I should be obliged indeed to leffen this Respect, if all the Nobility (and efpecially the elder brothers) are but fo many hereditary fools, if the privilege of Lords be to want brains †, if nobleman can hardly write or read ‡, if all their business is but to dress and vote ||, and all their employment in court to tell lies, flatter in public, flander in private, be falfe to each other, and follow nothing but felf-intereft **. Bless me, my

Lord, what an account is this you give of them? and what would have been faid of me, had I immolated, in this manner, the whole body of the Nobility, at the stall of a well-fed Prebendary?

Were it the mere Excess of your Lordship's Wit, that carried you thus triumphantly over all the bounds of decency, I might confider your Lordship on your Pegafus, as a fprightly hunter on a mettled horse; and while you were trampling down all our works, patiently fuffer the injury, in pure admiration of the Noble Sport. But fhould the cafe be quite otherwise, fhould your Lordship be only like a Boy that is run away with; and run away with by a Very Foal; real

That to good blood by old prefcriptive rules
Gives right hereditary to be Fools.

Nor wonder that my Brain no more affords,
But recollect the privilege of Lords,

AnJ. when you fee me fairly write my name;
For England's fake with all could do the fame.
Whilft all our bus'nefs is to drefs and vote. ibid.
** Courts are only larger families,

The growth of each, few truths, and many lies:
in private fatyrize, in public flatter.

Few to each other, all to one point true;

Which one I shan't, nor need explain. Adieu. p. ult.

ly common charity, as well as refpect for a noble family, would oblige me to ftop your career, and to help you down from this Pegafus.

Surely the little praife of a Writer should be a thing below your ambition: You, who were no fooner born but in the lap of the Graces; no sooner at school, but. in the arms of the Muses; no fooner in the World, but you practis'd all the skill of it; no fooner in the Court, but you poffefs'd all the art of it! Unrivall'd as you are, in making a figure, and in making a speech, methinks, my Lord, you may well give up the poor talent of turning a Diftich. And why this fondness for Poetry? Profe admits of the two excellencies you most admire, Diction and Fiction: It admits of the talents you chiefly poffefs, a moft fertile invention, and most florid expreffion; it is with profe, nay the plainest prose, that you beft could teach our nobility to vote, which, you justly obferve, is half at least of their bufinefs: And, give me leave to prophefy, it is to your talent in profe, and not in verse, to your speaking, not your writing, to your art at court, not your art of poetry, that your Lordship muft owe your future figure in the world.

My Lord, whatever you imagine, this is the advice of a Friend, and one who remembers he formerly had the honour of fome profession of Friendship from you: Whatever was his real share in it, whether fmall or great, yet as your Lordship could never have had the leaft Lofs by continuing it, or the leaft Interest by withdrawing it; the misfortune of lofing it, I fear, All their bus'nefs is to drefs and vote.

must have been owing to his own deficiency or neglect. But as to any actual fault which deferved to forfeit it in fuch a degree, he protests he is to this day guiltless and ignorant. It could at most be but a fault of omission; but indeed by omiffions, men of your Lordship's uncommon merit may fometimes think themselves fo injur'd, as to be capable of an inclination to injure another; who, tho' very much below their quality, may be above the injury.

I never heard of the leaft difpleasure you had conceived against me, till I was told that an imitation I had made of* Horace had offended fome perfons, and among them your Lordship. I could not have apprehended that a few general strokes about a Lord fcribling carelefly, a Pimp, or a Spy at Court, a Sharper in a gilded chariot, &c. that thefe, I fay, should be ever applied as they have been, by any malice but that which is the greatest in the world, the Malice of Ill-people to themselves.

Your Lordship fo well knows (and the whole Court and town thro' your means fo well know) how far the refentment was carried upon that imagination, not only in the Nature of the Libel + you propagated against me, but in the extraordinary manner, place, and prefence in which it was propagated ‡; that I shall • The first Satire of the fecond Book, printed in 1732.

Verfes to the Imitator of Horace, afterwards printed by J. Roberts 1732. Fol.

It was for this reason that this Letter, as foon as it was prineed, was communicated to the Q.

only fay, it feem'd to me to exceed the bounds of justice, common fenfe, and decency.

I wonder yet more, how a Lady, of great wit, beauty, and fame for her poetry, (between whom and your Lordship there is a natural, a juft, and a wellgrounded efleem) could be prevail'd upon to take a part in that proceeding. Your refentments against me indeed might be equal, as my offence to you both, was the fame; for neither had I the leaft mifunderstanding with that Lady, till after I was the Author of my own misfortune in difcontinuing her acquain tance. I may venture to own a truth, which cannot be unpleafing to either of you; I affure you my reafon for fo doing, was merely that you had both too much wit for me*; and that I could not do, with mine, many things which you could with yours. The injury done you in withdrawing myself could be but fsmall if the value you had for me was no greater than you have been pleas'd fince to profefs. But furely, my Lord, one may fay, neither the Revenge, nor the Language you held, bore any proportion to the pretended offence: The appellations of + Foe to human kind, an Enemy like the Devil to all that have Being; ungrateful, unjust, deferving to be whipt, blanketed, kicked, nay killed; a Monfler, an Affaffin, whose conversation every man ought to shun, and against whom all doors fhould be fhut; I beseech you, my Lord, had you the Once, and but once, his heedless youth was bit, And lik'd that dang'rous thing a female Wit. See the Letter to Dr Arbuthnot amongst the Variations. + See the aforesaid l'erfes to the Imitator of Horace.

fo

feaft right to give, or to encourage or justify any other in giving fuch language as this to me? Could I be *treated in terms more ftrong or more atrocious, if, during my acquaintance with you, I had been a Betrayer, a Backbiter, a Whisperer, an Eves-dropper, or an Informer? Did I in all that time ever throw a false Dye, or palm a foul Card upon you? Did I ever borrow, fleal, or accept either Money, Wit, or Advice from you? Had I ever the honour to join with either of you in one Ballad, Satire, Pamphlet, or Epigramn, on any person living or dead? Did I ever do you great an injury as to put off my own Verses for yours, efpecially on those Perfons whom they might most of fend? I am confident you cannot answer in the affirmative; and I can truly affirm, that, ever fince I loft the happiness of your conversation, I have not published or written, one fyllable of, or to either of you; never hitch'd your names in a Verfe, or trifled with your good names in company. Can I be honeftly charged with any other crime but an Omission (for the word Neglect, which I us'd before, flip'd my pen unguardedly) to continue my admiration of you all my life, and ftill to contemplate, face to face, your many excellencies and perfections? I am perfuaded you can reproach me truly with no great Faults, except my natural ones, which I am as ready to own, as to do all justice to the contrary Beauties in you. It is true, my Lord, I am fhort, not well fhap'd, generally ill-dress'd, if not someVOL. VI.

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