LETTERS Upon several OCCASIONS: Written by and between 

Mr. Dryden,  
Mr. Wycherly,  
Mr.—  
Mr. Congreve, and Mr. Dennis.    
Published by Mr. DENNIS.  
With a New Translation of Select LETTERS of Monsieur Voiture.  
LONDON, Printed for Sam. Briscoe, at the Corner-Shop of Charles-Street in Russel-Street in Covent Garden. 1696.   

To the Right Honourable Charles Montague, Esq;. One of the Lords of the Treasury, Chancellor of the Exchequer; and one of His Majesty's most Honourable Privy Council.  
SIR,  
AS soon as I had resolved to make this Address to you, that the Present might not be altogether unworthy of you, I took care to obtain the Consent of my Friends to publish some Letters, which they had writ as Answers to mine.  
When I look upon myself, I find I have reason to beg pardon for my Presumption: But when I consider those Gentlemen, I am encouraged to hope that you will not be offended to find yourself at the Head of no Vulgar Company, a Company, whose Names and Desert are universally known, a Company raised far above the level of Mankind by their own extraordinary Merit, and yet proud to do Homage to yours. They are Gentlemen, 'tis true, who are divided in their Interests, and who differ in their Politic Principles, but they agree in their Judgements of Things, which all the World admires, and they always consent when they speak of you.  
In presenting this little Book to you, I only designed to show my Zeal and my Gratitude; but they assure me unanimously, that I have likewise shown my Judgement. Tho indeed, Sir, the number of the Great, who cast a favourable Eye upon Human Learning, is not so considerable, but that a Man who would Address any thing of this nature to one of them, may soon determine his choice. Proficients in other Arts are encouraged by Profit, which is their main Design, but he who bestows all his time upon Human Studies is incited by Glory alone, and the World takes care that he should have no more than he seeks for. The Enthusiast, the Quack, the Pettifogger, are rewarded for Torturing, and for deluding Men; but Humanity has met with very barbarous Usage, only for pleasing, and for instructing them. The very Court, which draws most of its Ornament from it, has but too often neglected it; there Learning in general has been disregarded: For none but great Souls are capable of great Designs, and few Courtiers have had Greatness of Mind enough to procure the Promotion of Science, which is the Exaltation of Human Nature, and the Enlargement of the Empire of Reason. Our Ministers of State have formerly behaved themselves with so much indifference, as if it would have lessened them to have taken any care of Letters. They have shown themselves as perfectly unconcerned, as if not one had discovered, that at a time when our Neighbours are grown so knowing, the Public Safety depends on the Progress of Learning, and that to Patronise Science, is to take care of the State. Besides, too many of our Statesmen have been engaged in unjust Designs. Most of our Politicians have done their endeavour to encroach on the Crown, or to attempt on the People. Few have had Capacity and Integrity enough to keep the Balance so steady, as to maintain Prerogative at once, and assert Privilege; to serve the King Zealously, and their Country Faithfully; to possess at the same time the Favour of the one, and the Hearts of the other, to such a degree as to be courted by the People to serve as their Representative, at the very time that they are employed by the King in Matters of the highest Importance. Instead of that, most of them have had reason to be afraid of the King or the Commons; and Men who have been solicitous for their own Safety have seldom appeared concerned for the good of others. Few than have been and are in a Condition to be Protectors of Learning, and therefore those happy few deserve all the Honours which we are able to pay them. Of those, Sir, you appear in the foremost Rank, and are to the Commonwealth of Learning what you are to the State, a great Defence and a shining Ornament. You have warmly encouraged all sorts of Studies, but have been justly and nobly partial to those, for which the State has made no Provision: Which is enough to gain you the Esteem of all who have any regard for Learning, and to win the very Souls of all who, like me, are charmed with the softer Studies of Humanity. For which your Zeal has been so diffusive, that it has extended itself even to me, tho' a bare Inclination to cultivate Eloquence and Poetry, was the only thing which could recommend me to ●ou▪ Yet even this has been encouraged by the promise of your Protection and by the Humanity of your receiving me. The access which I have had to you, has been the greatest Obligation that you could lay upon a Man who has still valued Merit above all the World, and who has sought his Improvement more than he has his Advancement. When I have at any time approached you, I have found in you none of those forbidding Qualities, of which they accuse the Great. Instead of those, I have found an attractive and a human Greatness, the generous Sincerity of the Man of Honour joined with the Grace and Complaisance of the Courtier, and a Deportment noble without Pride, and Modest without descending. Nature has made me something averse from making my Court to Fortune. But I am proud to attend upon real Greatness, and to wait upon you since first you encouraged me, has been at once my Duty and my Ambition.  
