way? You may more eminently and more effectually ferve the Public even now, than in the ftations you have fo honourably fill'd. Think of Tully, Bacon, and Clarendon*: is it not the latter, the difgraced part of their lives, which you moft envy, and which you would choose to have liv'd?

I am tenderly fenfible of the with you exprefs, that no part of your misfortune may purfue me. But, God knows, I am every day lefs and lefs fond of my native country (fo torn as it is by Party-rage) and begin to confider a friend in exile as a friend in death; one gone before, where I am not unwilling or unprepared to follow after; and where (however various or uncertain the roads and voyages of another world may be) I cannot but entertain a pleafing hope that we may meet again,

I faithfully affure you, that in the mean time there is no one, living or dead, of whom I fhall think oftener or better than of you. I fhall look upon you as in a ftate between both, in which you will have from me all the paffions and warm wishes that can attend the living, and all the refpect and tender fenfe of lofs, that we feel for the dead. And I fhall ever depend upon your conftant friendship, kind memory, and good offices, tho' I were never to fee or hear the effects of them: like the truft we have in benevolent fpirits, who tho' we never fee or hear them, we think, are conftantly ferving us, and praying for us. Whenever I am wifhing to write to you, I fhall conclude you are intentionally doing fo to me. And every time that I think of you, I will believe you are thinking I never fhall fuffer to be forgotten (nay to be but faintly remember'd) the honour, the pleasure, the pride I muft ever have, in reflecting how frequently you have delighted me, how kindly you have diftinguish'd me, how cordially you have advis'd me! In converiation, in ftudy, I fhall always want you, and wifh for you: In my moft lively, and in my moft thoughtful hours, I fhall equally bear about me, the impreffions of you: And perhaps it will not be in This life only, that I fhall have caufe to remember and acknowledge the friendship of the Bishop of Rochester. I am, &c.

* Clarendon indeed wrote his best works in his banishment; but the best of Bacon's were written before his disgrace, and the hell of Tully's after his return som exile.

LETTER

LETTER XXIII.

To the fame.

May, 1723..

ONCE more I write to you, as I promis'd, and this once, I fear, will be the laft! the Curtain will foon be

drawn between my friend and me, and nothing left but to with you a long good-night. May you enjoy a ftate of repofe in this life, not unlike that fleep of the foul which fome have believ'd is to fucceed it, where we lye utterly forgetful of that world from which we are gone, and ripening for that to which we are to go. If you retain any memory of the paft, let it only image to you what has pleas'd you beft; fometimes prefent a dream of an abfent friend, or bring you back an agreeable converfation. But upon the whole, I hope you will think lefs of the time paft than of the future; as the former has been lefs kind to you than the latter infallibly will be. Do not envy the world your ftudies; they will tend to the benefit of men against whom you can have no complaint, I mean of all Pofterity; and, perhaps, at your time of life, nothing elfe is worth your care. What is every year of a wife man's life but a cenfure or critic on the paft? Those whofe date is the fhorteft, live long enough to laugh at one half of it: the boy defpifes the infant, the man the boy, the philofopher both, and the Chriftian all. You may now begin to think your manhood was too much a puerility; and you'll never fuffer your age to be but a fecond infancy. The toys and baubles of your childhood are hardly now more below you, than thofe toys of our riper and of our declining years, the drums and rattles of ambition, and the dirt and bubbles of avarice. At this time, when you are cut off from a little fociety, and made a citizen of the world at large, you fhould bend your talents not to serve a party, or a few, but all mankind. Your Genius fhould mount above that mift in which its participation and neighbourhood with earth long involv'd it; to fhine abroad and to heaven, ought to be the bufinefs and the glory of your prefent fituation. Remember it was at fuch a time, that the greatest lights of antiquity dazzled and blazed the moft, in the retreat, in their exile, or in their death: but why do I talk of dazzling or blazing? it was then that they did good, that they gave light, and that they became guides to mankind.

Thofe aims alone are worthy of fpirits truly great, and fuch I therefore hope will be yours. Refentment indeed

may

may remain, perhaps cannot be quite extinguished, in the nobleft minds; but revenge never will harbour there: higher principles than thofe of the firft, and better principles than thofe of the latter, will infallibly influence men, whofe thoughts and whofe hearts are enlarged, and cause them to prefer the whole to any part of mankind, especi ally to fo fmall a part as one's fingle felf.

Believe me, my Lord, I look upon you as a spirit entered into another life *, as one juft upon the edge of Immortality; where the paffions and affections must be much more exalted, and where you ought to defpife all little views, and all mean retrofpects. Nothing is worth your looking back; and therefore look forward, and make (as you can the world look after you. But take care that it be not with pity, but with efteem and admiration.

am with the greateft fincerity, and paffion for your fame as well as happiness,

Your, &c.

LETTER XXIV.

From the Bishop of ROCHESTER.

Paris, Nov. 23, 1731.

