me, than by employing me in fuch an office. As I have an ambition of having it known that you are my friend, I fhall be very proud of fhewing it by this, or any other inftance. queftion not but your Tranflation will enrich our Tongue, and do honour to our Country; for T conclude of it already from thofe performances with which you have obliged the public. I would only have you confider how it may moft turn to your advantage. Excufe my impertinence in this particular, which proceeds from my zeal for your eafe and happinefs. The work would coft you a great deal of time, and, unless you undertake it, will, I am afraid, never be executed by any other; at least I know none of this age that is equal to it befide yourself.

I am at prefent wholly immerfed in country business, and begin to take delight in it. I wish I might hope to fee you here fome time, and will not defpair of it, when you engage in a work that will require folitude and retirement.

I am

Your, &c.

LETTER XII.

Mr. ADDISON to Mr. Po PE.

Nov. 2, 1713.

Have receiv'd your letter, and am glad to find that you have laid fo good a scheme for your great undertaking. I queftion not but the Profe will require as much care as the Poetry, but the variety will give yourself some relief, and more pleasure to your readers.

You gave me leave once to take the liberty of a friend, in advising you not to content yourself with one half of the nation for your admirers, when you might command them all. If I might take the freedom to repeat it, I would on this occafion. I think you are very happy that you are out of the fray, and I hope all your undertakings will turn to the better account for it.

*The Notes to his Tranflation of Homer.

You

You fee how I prefume on your friendship in taking all this freedom with you; but I already fancy, that we have lived many years together in an unreserved converfation, and that we may do fa, many more, is the fincere wish of

Your, &c.

Yo

LETTER XIII.

To Mr. ADDISON..

OUR laft is the more obliging, as it hints at fome little niceties in my conduct, which your candour and affection prompts you to recommend to me, and which (fo trivial as things of this nature feem) are yet of no flight confequence, to people whom every body talks of, and every body as he pleafes. 'Tis a fort of tax, that attends an estate in Parnaffus, which is often rated much, higher than in proportion to the small poffeffion an author holds. For indeed an author, who is once come upon the town, is enjoy'd without being thanked for the pleafure, and fometimes ill-treated by thofe very persons who first debauched him. Yet, to tell you the bottom of my heart, I am no way difpleafed that I have offended the violent of all parties already; and at the fame time I af-. fure you confcientioufly, I feel not the leaft malevolence. or refentment against any of those who mifreprefent me, or are diffatisfied with ine. This frame of mind is fo cafy, that I am perfectly content with my condition.

As I hope, and would flatter myself, that you know me and my thoughts fo entirely, as never to be mistaken in either, fo 'tis a pleasure to me that you guess'd so right in regard to the author of that Guardian you mentioned. But I am forry to find it has taken air, that I have fome hand in those papers, because I writ fo very few as neither to deserve the credit of fuch a report with some people, nor the difrepute of it with others. An honeft Jacobite fpoke to me the fenfe or nonfenfe of the weak part of

his party very fairly, that the good people took it ill of me, that I writ with Steele, tho' upon never fo indifferent fubjects. This, I know, you will laugh at as well as I do; yet I doubt not but many little calumniators and perfons of four difpofitions will take occafion hence to befpatter me. I confefs 1 fcorn narrow fouls of all parties; and if I renounce my reafon in religious matters, I'll hardly do it in any other.

I can't imagine whence it comes to pass, that the few Guardians I have written are fo generally known for mine; that in particular which you mention I never difcovered to any man but the publifher, till very lately: yet almoft every body told me of it.

As to his taking a more politic turn, I cannot any way enter into that fecret, nor have I been let into it any more than into the reft of his politics. Tho' 'tis faid, he will take into thefe papers alfo feveral fubjects of the politer kind, as before: but I affure you, as to myself, I have quite done with them for the future. The little I have done, and the great refpe&t I hear Mr. Steele as a man of wit, has render'd me a fufpected Whig to fome of the violent; but (as old Dryden faid before me) 'tis not the violent I defign to please.