The Permission which you gave me to approach you, was so great an Incitement to me, that I believe it might have brought me to write well if I had not a very just reason to resolve to attempt it no more. You had given me one great Encouragement before I had the Honour to see you, and that was, by leaving off Writing yourself. For Vanity is a greater Incitement to Poets than Pensions, and even Want depresses the Spirits less than the thought of being surpassed. Therefore while Mr. Montague Sung, he Sung alone. We admired indeed our Conquering Monarch, but we admired in silence. We revered the Greatness of your Genius, and neglected our Talents. Indeed the strength and sweetness of your Voice was fit to charm us alone, and we who followed, were only fit for the Chorus. But you have left a Province, which you have made your own, to the Adminstration of those who are under you, and are gone on in your victorious Progress to the Acquisition of new Glory. From which I am sensible that I detract by detaining you. For your Actions are your best Encomiums, and the loud consent of the Nation your best Panegyric. It was a glorious one that was spoken to you by the People of Westminster in the request that they made to you to serve as their Member in the present Parliament; at a time when they were Caballing all over the Kingdom, and Gentlemen were depriving Peasants of their little Reason, in order to obtain their Voices, Mr. Montague's Merit, while he was silent, solicited for him so importunately, that it prevailed upon a number of considerable Inhabitants of the Politer parts of the Town, to come and make it their humble Request to you, to Honour them by Representing them, which puts me in mind of a Saying of De la Bruiere, That the People are then at their height of Happiness, when their King makes Choice for his Con●idents, and for his Ministers, of the very same Persons that the People would have chosen, if the Choice had been in their power. This, at present, is our own Case; for doubtless the same People, who, without any Brigue or the least Corruption, came voluntarily to entreat you to suffer them to place you in the Great Council of the Kingdom, would, if the Choice had been in their power, have placed you in the Privy-Council; and they who frankly offered to trust you with the disposal of the Money which is in their Houses, would have trusted you, had it been in their power, with the Intendency of that in the Treasury. So that the People's proffer to Choose you, seems to me to be a loud Approbation of the Choice, which the King had made before of you, and of your Ministration upon that Choice. But I injure the Public while I detain you. Yet give me leave to end with my Zealous Wishes for you, that the Happiness may be multiplied on you, which you so nobly seek to communicate, that you may increase in Riches and Honours faster than you advance in Years, till you arrive at that height of Prosperity which may be answerable to your high Desert, and till Fortune may be said to pour down her Gifts upon you, in Emulation of Art and Nature: Yet Envy after all shall be forced to declare, that Mr. Montague sprung from an Illustrious Stock, and loaded with Plenty and Honours, is yet nobler by Desert, than he is by Descent, and greater by Virtue than he is by Fortune;  
I am Sir, Your most Humble And most Obedient Servant, John Dennis.   

To the READER.  
I Once resolved to have a long Preface before this little Book; but the Impression has been so long retarded by the Fault of those who had the care of it, that I have now neither Time nor Humour to execute what I intended. I shall therefore only give a Compendious Account of what I proposed to have treated of more at large. I designed in the first place to have said something of the Nature and of the end of a Letter, and thought to have proved that the Invention of it was to supply Conversation, and not to imitate it, for that nothing but the Dialogue was capable of doing that; from whence I had drawn this Conclusion, that the Style of a Letter was neither to come quite up to that of Conversation, nor yet to keep at too great a distance from it. After that, I determined to show that all Conversation is not familiar; that it may be Ceremonious, that it may be Grave, nay, that it may be Sublime, or that Tragedy must be allowed to be out of Nature: That if the Sublime were easy and unconstrained, it might be as consistent with the Epistolary Style, as it was with the Didactique, that Voiture had admirably joined it with one of them, and Longinus with both. After this, I resolved to have said something of th●se who had most succeeded in Letters amongst the Ancients and Moderns, and to have treated of their Excellencies and their Defects: To have spoken more particularly of Cicero and Pliny amongst the Ancients, and amongst the Moderns of Balzac and Voiture; to have sh●wn that Cicero is too simple, and too dry, and that Pliny is too affected, and too refined, that one of them has too much of Art in him, and that both of them have too little of Nature. That the Elevation of Balzac was frequently forced and his Sublime affected; that his Thoughts were often above his Subject, and his Expression almost always above his Thoughts; and that whatsoever his Subjects were, his Style was seldom altered; that Voiture was easy and unconstrained, and natural when he was most exalted, that he seldom endeavoured to be witty at the expense of right Reason: But that as his Thoughts were for the most part true and just, his Expression was often defective, and that his Style was too little diversified. That for my own part, as I came infinitely short of the extraordinary Qualities of these great Men, I thought myself obliged to endeavour the rather to avoid their Faults; and that consequently I had taken all the care that I could, not to think out of Nature and good Sense, and neither to force nor neglect my Expression; and that I had always taken care to suit my Style to my Subject, whether it was Familiar or Sublime, or Di●ctique; and and that I had more or less varied it in every Letter. All this and more I designed to have said at large; which I have only hinted now in a hurry. I have nothing to add but to desire the Reader to excuse my bad Performance, upon the account of my good Endeavour, and for striving to do well in a manner of Writing, which is at all times useful, and at this Time necessary; a manner in which the English would surpass both the Ancients and Moderns, if they would but cultivate it, for the very same Reasons that they have surpassed them in Comedy. But methinks, I have a Title to the Readers Favour, for I have more than made amends for the defects of my own Letters, by entertaining him with those of my Friends.   

