with you fome more of my papers, (fince these return fo much better out of your hands than they went from mine) for I intended (as I told you formerly) to spend a month, or fix weeks this fummer, near you in the country. You may be affured there is nothing I defire so much, as an improvement of your friendship. BY LETTER XI. April 10, 1706. Y one of yours of the laft month, you defire me to felect, if poffible, fome things from the * first volume of your Mifcellanies, which may be alter'd fo as to appear again. I doubted your meaning in this; whether it was to pick out the best of those verses (as thofe on the Idlenefs of bufinefs, on Ignorance, on Lazinefs, &c.) to make the method and numbers exact, and avoid repetitions? For tho' (upon reading 'em on this occafion) I believe, they might receive fuch an alteration with advantage; yet they would not be changed fo much, but any one would know 'em for the fame at first fight. Or if you mean to improve the worst pieces? which are fuch, as, to render them very good, would require great addition, and almoft the entire new writing of them. Or, laftly, if you mean the middle fort, as the Songs and Love-verfes? For these will need only to be shortened, to omit repetition; the words remaining very little different from what they were before. Pray let me know your mind in this, for I am utterly at a lofs. Yet I have try'd what I could do to fome of the fongs, and the poems on Laziness and Ignorance, but can't (even in my own partial judgment) think my alterations much to the purpose. * Printed in folio, in the year 1704. So So that I must needs defire you would apply your care wholly at present to those which are yet unpublifhed, of which there are more than enough to make a confiderable volume, of full as good ones, nay, I believe, of better than any in Vol. I. which I could with you would defer, at least 'till you have finish'd thefe that are yet unprinted. I send you a sample of fome few of these; namely, the verses to Mr. Waller in his old age; your new ones on the Duke of Marlborough, and two others. I have done all that I thought could be of advantage to them: fome I have contracted, as we do fun-beams, to improve their energy and force : some I have taken quite away, as we take branches from a tree, to add to the fruit; others I have entirely new exprefs'd, and turn'd more into poetry. Donne (like one of his fucceffors) had infinitely more wit than he wanted verfification: for the great dealers of wit, like thofe in trade, take least pains to fet off their goods; while the haberdashers of small wit, fpare for no decorations or ornaments. You have commiffion'd me to paint your shop, and I have done my best to brush you up like your neighbours *. But I can no more pretend to the merit of the production, than a midwife to the virtues and good qualities of the child she helps into the light. The few things I have entirely added, you will excuse; you may take them lawfully for your own, because they are no more than sparks lighted up by your fire and you may omit them at last, if you think them but fquibs in your triumphs. I am, &c. *Several of Mr. Pope's lines, very eafy to be dif tinguished, may be found in the Pofthumous Editions of Wycherley's Poems: particularly in thofe on Solitude, on the Public, and on the Mixed life. VOL. VII. C LET I LETTER XII. From Mr. WYCHERLEY. Nov. 11, 1707. Receiv'd yours of the 9th yesterday, which has (like the rest of your letters) at once pleas'd and inftructed me; fo that, I affure you, you can no more write too much to your abfent friends, than speak too much to the prefent. This is a truth that all men own who have either feen your writings, or heard your discourse; enough to make others fhow their judgment, in ceafing to write or talk, especially to you, or in your company. However, I fpeak or write to you, not to please you, but myfelf; fince I provoke your anfwers; which whilft they humble me, give me vanity; tho' I am leffened by you even when you commend me: fince you commend my little sense with fo much of yours, that you put me out of countenance, whilft you would keep me in it. So that you have found a way (against the cuftom of great wits) to fhew even a great deal of good-nature with a great deal of good sense. I thank you for the book you promis'd me, by which I find you would not only correct my lines, but my life. As to the damn'd verfes I entrusted you with, I hope you will let them undergo your purgatory, to fave them from other people's damning them: fince the critics, who are generally the first damn'd in this life, like the damn'd below, never leave to bring those above them under their own circumstances. I beg you to perufe my papers, and select what think beft or moft tolerable, and look over them again; for I refolve suddenly to print fome of them, as a harden'd old gamefter will (in fpite of all for you mer mer ill ufage by fortune) push on an ill hand in expectation of recovering himfelf; efpecially fince I have fuch a Croupier or Second to ftand by me as Mr. Pope. LETTER XIII. Nov. 20, 1707. M don, tells me I muff write to you by him, R. Englefyld being upon his journey to Lon which I do, not more to comply with his defire, than to gratify my own; tho' I did it fo lately by the meffenger you fent hither: I take it too as an op portunity of fending you the fair copy of the poem * on Dulness, which was not then finifh'd, and which I fhould not care to hazard by the common poft. Mr. Englefyld is ignorant of the contents, and I hope your prudence will let him remain fo, for my fake no lefs than your own: fince if you fhould reveal any thing of this nature, it would be no wonder reports fhould be rais'd, and there are those (I fear) who would be ready to improve them to my difadvantage. I am forry you told the great man, whom you met in the court of requests, that your papers were in my hands; no man alive fhall ever know any fuch thing from me; and I give you this warning befides, that tho' yourself fhould fay I had any ways affifted you, I am notwithstanding refolv'd to deny it. The method of the copy I fend you is very different from what it was, and much more regular : * The original of it in blots, and with figures of the References from copy to copy, in Mr. Pope's hand, is yet extant, among other fuch Broüillons of Mr. Wycherley's poems, corrected by him. P. for for the better help of your memory, I defire you to compare it by the figures in the margin, answering to the fame in this letter. The poem is now divid→ ed into four parts, mark'd with the literal figures 1. 2. 3. 4. The first contains the Praise of Dulness, and fhews how upon several fuppofitions it paffes for I. religion. 2. philosophy. 3. example. 4. wit. and 5. the cause of wit, and the end of it. The fecond part contains the Advantages of Dulness; 1ft, in business; and 2dly, at Court; where the fimilitudes of the Byafs of a bowl, and the Weights of a clock, are directly tending to the fubject, tho' introduced before in a place where there was no mention made of those advantages (which was your only objection to my adding them.) The third contains the Happinefs of Dulness in all ftations, and fhews in a great many particulars, that it is fo fortunate as to be esteem'd fome good quality or other in all forts of people; that it is thought quiet, fenfe, caution, policy, prudence, majefty, valour, circumfpection, honefty, &c. The fourth part I have wholly added, as a climax which fums up all the praise, advantage, and happiness of Dulnefs in a few words, and ftrengthens them by the oppofition of the difgrace, disadvantage, and unhappiness of Wit, with which it concludes *. Tho' the whole be as fhort again as at first, there is not one thought omitted, but what is a repetition of fomething in your firft volume, or in this very *This is totally omitted in the prefent Edition: Some of the lines are these : "Thus Dulness, the safe opiate of the mind, paper: |