I generally employ the mornings in painting with Mr. Jervas, and the evenings in the converfation of fuch as I think can moft improve my mind, of whatever denomination they are. I ever muft fet the higheft value upon men of truly great, that is, honeft principles, with equal capacities. The best way I know of overcoming calumny and mifconftruction, is by a vigorous perfeverance in every thing we know to be right, and a total neglect of all that can enfue from it. 'Tis partly from this maxim that I depend upon your friendship, because I believe it will do juftice to my intention in every thing; and give me leave to tell you, that (as the world goes) this is no small affurance I repofe in you. I am

Your, &c.

See the Epifle to him in verfe, writ about this time.

LETTER

I

LETTER XIV,

To Mr. ADDISON,

Dec, 14, 1713.

Have been lying in wait for my own imagination, this week and more, and watching what thoughts came up in the whirl of the fancy, that were worth communicating to you in a letter. But I am at length convinced that my rambling head can produce nothing of that fort; fo I muft e'en be contented with telling you the old ftory, that I love you heartily. I have often found by experience, that nature and truth, tho' never fo low or vulgar, are yet pleasing when openly and artlessly represented: it would be diverting to me to read the very letters of an infant, could it write its innocent inconfiftencies and tautologies juft as it thought them. This makes me hope a letter from me will not be unwelcome to you, when I am confcious I write it with more unrefervedness than ever man wrote, or perhaps talk'd to another, I trust your good-nature with the whole range of my follies, and really love you fo well, that I would rather you should pardon me than efteem me; fince one is an act of goodness and benevolence, the other a kind of constrained deference,

You can't wonder my thoughts are scarce confiftent, when I tell you how they are distracted. Every hour of my life my mind is ftrangely divided; this minute perhaps I am above the ftars, with a thousand fyftems round about me, looking forward into a vaft abyfs, and lofing my whole comprehenfion in the boundless space of Creation, in dialogues with Whifton and the Aftronomers; the next moment I am below all trifles groveling with T* in the very centre of nonfenfe: now I am recreated with the brifk fallies and quick turns of wit, which Mr. Steele in his livelieft and freeft humours darts about him; and now levelling my application to the infignificant obfervations and quirks of Grammar of C* and D*. Good God! what an incongruous animal is man! how VOL. IV, unfettled

F

unfettled in his best part, his foul; and how changing and variable in his frame of body? the conftancy of the one fhook by every notion, the temperament of the other affected by every blast of wind! What is he altogether but one mighty inconfiftency: fickness and pain is the lot of one half of him, doubt and fear the portion of the other! What a buftle we make about paffing our time, when all our space is but a point? what aims and ambitions are crowded into this little inftant of our life, which (as Shakespear finely words it) is rounded with a fleep? Our whole extent of being is no more, in the eye of him who gave it, than a scarce perceptible moment of duration. Those animals whofe circle of living is limited to three or four hours, as the Naturalifts tell us, are yet as long-lived, and poffefs as wide a scene of action as man, if we confider him with a view to all Space, and all Eternity. Who knows what plots, what atchievements a mite may perform in his kingdom of a grain of duft, within his life of fome minutes; and of how much less confideration than even this, is the life of man in the fight of God, who is from ever, and for ever?

Who that thinks in this train, but muff fee the world and its contemptible grandeurs, leffen before him at every thought? 'Tis enough to make one remain ftupify'd in a poize of inaction, void of all defires, of all defigns, of all friendships.

But we must return (thro' our very condition of being) to our narrow felves, and thofe things that affect ourfelves our paffions, our interefts flow in upon us, and unphilofophize us into mere mortals. For my part, I never return fo much into myfelf, as when I think of you, whose friendship is one of the best comforts I have for the infignificancy of myself. I am

Your, &c.

LETTERS