A COLLECTION OF LETTERS, Written by several Eminent Hands.  
To Walter Moyle, Esq;  
Dear Sir,  
YOU know that a Grave Fellow assures us, that upon the Cessation of Oracles, Lamentable Cries were heard in the Air, proclaiming along the Coasts the Death of the Great Pan: And have not you upon this dearth of good Sense, and this Cessation of Wit? tell me truly; have not you heard 
These sounds upon the Cornish Shore,  
The Sage, Will E— is no more.  ●one is the Universal Lord of Wit! He to whom all the Wits paid Homage; For whom his Subjects set a Tax upon Words, and laid exorbitant Customs on Thoughts. He's Dead, alas, He's Dead!  
Dead I mean, Sir, in a Legal Capacity, that is, Outlawed and gone into the Friars; to go into which is once more to Outlaw himself. He has done it Sir, and and ill Fortune has brought him to be a Felo▪ de se that way. For since the Law thought it but Just to put Will out of its Protection, Will thought it but prudent to put himself out of its Power. And since the Law could use him with so much Contempt, as to declare to all the World that it does not care for Will E—, Will, who is extremely stout in Adversity, has declared by his Actions that he does not care for the Law. Virgil tells us in his Sixth Book, that the Souls in Hell were busied about the same things in which they were employed upon Earth; Even so does Sage Will use the same Nutmeg-●rater, and the same Tea-Pot in the Friars, that he handled before in Bowstreet. Thus has he left the Wits, without any sorrow, though he loves them, and without taking any leave of them. For Will thinks they cannot be long from him, and he says, he expects that in a very little time his Old Company should be constant at his New House. And dost not thou think that they too have reason to expect the very same thing. For as the Death of any Man ought to put ●ll his Friends in mind, that he went before but to lead them the way; so Will's departure from this Miserable Life, this lewd Covent-Garden-Life, and his Ferrying from Somerset-stai●s to the Infernal Shore of A●satia, should be a M●mento to the rest of the Wits, that he is but gone whither they all must follow.  
To leave off Poetical Similes, this Body-Politick is in a Cursed Condition; and cannot keep long together without a Head. The Members are at present in a Grave Debate how to get one. To morrow the Whole House will resolve itself into a Grand Committee, to consult about Ways and Means of making Provision for the Common Necessities. Some talk of an Excise upon May-dew, and Rasberry-Brandy: That there will be a Poll is strongly asserted, in which every Man is to pay according to his respective condition. To morrow it will be known to how much each Man's Quota amounts. As for Example; How much a Poet is to Pay, how much a Wit, how much a Politician, and how much a Critic. A Critic did I say? I beg your pardon. They have voted Nemine Contra● dicente, that they will cess no Critic till Mr. Moyle returns.  
I have given them my Sentiments upon the forementioned Poll, which were, That it was something hard to make a Man pay for being called, Wit, Poet, or Critic; That they saw by Experience lately in the State, that Poor Dogs grumbled to pay for their Titles. How then could they think that People would be contented to be Taxed for their Nicknames? That in settling this Tax they were to take a quite contrary Method, to that which was taken upon Settling a Tax in the State. That in the State, sometimes a Man paid for what he really had; As for Example, when a Country Squire paid for his Land or his Money; and sometimes for what he really had not, as when a Cit. that is twice dubbed, Knight by the King, and Cuckold by his Wife, pays for his Honour, and for his Children. The first of which is but as it were his, for it is really the Kings; and the Second of ●hich are but as it were his, for they are really the Courtiers who helped him to his Title. In the State too a Man is made to pay for something which he does, or for something which he does not. As a jacobite pays so much for Swearing when he's Drunk, and so much more for not Swearing when he's Sober. But that in our case, if we would be exactly Just, we should make People pay neither for what they have, nor for what they have not; nor for what they do, nor for what they do not; But should oblige them to Pay only for pretending to have what they really have not, or for offering to do, what they are utterly incapable of doing. That thus the Tax would certainly fall upon the most Solvent Part of the Body. For how ridiculous would it be to Tax a Man for having Poetry and Wit, when they are almost always signs, that he has not a Farthing to Pay? On the other side how absurd would it be to Tax him for a bare want of those Qualities? since when a Man is Dull without pretending, 'tis ten to one but he is Poor, for Riches make Men Vain, and Vanity makes them Affected. But he who is not much at his Ease, is hardly at leisure for Affectation, and I have often seen, that when Vanity has thrown a Fop out of Nature, necessity has brought him back again: But a Rich Rogue will be sure to be always pretending. Fortune takes pleasure in making those Vain, whom Nature before made Impotent, and both of them often conspire to finish a Coxcomb. Thus I would have none Pay, but they who put Gravity upon us for Wisdom, Visions for Politics, and Q●ibbles for Wit; and I would have no Man at any Expense for being called a Poet, a Wit, or a Critic, unless i● be by himself. It would be equally hard to lay a Tax upon any one, for his Ill Fortune, or for his Ill Nature, since they are things of which no Man is Master. But what? A Sot cannot help his Vanity. Agreed. But than it makes him so much happier than he deserves to be, that he may well be contented to Pay for it.  