You will wonder to fee me in print; but how could I avoid it? The dead and the living, my friends and my foes, at home and abroad, call'd upon me to fay fomething; and the reputation of an + Hiftory which I and all the world value, muft have fuffered, had I continued filent. I have printed it here, in hopes that fomebody may venture to reprint it in England, notwithstanding those two frightening words at the clofe of it. Whether that happens or not, it is fit you should have a fight of it, who, I know, will read it with fome degree of fatisfaction, as it is mine, tho' it should have (as it really has) nothing else to recommend it. Such as it is, Extremum hoc munus morientis habeto; for that may well be the cafe, confidering that within a few months I am entering into my feventieth

*The Bishop of Rochester went into exile the month following, and continued in it till his death, which happen'd at Paris on the fifteenth day of February, in the year 1732.

Earl of Clarendon's.

The Bishop's Name, fet to his Vindication of Bifhop Smalridge, Dr. Aldrich, and himself, from the fcandalous Reflections of Oldmixon, relating to the Publication of Lord Clarendon's Hiftory. Paris, 1931, 4to, fince reprinted in England.

year :

year: after which, even the healthy and the happy cannot much depend upon life, and will not if they are wife, much defire it. Whenever I go, you will loose a friend who loves and values you extremely, if in my circumftances I can be faid to be loft to any one, when dead, more than I am already whilft living. I expected to have heard from you by Mr. Morrice, and wonder a little that I did not; but he owns himself in a fault, for not giving you due notice of his motions. It was not amifs that you forebore writing, on a head wherein I promis'd more than I was able to perform. Difgrac'd men fancy fometimes, that they preferve an influence, where when they endeavour to exert it, they foon fee their mistake. I did fo, my good friend, and acknowledge it under 'iny hand. You founded the coaft and found out my error, it seems, before I was aware of it; but enough on this fubject.

What are they doing in England to the honour of letters; and particularly what are you doing? Ipfe quid audes? Qua circumvolitas agilis Thyma? Do you pursue the moral plan you marked out, and feemed fixteen months ago fo intent upon ? Am I to fee it perfected ere I die, and are you to enjoy the reputation of it while you live? or do you rather chufe to leave the marks of your friendship, like the legacies of a will, to be read and enjoyed only by those who survive you? Were I as near you as I have been, I fhould hope to peep into the manufcript before it was finifhed. But alas! there is, and will ever probably be a great deal of land and fca between us. How many books have come out of late in your parts, which you think I should be glad to peruse? Name them the catalogue, I believe, will not coft you much trouble. They must be good one's indeed to challenge any part of my time, now I have fo little of it left. I, who fquandered whole days heretofore, now husband hours when the glafs begins to run fow, and care not to mifpend them on trifles. At the end of the Lottery of Life, our last minutes, like tickets left in the wheel, rife in their valuation they are not of fo much worth perhaps in themfelves as those which preceded, but we are apt to prize them more, and with reason. I do fo, my dear friend, and yet think the moft precious minutes of my life are well employed, in reading what you write. But this is a fatisfaction I cannot much hope for, and therefore must be take myself to others lefs entertaining. Adieu! dear Sir, and forgive me engaging with one, whom you, I think, have reckoned among the heroes of the Dunciad. It was neceffary for me either to accept of his dirty challenge, or to have fuffered in the esteem of the world by declining it.

My

My respects to your Mother; I fend one of these papers for Dean Swift, if you have an opportunity, and think it worth while to convey it. My Country at this distance seems to me a ftrange fight; I know not how it appears to you, who are in the midft of the fcene, and yourfelf a part of it; I wish you would tell me. You may write fafely to Mr. Morice, by the honeft hand that conveys this, and will return into these parts before Christmas; sketch out a rough draught of it, that I may be able to judge whether a return to it be really eligible, or whether I should not, like the Chemift in the bottle, upon hearing Don Quevedo's account of Spain, defire to be corked up again.

After all, I do and muft love my Country, with all its faults and blemishes; even that part of the conftitution which wounded me unjustly, and itfelf through my fide, fhall ever be dear to me. My laft wifh fhall be like that of father Paul, Efto perpetua! and when I die at a diftance from it, it will be in the fame manner as Virgil describes the expiring Peloponnefian,

Sternitur,

et dulces moriens reminifcitur Argos.

Do I ftill live in the memory of my friends, as they certainly do in mine? I have read a good many of your paper fquabbles about me, and am glad to fee fuch free conceffions on that head, tho' made with no view of doing me a pleasure, but merely of loading another.

I

LETTER XXV.

From the Bishop of ROCHESTER.

On the death of his Daughter.

I am, &c.

Montpelier, Nov. 20, 1729. Am not yet Mafter enough of myself, after the late wound I have receiv'd, to open my very heart to you, and am not content with less than that, whenever I converfe with you. My thoughts are at prefent vainly, but pleafingly employed, on what I have loft, and can never recover. I know well I ought, for that reafon, to call them off to other fubjects, but hitherto I have not been able to do it. By giving them the rein a little, and fuffering VOL. 1V. them