in the midst of it; conversation was their business : they cultivated the arts of persuasion, on purpose to show men it was their interest, as well as their duty, not to be foolish, and false, and unjust; and that too in many instances with success; which is not very strange, for they showed by their life, that their lessons were not impracticable; and that pleasures were no temptations, but to such as wanted a clear preception of the pains annexed to them. But I have done preaching à la Grecque. Mr. Ratcliffe* made a shift to behave very rationally without their instructions, at a season which they took a great deal of pains to fortify themselves and others against: one would not desire to lose one's head with a better grace. I am particularly satisfied with the humanity of that last embrace to all the people about him. Sure it must be somewhat embarrassing to die before so much good company!

You need not fear but posterity will be ever glad to know the absurdity of their ancestors: the foolish will be glad to know they were as foolish as they, and the wise will be glad to find themselves wiser. You will please all the world then; and if you recount miracles you will be believed so much the sooner. We are pleased when we wonder, and we believe because we are pleased. Folly and wisdom,

He was exe

* Brother of the Earl of Derwentwater. cuted at Tyburn, December 1746, for having been concerned in the rebellion in Scotland. See Walpole's Letters to H. Mann, vol. ii. p. 206.-Ed.

and wonder and pleasure, join with me in desiring

you would continue to entertain them: refuse us Adieu, dear Sir!

if you can.

XVI.

T. GRAY.

MR. GRAY TO MR. WALPOLE.

Cambridge, 1747.

I HAD been absent from this place a few days, and at my return found Cibber's book* upon my table: I return you my thanks for it, and have already run over a considerable part; for who could resist Mrs. Letitia Pilkington's recommendation? (by the way is there any such gentlewoman †? or has somebody put on the style of a scribbling woman's panegyric to deceive and laugh at Colley ?) He seems to me full as pert and as dull as usual. There are whole pages of common-place stuff, that for stupidity might have been wrote by Dr. Waterland, or any other grave divine, did not the flirting saucy phrase give them at a distance an air of youth and gaity: It is very true, he is often in the right with regard to Tully's weaknesses; but was there any

*Entitled "Observations on Cicero's Character," or some such thing; for I have not the book by me, and it has been long since forgot.-Mason.

+ This Lady made herself more known some time after the date of this letter.-Mason.

one that did not see them? Those, I imagine, that would find a man after God's own heart, are no more likely to trust the Doctor's recommendation than the Player's; and as to Reason and Truth, would they know their own faces, do you think, if they looked in the glass, and saw themselves so bedizened in tattered fringe and tarnished lace, in French jewels, and dirty furbelows, the frippery of a stroller's wardrobe ?

Literature, to take it in its most comprehensive sense, and include every thing that requires invention or judgment, or barely application and industry, seems indeed drawing apace to its dissolution, and remarkably since the beginning of the war. I remember to have read Mr. Spence's pretty book; though (as he then had not been at Rome for the last time) it must have increased greatly since that in bulk. If you ask me what I read, I protest I do not recollect one syllable; but only in general, that they were the best bred sort of men in the world, just the kind of frinds one would wish to meet in a fine summer's evening, if one wished to meet any at all. The heads and tails of the dialogues, published separate in 16mo, would make the sweetest reading in natiur for young gentlemen of family and fortune, that are learning to dance.* I rejoice to hear there is such a crowd

This ridicule on the Platonic way of dialogue (as it was aimed to be, though nothing less resembles it) is, in my opinion, admirable. Lord Shaftsbury was the first who

of dramatical performances coming upon the stage. Agrippina can stay very well, she thanks you, and be damned at leisure: I hope in God you have not mentioned, or shewed to any body that scene (for trusting in its badness, I forgot to caution you concerning it); but I heard the other day, that I was writing a Play, and was told the name of it, which nobody here could know, I am sure. The employment you propose to me much better suits my inclination; but I much fear our joint-stock would hardly compose a small volume; what I have is less considerable than you would imagine, and of that little we should not be willing to publish all.

This is all I can any where find. You, I imagine, may have a good deal more. I should not care how unwise the ordinary run of Readers might think my affection for him, provided those few, that ever loved any body, or judged of any thing rightly,

brought it into vogue, and Mr. Spence (if we except a few Scotch writers) the last who practised it. As it has now been laid aside some years, we may hope, for the sake of true taste, that this frippery mode of composition will never come into fashion again; especially since Dr. Hurd has pointed out, by example as well as precept, wherein the true beauty of Dialogue-writing consists.- Mason. Walpole's Letters to Ld. Hertford.-Ed.

See

+ What is here omitted was a short catalogue of Mr. West's Poetry then in Mr. Gray's hands; the reader has seen as much of it in the three foregoing sections as I am persuaded his friend would have published, had he prosecuted the task which Mr. Walpole recommended to him,

might, from such little remains, be moved to consider what he would have been; and to wish that heaven had granted him a longer life and a mind

more at ease.

I send you a few lines, though Latin, which you do not like, for the sake of the subject;* it makes part of a large design, and is the beginning of the fourth book, which was intended to treat of the passions. Excuse the three first verses; you know vanity, with the Romans, is a poetical licence.

XVII. MR. GRAY TO MR. WALPOLE.

Cambridge, 1747.

I HAVE abundance of thanks to return you for the entertainment Mr. Spence's book has given me, which I have almost run over already; and I much fear (see what it is to make a figure) the breadth

that of printing his own and Mr. West's Poems in the same volume; and which we also perceive from this letter, he was not averse from doing. This therefore seems to vindicate the Editor's plan in arranging these papers; as he is enabled by it not only to shew what Mr. West would have been, but what Mr. Gray was, I mean not as a Poet, for that the world knew before, but as an universal Scholar, and (what is still of more consequence) as an excellent moral man.-Mason.

The admirable Apostrophe to Mr. West, with which the Fragment of the 4th Book de Principiis Cogitandi opens. -Ed.