From Wills th●t was▪ Nou. 5. 1695. I am Your most humble Servant, John Dennis.  
To Mr. Wycherly at Cleve near Shrewsbury.  
Sir,  
WHile I venture to write these Lines to you, I take it to be my Interest not to consider you, as I hitherto always have done▪ and as for the future I always shall viz. as Mr. Wycherly, as the greatest Comic Wit that ever Engl●nd bred, as a Man sent purposely into the World, to Charm the Ears of the Wittiest Men, and to Ravish the Hearts of the most Beautiful Women: No, Sir, that in writing to you I may assume some Spirit, I shall at present only consider you as the Humble Hermit at Cleve; Humble even in the full Possession of all those extraordinary Qualities, the knowledge of which has made me Proud. I must confess, that I have no great Opinion of that which Men generally call Humility. Humility in most Men is want of Heat; 'tis Phlegm, 'tis Impotence, 'tis a Wretched Necessity, of which, they who lie under it, vainly endeavour to make a Virtue. But in a Man of Mr. Wycherly's make, 'tis Choice, 'tis Force of Mind, 'tis a Good, 'tis a Generous Condescension. And what Force of Mind is there not requisite to bend back a Soul by perpetual Reflection, which would be always Rising, and eternally Aspiring by virtue of its inborn Fire? Yet yours, notwithstanding all its Power, cannot wholly depress its self, nor descend in every part of it. At the time that your Will vouchsafes to stoop, your Understanding soars, your Writings are as bold as your Converastion is Modest, (though those are bold, as this is Modest with Judgement) and he who would do you Justice, must needs confess that you are a very Ambitious Writer, though a very Humble Man. Yet your very Ambition has obliged Mankind: It has exalted Humane Nature, in raising your own by its most noble Efforts; and that without boasting Pre-eminence. And surely it must be for this very reason that we feel a Secret Pride, when we but read the Discoveries which you have made. Thus I cannot say that you are without Vanity, for never was Man exempt from it; but I can say, that you have made use even of Vanity to humble you by way of Re●lection, and that you have avoided that dangerous Effect of it, Vainglory, the R●●k upon which seseveral great Wits before you have been seen to split. For you have always wisely considered, that Vainglory in the Vulgar may be Supportable, nay may be Diverting; but that in great Men it must be Intolerable. That whereas in the First 'tis want of Discernment, 'tis Folly, 'tis the Extravagant Blindness of Self-Love; in the Last, 'tis Crime, 'tis Malice, 'tis a Secret and Proud Design to Mortify and Insult over the rest of Men, over whom they have so much advantage; That it is for this very reason, that we so deeply resent and so severely revenge the Mortal Affronts we receive from it. Great Wits were by Heaven predestined to rule, to rule the Minds of others, the Noblest Empire; but when they grow outwardly Vain they grow Tyrants, and then their discontented Subjects rebel, and then they depose those Kings as Usurpers, whom before they Obeyed as their Lawful Monarches. But a Moderate, a Good, and a Gracious Prince, like you, commands their Hearts as well as their Understandings, and under one whom they love so well, they grow as Proud, as they are pleased to Obey. Our violent Inclinations make us belong to you, and therefore 'tis the Interest ●ven of our Pride, that you should long continue in the place which your extraordinary desert has attained. Did we nothing but esteem you as much as we do, we should certainly envy you; if we did not hate you; for bare esteem is always forced upon us, whereas Inclination is much▪ more Voluntary; Besides, as a Judicious Frenchman observes, Esteem is Foreign, and comes from Abroad, and is therefore received with Grumbling; but Inclination is our own and born in our Breasts, and is therefore Caressed and Cherished. I might add, that upon this account, it is hard to wish well to those whom we very much esteem, if they have not likewise the Skill to make themselves be beloved; because barely to esteem depresses the Spirits, as much as to love very much exalts them, it brings the Soul to a Languid Temper, and gives it at once too horrid Views of another's Excellencies, and of its own Infirmities; but Affection gives it Agitation and Warmth; and in the View of a Friend's d●sert, it takes too much pleasure, and too much pride to consider its own Defects. 