few more such people were to leave the world, I would not give sixpence to stay in it.

I am not so much concerned as to the point whether you are to live fat or lean: most men of wit or honesty are usually decreed to live very lean: so I am inclined to the opinion that it is decreed you shall; however be comforted, and reflect, that you will make the better busto for it.

'Tis something particular in you, not to be satisfied with sending me your own books, but to make your acquaintance continue the frolic. Mr. Wdarton3 forced me to take Gorboduc, which has since done me great credit with several people, as it has done Dryden and Oldham some diskindness; in shewing there is as much difference between their Gorboduc and this, as between Queen Anne and King George. It is truly a scandal, that men should write with contempt of a piece which they never

'The person here mentioned was my father, a Fellow of Magdalen College in Oxford, and afterward Professor of Poetry; who was an intimate friend of Mr. Digby, of whose piety and goodness of heart he used to relate many instances. Gorboduc was the first drama in our language that was like a regular tragedy. It was first exhibited in the Hall of the Temple, and afterward before Q. Elizabeth, 1561. It was written by Th. Sackvil, Lord Buckhurst; the original contriver of the Mirror of Magistrates. He was assisted in it by Thomas, a translator of some of the Psalms. Mr. Spence, who succeeded my father as Professor of Poetry at Oxford, printed an edition of Gorboduc, from this very Copy of Pope, 1736, with a dedication to his friend Lord Middlesex; a man of taste, and descendant of Lord Buckhurst. From this Letter of Pope it appears how little at that time was known of our ancient poets. For a full account of Gorboduc, see the History of English Poetry, vol. 3. page 536, by my brother Mr. Thomas Wdarton.

once saw, as those two Poets did, who were ignorant even of the sex, as well as sense, of Gorboduc*.

Adieu! I am going to forget you: this minute you took up all my mind; the next I shall think of nothing but the reconciliation with Agamemnon, and the recovery of Briseis. I shall be Achilles' humble servant these two months (with the good leave of all my friends). I have no ambition so strong at present, as that noble one of Sir Salathiel Lovel, recorder of London, to furnish out a decent and plentiful execution of Greeks and Trojans. It is not to be expressed how heartily I wish the death of all Homer's heroes, one after another. The Lord preserve me in the day of battle, which is just approaching! Join in your prayers for me, and know me to be always

Your, etc.

LETTER II.

London, March 31, 1718.

To convince you how little pain I give myself in corresponding with men of good-nature and good understanding, you see I omit to answer your letters

'I have been informed by Lord Macartney, that he had seen a Letter from this Lord Treasurer Buckhurst to Queen Elizabeth representing the great inconvenience and distance of his house at Buckhurst, forty miles from London, through strange, uncouth ways, and requesting a grant of Knowle, as being nearer town, and consequently more convenient to him for the duty of his office. So little communication was there, from place to place, at that time.

till a time, when another man would be ashamed to own he had received them. If therefore you are ever moved on my account by that spirit, which I take to be as familiar to you as a quotidian ague, I mean the spirit of goodness, pray never stint it, in any fear of obliging me to a civility beyond my natural inclination. I dare trust you, Sir, not only with my folly when I write, but with my negligence when I do not; and expect equally your pardon for either.

If I knew how to entertain you through the rest of this paper, it should be spotted and diversified with conceits all over you should be put out of breath with laughter at each sentence, and pause at each period, to look back over how much wit you have passed. But I have found by experience that people now-a-days regard writing as little as they do preaching the most we can hope is to be heard just with decency and patience, once a week, by folks in the country. Here in town we hum over a piece of fine writing, and we whistle at a sermon. The stage is the only place we seem alive at! there indeed we stare, and roar, and clap hands for K. George and the government. As for all other virtues but this loyalty, they are an obsolete train, so ill-dressed, that men, women, and children, hiss them out of all good company. Humility knocks so sneakingly at the door that every footman outraps it, and makes it give way to the free entrance of pride, prodigality, and vain-glory.

My Lady Scudamore, from having rusticated in your company too long, really behaves herself scan

dalously among us: she pretends to open her eyes for the sake of seeing the sun, and to sleep because it is night; drinks tea at nine in the morning, and is thought to have said her prayers before: talks, without any manner of shame, of good books, and has not seen Cibber's play of the Nonjurors. I rejoiced the other day to see a libel on her toilette, which gives me some hope that you have, at least, a taste of scandal left you, in defect of all other vices.

Upon the whole matter, I heartily wish you well; but as I cannot entirely desire the ruin of all the joys of this city, so all that remains is to wish you would keep your happiness to yourselves, that the happiest here may not die with envy at a bliss which they cannot attain to.

I am, etc.

LETTER III.

FROM MR. DIGBY.

Coleshill, April 17, 1718.

I HAVE read your letter over and over with delight. By your description of the town, I imagine it to lie under some great enchantment, and am very much concerned for you and all my friends in it. I am the more afraid, imagining, since you do not fly those horrible monsters, rapine, dissimulation, and luxury, that a magic circle is drawn about you

5 Cibber always insisted, that this comedy, founded on the admirable Tartuffe of Moliere, was the chief cause of our author's resentment against him. It met with great success on the stage.

and you cannot escape. in quite another world, surrounded with blessings and pleasures, without any occasion of exercising our irascible faculties; indeed we cannot boast of good-breeding and the art of life, but yet we don't live unpleasantly in primitive simplicity and good humour. The fashions of the town affect us but just like a raree-show, we have a curiosity to peep at them, and nothing more. What you call pride, prodigality, and vain-glory, we cannot find in pomp and splendour at this distance; it appears to us a fine glittering scene, which if we don't envy you, we think you happier than we are, in your enjoying it. Whatever you may think to persuade us of the humility of virtue, and her appearing in rags amongst you, we can never believe: our uninformed minds represent her so noble to us, that we necessarily annex splendour to her and we could as soon imagine the order of things inverted, and that there is no man in the moon, as believe the contrary. I cannot forbear telling you we indeed read the spoils of Rapine as boys do the English Rogue, and hug ourselves full as much over it; yet our roses are not without thorns. Pray give me the pleasure of hearing (when you are at leisure) how soon I may expect to see the next volume of Homer.

We are here in the country

I am, etc.