SIR, FROM MR. CARTER.* Henrietta Street, March 15, 1735-6. I WOULD have waited on you, when I sent my servant with a message, but was informed you did not see company. I have no doubt the printer will have occasion for a great many cargoes from our friend Mr. Jervas.t I am very glad I had an opportunity of doing anything agreeable to you. I have long wished for some instance of assuring you that I am, with great respect, Your most obedient and most humble servant, THOMAS CARTER. FROM MR. POPE. March 25, 1736. If ever I write more epistles in verse, one of them shall be addressed to you. I have long concerted it and begun it, but I would make what bears your name as finished as my last work ought to be, * Mr. Carter was Master of the Rolls in Ireland.-D. S. † A fine print of the Dean, engraved by Fourdrinier, from an original picture painted by Jervas, which was afterwards purchased by the Earl of Chesterfield, and placed in his elegant library at May Fair, in the collection of English authors.-D. S. that is to say, more finished than any of the rest. The subject is large, and will divide into four epistles, which naturally follow the Essay on Man, viz., 1. Of the Extent and Limits of Human Reason and Science: 2. A View of the useful and therefore attainable, and of the unuseful, and therefore unattainable, Arts: 3. Of the Nature, Ends, Application, and Use of different Capacities: 4. Of the Use of Learning, of the Science of the World, and of Wit. It will conclude with a Satire against the misapplication of all these, exemplified by pictures, characters, and examples. But, alas! the task is great, and non sum qualis eram! My understanding, indeed, such as it is, is extended rather than diminished: I see things more in the whole, more consistent, and more clearly deduced from, and related to each other. But what I gain on the side of philosophy, I lose on the side of poetry: the flowers are gone when the fruits begin to ripen, and the fruits perhaps will never ripen perfectly. The climate (under our heaven of a court) is but cold and uncertain; the winds rise, and the winter comes on. I find myself but little disposed to build a new house; I have nothing left but to gather up the relics of a wreck, and look about me to see how few friends I have left. Pray, whose esteem or admiration should I desire now to procure by my writings? whose friendship or conversation to obtain by them? I am a man of desperate fortunes, that is, a man whose friends are dead, for I never aimed at any other fortune than in friends. As soon as I had sent my last letter, I received a most kind one from you, expressing great pain for my late illness at Mr. Cheselden's. I conclude you was eased of that friendly apprehension in a few days after you had dispatched yours, for mine must have reached you then. I wondered a little at your quere who Cheselden was? it shews that the truest merit does not travel so far any way as on the wings of poetry; he is the most noted and most deserving man in the whole profession of chirurgery; and has saved the lives of thousands by his manner of cutting for the stone. I am now well, or what I must call so. I have lately seen some writings of Lord Bolingbroke's, since he went to France. Nothing can depress his genius: whatever befalls him, he will still be the greatest man in the world, either in his own time or with posterity. Every man you know or care for here, inquires of you, and pays you the only devoir he can, that of drinking your health. I wish I wish you had any motive to see this kingdom. I could keep you, for I am rich; that is, I have more than I want. I can afford room for yourself and two servants; I have indeed room enough; nothing but myself at home; the kind and hearty housewife is dead; the agreeable and instructive neighbour is gone; yet my house is enlarged and the gardens extend and flourish, as knowing nothing of the guest they have lost. I have more fruit-trees and kitchen garden than you have any thought of; nay I have good melons and pine apples of my own growth. I am as much a better gardener, as I am a worse poet, than when you saw me; but gardening is near akin to philosophy, for Tully says, agricultura proxima sapientiæ. For God's sake, why should not you (that are a step higher than a philosopher, a divine, yet have more grace and wit than to be a bishop) even give all you have to the poor of Ireland, (for whom you have already done everything else,) so quit the place, and live and die with me? And let tales animæ concordes be our motto and our epitaph. FROM DR. SHERIDAN. DEAR SIR, March 27, 1736. I HAD a pleasure and grief at once in your letter, to find you had not forgotten me, and to find you uneasy at a thing which God only can mend. The dream, which I had before the receipt of yours, was so odd and out of the way, that if Artemidorus were living, he would confess it to be out of all methods of interpretation; yet I cannot avoid imparting it to you, because if you be not much changed, no man ever could sift a matter to the truth beyond you. Thus it was :— Imprimis, I fell asleep, (or I could not dream,) and what was the first thing I saw, but honest Cato in a cockboat by himself, engaging not only a large fleet of foreigners, but now and then obliged to tack about against some dirty shattered floats, filled with his own countrymen. All were his enemies, except a very few, who were pressed and carried on against their will by the arbitrary power of the rowers. I would give a shilling, as low as money is reduced, to know the meaning of it. * VOL. XVIII. 2 D DR. SHERIDAN TO MRS. ALBA VIA. DEAR MADAM, I THANK my dear friend the Dean and you for your kind warning against a cold, which, I thank God, is not among us, as I told you in my last. Whisky, of which I take half a pint in the twenty-five hours, with an agreeable mixture of garlick, bitter orange, gentian-root, snake-root, wormwood, &c., hath preserved me from the asthma for three weeks past to any violent degree. I am happy when my gaspings are no quicker than those of a very quick walker. So much for myself. Now for your jewel of a son. I never met with any boy of his age of such thorough good sense, and so great a thirst for improving himself. I thank God, he is as you and I could wish. The Dean will have pleasure to examine him. Adieu. FROM DR. SHERIDAN. DEAR SIR, April 3, 1736. I WOULD have written last post, but I had such a violent headache, that I could no more think than a cabbage. And now all the business I have is to make you a paper visit, only to ask you, how you do? You may think me impertinent for the question; but when I tell you, that I have not above three friends, you will not wonder that I should be afraid |