'Tis true, that you are esteemed at this high rate, you own to your Wit and your penetration; but that you are esteemed without Envy, that you are with Joy and Gladness esteemed, you own to this, that while the force of your Fancy and Judgement makes all the World admire you, you remain yourself unmoud by it; that while your Excellence fills all mouths but yours, you alone appear to be unacquainted with it. Thus while by the Merit of your extraordinary Qualities, you are known to surpass all others, it plainly appears that you have beyond all this a Greatness of Soul, from whence you look down on your own Merit. An infallible sign that the Talents which we admire in you are no Illusions, but real things, things that were born with you, and have been improved by you, and which you have not acquired: For Men are found to be Vainer, upon the account of those Qualities which they fond believe they have, than of those which they really have; and Hereditary Greatness gives Men leave to be humble, whereas Preferment occasions Pride. None but such real Greatness as yours can Capacitate a Man to be truly humble; for the Soul which by Nature is not seated High, can hardly be said to Descend. If I have insisted too long on this shining Subject, a Subject which is so conspicuous in you; if you look upon this tedious Letter, as one of those various Persecutions which every eminent Virtue provokes; I desire you to consider, that I have so many obligations to this very Humility, that I looked upon myself as obliged by gratitude to say as much as I have done. For to that I own the happiness which I have frequently received in your Conversation; to that I own the present Satisfaction which your Permission to write to you gives me; and to that I am indebted for the Hopes of your Answers; when I have received them I shall then believe what you were pleased to tell me when I saw you last, that you are much more Humble in the Clear Air on your Mountain at Cleve, than when you are in Fog and Sulphurous Smoke in Bowstreet. But at the same time, the Satisfaction of thinking that Distance does not make you forget me, will render him very proud, who is at present,  
London, jan. 19 1693/ 4. Sir, Your very Humble Servant. John Dennis.  
Mr. Wycherly's Answer to Mr. Dennis.  
Dear Sir,  
YOU have found a way to make me satisfied with my absence from London, nay, what is more, with the distance which is now betwixt you and me. That indeed uses to lessen Friendship, but give● me the greater Mark of yours by your kind Letter, which I had missed if I had been nearer to you: So that I, who receive no Rents here, yet must own if I did, I could not receive greater Satisfaction than I had from yours, worth even a Letter of Exchange, or Letters Patents; For I value your Friendship more than Money, and am Prouder of your Approbation than I should be of Titles; For the having the good opinion of one who knows mankind so well, argues some merit in me, upon which every man ought to consider himself more, than upon the goods of Fortune. I had rather be thought your Friend in proof of my Judgement and good Sense, than a Friend to the Muses; and ●ad rather have you than them thought mine. If I am as you say, at once Proud and Humble, 'tis since I have known I have had the honour to please you; though your praise rather humbles than makes me (though a damned P●et) more vain. For it is so great, that it rather seems the Raillery of a witty Man, than the Sincerity of a Friend; and rather proves the Copiousness of your own Invention, than justifies the Fertility of mine. But I fear I am forfeiting the Character of the Plain-dealer with you; and seem like vain Women or vainer Men, to refuse praise, but to get more; and so by returning your Compliments, show my s●lf grateful out of Interest, as Knaves are punctual in some payments, ●ut● to augment their Credit. And for your Praise of my Humility, (the only mark of my Knowledge, since it is a mark of my knowing myself) you have praised that to its Destruction, and have given me so much, you have left me none. ●ike those Admirers who praise a young Maid's Modesty till they deprive her of it. But let me tell you, 'tis not to my humility that you own my Friendship, bu● to my Ambition, since I can have no greater than to be esteemed by you, and the World, your Friend, and to be known to all Mankind for,  
Dear Sir, Your humble Servant, W. Wycherley.  
Postscript.  
My Dear Friend, I have no way to show my Love to you in my Ababsence, but by my jealousy. I would not have my Rivals in your Friendship the C—s, the D— s, the W— s, and the rest of your Tavern Friends enjoy your conversation while I cannot; Tho' I confess, 'tis to their interest to make you dumb with Wine, that they may be heard in your company; tho' it were more the Demonstration of their wit to hear you, than to be heard by you. For my own part, I am Ambitious of your Company alone in some Solitude, where you and I might be all one.  
For I am sure if I can pretend to any Sense, I can have no Instruction or Satisfaction of Life, better than your example and your Society.  
My Service pray, to all my Friends, that is, to all yours whom I know, and be charitable (as often as you can) to the absent; which you good Wits seldom are; I mean be charitable with your Letters to  
Your humble Servants.  
Postscript.  
Pray let me have more of your Letters, though they should rally me with Compliments undeserved as your last has done; for like a Country Esquire I am in love with a Town Wit's Conversation, though it be but at a Distance that I am forced to have it, and though it abuses me while I enjoy it.  
