliged, A. POPE. a lye guarded.) Your letter has been in my pocket in constant wearing, till that, and the pocket, and the fuit, are worn out, by which means I have read it forty times, and I find by fo doing that I have not enough confidered and reflected upon many others you have obliged me with; for true friendship, as they fay of good writing, will bear reviewing a thoufand times, and ftill difcover new beauties. I have had a fever, a fhort one, but a violent: I am now well; fo it fhall take up no more of this paper. I begin now to expect you in town to make the winter come more tolerable to us both. The fummer is a kind of heaven, when we wander in a paradifaical fcene among groves and gardens; but at this season, we are, like our poor first parents, turned out of that agreeable though folitary life, and forced to look about for more people to help to bear our labours, to get into warmer houses, and live together in cities. I hope you are long fince perfectly restored, and rifen from your gout, happy in the delights of a contented family, fmiling at ftorms, laughing at greatness, merry over a Christmas-fire, and exercifing all the functions of an old Patriarch in charity and hofpitality. I will not tell Mrs. B* what I think fhe is doing; for I conclude it is her opinion, that he only ought to know it for whom it is done; and fhe will allow herself to be far enough advanced above a fine lady, not to defire to fhine before men. Your daughters perhaps may have fome other thoughts, which even their mother must excuse them for, because she is a mother. I will not, however suppose those thoughts get the better of their devo. tions, but rather excite them and affift the warmth of them; while their prayer may be, that they may rise up and breed as irreproachable a young family as their parents have done. In a word, I fancy you all well, eafy, and happy, just as I wish you; and next to that, I wish you all with me. Next to God, is a good man; next in dignity, and next in value. Minuifti eum paullo minus ab angelis. If therefore I wish well to the good and the deferving, and defire they only should be my companions and correfpondents, I must very foon and very much think of you. I want your company, and your example. Pray make hafte to town, fo as not again to leave us discharge the load of earth that lies on you, like one of the mountains under which, the poets fay, the giants (the men of the earth) are whelmed: leave earth, to the fons of the earth, your conversation is in heaven. Which that it may be accomplished in us all, is the prayer of him who maketh this fhort Sermon; value (to you) three-pence. Adieu. Mr. Blount died in London the following Year, 1726. P. LETTERS ΤΟ AND FROM THE HON. ROBERT DIGBY. From 1717 to 1727. I LETTER I. TO THE HON. ROBERT DIGBY. a June 2, 1717. HAD pleased myself fooner in writing to you, but that I have been your fucceffor in a fit of fickness, and am not yet fo much recovered, but that I have thoughts of ufing your phyficians. They are as grave perfons as any of the faculty, and (like the ancients) carry their own medicaments about with them. But indeed the moderns are fuch lovers of raillery, that nothing is grave enough to escape them. Let them laugh, but people will still have their opinions: as they think our Doctors affes to them, we'll think them affes to our Doctors. I am glad you are fo much in a better state of health, as to allow me to jeft about it. My concern, when I heard of your danger, was fo very serious, that I almost * Affes. W. I almost take it ill Dr. Evans fhould tell you of it, or you mention it. I tell you fairly, if you and a few more fuch people were to leave the world, I would not give fixpence to stay in it. I am not so much concerned as to the point whether you are to live fat or lean: moft men of wit or honesty are usually decreed to live very lean: so I am inclined to the opinion that it is decreed you fhall; however be comforted, and reflect, that you will make the better bufto for it. 'Tis fomething particular in you, not to be fatisfied with fending me your own books, but to make your acquaintance continue the frolic. Mr. Wdarton* forced me to take Gorboduc, which has fince done me great credit with feveral people, as it has done Dryden and Oldham fome difkindness: in fhewing there is as much difference between their Gor boduc * The perfon here mentioned was my father, a Fellow of Magdalen College in Oxford,, and afterwards Profeffor of Poetry; who was an intimate friend of Mr. Digby, of whose piety and goodness of heart, he used to relate many inftances. Gorboduc was the firft drama in our language that was like a regular tragedy. It was first exhibited in the Hall of the Temple, and afterwards before Q. Elizabeth, 1561. It was written by Th. Sackville, Lord Buckhurft; the original contriver of the Mirror of Magiflrates. He was affifted in it by Thomas, a tranflator of fome of the Pfalms. Mr. Spence, who fucceeded father as Profeffor of Poetry at Oxford, printed an edition of Gorboduc, from this very Copy of Pope, 1736, with a dedication to his friend Lord Middlefex ;. a man of taste, and defcendant of Lord Buckhurft. From this Letter of Pope it appears how little at that time was known of our ancient poets. For a full account of Gorbuduc, fee the Hiftory of English poetry, vol. 3. page 536, by my brother Mr. Thomas Wdarton. my |