From Cleve near Srewsbu●y February the 4th 1693/4.  
To Mr. Wycherly.  
Dear Sir,  
NOT long after I writ my last to you, I was hurried up to Town by a kind of a Colic, which has ended in a Defluction upon one of my Feet. You know Sir, a Defluction is a general name which some pleasant Frenchmen have given an infant Gout, too young to be yet Baptised. But though the distemper raged in each hand, I would in spite of it, answer your admirable Letter, a Letter which I had certainly known to be yours, though it had been sent me without a name, nay and transcribed by a Chancery Cle●k in his own hideous manner of Copying. But I must confess I was surprised to hear you say in it, that you took the sincerity of a man who so much esteems you for Raillery, yet though you declare it, you can never believe it. I am willing to believe you exceeding humble; but you can never be humble to that Degree, unless your Mind which resembles your Eye, in its Clearness, its Liveliness, and in its piercing Views, should be also like it in this, that plainly discerning all things else, it wants a sight of itself; but in this it does not resemble it: For it beholds itself by Reflections, and like a lovely Maid at her Glass, is Charmed with the sight of its own Beauty. This is a sight in which you take Pride as well as Pleasure; but yours I must confess is a guiltless Pride, it being nothing but first motion, which it is impossible for Man to avoid. You have both the Force to subdue it immediately, and the Art and Goodness to Conceal it from us. Thus it plainly appears from what I have said, that you do not believe I had any design to rally you. I am confident that through all my Letter there appears an Air of Sincerity. But that is a Virtue which has been so long and so peculiarly yours, that you may perhaps be jealous of it in your Friends, and disclaim some Virtues which they commend in you only to Monopolise that. You had given me, at least an occasion to think so, if the Raillery in yours had not been so very apparent, that even I had Eyes to discern that you have been to blame in it, though I am doubly blinded with Love of you and myself. Yet if you writ it with a design to Mortify me, assure yourself that I shall fortify my Vanity with that very Artillery with which you have begun to attack it. If Mr. Wycherly rallies, me it is certain that I have my defects; but it is full as certain, that he would never condescend to abuse me at such a distance if he wholly despised me. Thus, Sir, you see I am as reasonable with my Friend▪ as a Russian spouse is with her Husband, and take his very Raillery for a mark of Esteem, as she does a Beating for a proof of Affection. The very worst of your Qualities gain our Affections. Even your Jealousy is very obliging, which it could never be unless it were very groundless. But since your very Suspicion is obliging, what influence must your kindness have on our Souls? The wish that I were with you in some Retirement, is engaging to that degree, that I almost repent that I so eagerly desired your Conversation before. For if it were possible I would augment that desire as a grateful return to yours. To be with you in Solitude would make me perfectly happy. Tho' it were in the Orcadeses, I would not wish myself removed to any happier Climate; no, not even to that which contained my absent Mistress; all that I could do for her on that occasion, would be to wish her with me. In that Retirement▪ what should I not● enjoy? Where I should be admirably instructed without trouble, and infinitely delighted without Vice, where I should be glorious at once with Envy and Quiet. For what could be more glorious, than to be the Companion of your retreat; My very Ambition instructs me to love such Solitude. Tho' properly speaking, there can be no Solitude where you reside. Immortal Company still attends you, and the Virtues, the Graces, and the Charming Nine who love the Groves, and are fond of you, follow you to remotest Retirements. The comic Muse is more particularly yours; and it is your peculiar praise to allure the most ravishing of all the Sisters after you into Retirement. To make that Goddess forsake the crowd with you, who loves it most of the Nine. You have been constantly her Darling, her best beloved. Thus in Retirement with her and you, I should have the Conversation of Mankind; I should enjoy it with all its Advantages, without its least inconveniencies. In the Philosophy of your Actions and Words, I should see the Wise, the Good, and the truly Great; in your observations, and in your raillery, the Men of Sense, and the Men of Wit; and in your satire severely p●easant, the Fools and Rascals exposed by it. In the Postscript to my last, I made an Apology for usurping a Style so Foreign from this way of writing. I have once more run into the same fault in this, but the very thought of Mr. Wycherly spreads a generous warmth through me, and raises my Soul to rapture. And when a Man writes, his Soul and his Style of necessity rise together. In my next I have something with which I must trouble you, that will require another manner of writing.  
I am etc. London, Feb. 17.  
To Mr. Wycherly.  
Dear Sir,  
I Have been very ill ever since I took my leave of you, so that I parted in one Night from all that I value most, that is, from my Health and You. However, Nature was kind in not failing to supply me with Vigour, till Fortune had deprived me of your Conversation, and I was got amongst People with whom I have small occasion for Vigour. Yet even here in spite of Sickness and Absence I have made a shift to converse with you: ●or I thought that your Works were the only things that could make me full amends for the loss of your Company. By them you have been able to give me Joy even in the midst of my Pain. For, the Country Wife, and the Plain Dealer are stores of Delight, which you have laid up by a Noble Charity, to supply the Poor in Spirit through all Posterity. So that I bel●eve that to be one of the Reasons of Fortune's Pique to you, that you have put it out of her power for the time to come, to prosecute her Quarrel to Men ●f Sense effectually. For by having recourse to you in your Works, they are sure to become more happy than Fools, even at the time when they are less successful. But I can hold up my Head no longer at present, as soon as I am better you may expect a longer Letter from me.  
I am Yours, etc.  
To Mr. Dennis.  
Dear Sir,  
I Have received yours of the 20th of November, and am glad to find by it, that however your Friends are losers by your Absence from the Town, you are a Gainer by it; of your Health, which every one you have left behind you, (but Ch—) may be thought a Friend to; and the more each Man is your Friend, the more he is satisfied with your Absence, which though it makes us Ill for want of you, makes you well for want of us: your taking no leave of me (which you would excuse) I take to be one of the greatest Kindnesses you ever showed me; for I could no more see a Departing Friend from the Town, than a Departing Friend from this Life; and sure 'tis as much kindness and good breeding to steal from our Friend's Society unknown to 'em, (when we must leave 'em to their Trouble) as it is to steal out of a Room, after a Ceremonious Visit, to prevent trouble to him, whom we would Oblige and Respect; so that your last Fault (as you call it) is like the rest of your Faults, rather an Obligation than an Offence, though the greatest Injury indeed you can do your Friends, is to leave 'em against their Will, which you must needs do. You tell me you converse with me in my Writings▪ I must confess than you suffer a great deal for me in my Absence, which (though I would have you love me) I would not have you do; but for your truer Diversion, pray change my Country-Wife for a better of your own in the Country, and exercise your own Plain-Dealing there, than you will make your Country Squire better Company, and your Parson more sincere in in your Company than his Pulpit, or in his Cups: But when you talk of Store of Delights you find in my Plain-Dealer, you cease to be one; and when you commend my Country-Wife, you never were more a Courtier; and I doubt not but you will like your next Neighbour's Country Wife better than you do mine, that you may pass your time, better than you can do with my Country-Wife; and like her Innocence more than her Wit, since Innocence is the better Bawd to Love; but enjoy my Wife and welcome in my Absence, I shall take it as civilly as a City Cuckold; I was sorry to find by you that your head ached whilst you writ me your Letter. Since I fear 'twas from reading my Works (as you call them) not from your own Writing, which never gave you Pain, though it would to others to imitate it, I've given your Service to your Friends at the Rose, who since your absence own they ought not to go for the Witty Club, nor is Wills the Wit's Coffeehouse any more, since you left it, whose Society for want of yours is grown as Melancholy, that is as dull as when you left 'em a Nights, to their own Mother-Wit, their Puns, Couplets, or Quibbles; therefore expect not a Witty Letter from any of them, no more than from me, since they, nor I have conversed with you these three Weeks. I have no News worth sending you, but my next shall bring you what we have; in the mean time let me tell you (what I hope is no News to you) that your Absence is more tedious to me, than a Quibbler's Company to you; so that I being sick yesterday, as I thought without any cause, reflected you were Forty or Fifty Miles off, and then found the reason of my Indisposition, for I cannot be well so far from you, who am  
My Dear Mr. Dennis Your obliged humble Servant, W. Wycherly. London, Dec. 1. 94.  
Postscript.  
Pray pardon me that I have not sooner answered your Letter, for I have been very busy this last Week about Law Affairs, that is, very Dull and Idle, though very Active. Your Friends of the Coffeehouse and the Rose, whether Drunk or Sober, Good Fellows or Good Wits, show at least their Sense, by valuing you and yours, and send you all their Service; and never are more Wits, and less Poets▪ that is, less Liars, than when they profess themselves your Servants.  
For News, W— lives Soberly, Changed— goes to bed Early; D'Vrfy sings now like a Poet, that is, without being asked: And all the Poets or Witss-at-will, since your departure, speak well of the Absent. Bal— says his ill Looks proceed rather for want of your Company, than for having had that of this Mistress; even the Quibblers and Politicians, have no Double-meaning when they speak well of you.  
To Mr. Wycherly.  
Dear Sir,  
THE sight of your Letter revived me. It appeared like the Rays of the New Sun, to one who has Wintered under the Pole, and brought with it Light, Warmth, and Spirit. The Raillery in it was very obliging; for the Lust of Praise is as Powerful with Men, as the Itch of Enjoyment is with Women; and it is as hard for us to think that our Friend's ridicule us when they commend our Wit, as it is for them to believe that their Gallants abuse them when they extol their Beauty. Yet generally in both cases, whatever is said, is said for the satisfaction of him that speaks it. But then, as he delights in Deceiving, the Person to whom he speaks is deceived with Pleasure, and both Parties are satisfied. But Mr. Wycherly is to be excepted from this general Rule, who commends his Friend for his Friend's sake. You never are Witty to please yourself, to whom Wit has so long been habitual, that you are often hardly moved yourself when you say those admirable things with which we are transported. Not that I am so far betrayed by Vanity, as to take your Compliments at the Foot of the Letter, or to suppose that you believed all that you said; but I am willing for your sake to believe that you meant something of it, and that not being without kindness for me, (which is only owing to the Sweetness of your Nature, that is to your Merit, and not to mine;) your Reason, as the Duke De la Rochefoucaut says, has been bubbled by your Affection. And here, Sir, I have much the Advantage of you; for when I declare that I have the greatest Opinion in the World of you, none will mistrust my Sincerity, and all will applaud my Discernment; but you cannot express your Zeal at so high a Rate for any Friend, but it must considerably lessen the World's Opinion of your Judgement. But it is Mr. Wycherly's peculiar Praise, never to have shown want of Judgement in any thing, unless in that only thing in which Error is Honourable. How few are they who are capable of Erring at your Rate!  
Vellem in amicitiâ sic erraremus, & isti  
Errori virtus nomen posuisset honestum.  
And how happy is the Man who has a Friend so accomplished, that Error in him is Virtue. I am that Happy Man, and am so far exalted by my Happiness, that I am never less humble, than when I Subscribe myself,  
Dear Sir, You most Humble and Faithful Servant.  
Mr. Wycherly's to Mr.—  
Dear Sir,  
I Have had yours of the 31st of March, to which I should sooner have returned an Answer, had I not been forced to take a little turn out of Town; but your Letter to me, brought me not more satisfaction than your last to Mr. Moyle gave me disquiet for you. Since by that I find how uneasy you are. Yet know my Friend from one sufficiently experienced in love disasters, that Love is often a kind of losing Loadam, in which the loser is most often the gainer. If you have been deprived of a Mistress, consider you have lost a Wife, and though you are disappointed of a short satisfaction, you have likewise escaped a tedious vexation, which Matrimony infallibly comes to be, one way or another; so that your Misfortune is an accident which your true Friends should rather Felicitate than Commiserate. You told me in your last, that you were no more Master of yourself. Then how should I help rejoicing at the restoration of your Liberty? A Man might as reasonably be sorry for his Friend's recovery from Madness, as for his recovery from Love, (though for the time a pleasant Frenzy;) so that, your Mistress' Father, has rather been your Doctor than your Enemy. And you should not be angry with him, if he cures you of your love distemper, th● by a means a little too violent, for next to his Daughter's cure of love, his may prove the best; well, pray be not angry, that I can be pleased with any thing that can so much displease you. I own my Friendship for you has a little Selfishness in it, for now you cannot be so happy as you would in the Country, I hope you will make us as happy as we can be in Town, which we shall be as soon as we have your company: For know, my Friend, change of Air after a love distemper, may be as good as 'tis after a Fever; and therefore make haste to Town, where a great many Doctors have engaged to complete your Cure. Your Friends will do any thing to root out the remains of your Passion. The witty Club will grow grave to instruct you, and the grave Club will grow gay to delight you. Wh. will turn a Philosopher, and I will grow a good fellow, and venture my own health, for the recovery of your good Humour; for I had rather be sick in your Company, than for want of it (who am,  
Dear Sir, Your most unalterable Friend and humble Servant, W. Wycherly.  
Postscript.  
Pray pardon me for not writing to you before, or rather for writing to you so dully now, which I hope will be my best excuse for my not writing sooner. All your Friends of the Coffee-house are well, and what is no news to you, are in spite of your Absence your constant humble Servants.  
London, April 11. 1695.  
To Mr. Wycherly.  
I have a colourable excuse for my Silence, ●or when you went out of Town, you gave me the hopes of receiving a Letter from you, as soon as you arrived at Cleve. Besides, since that, I have been a month in Northamptonshire. But the Inclination which I have to converse with Mr. Wycherly, is too violent to receive any check from Punctillo's. But, alas, I was restrained by too just an Impediment. For ever since I saw you, I have been so racked by a cruel Passion, that I have had no power to do any thing but to complain. And your portion of Melancholy is not so small, that you have need to be troubled with another Man's Spleen. I would be sure to communicate my happiness to my Friend, nay I could be but half happy if I did not communicate it. As in love I never could be pleased to a height with my own pleasure, if I did not find that it added to that of my Mistress. But I should impart my ill humour to my Friend, if I found that it were not in his power to ease me, and that it were much in his inclination, with as much Regret, as I should acquaint him with his own ill Fortune, if I were clearly convinced that it were not in my power to assist him. You would not advise me to stifle this passion. You are too well acquainted with Love and me to do that. You know that that would be to persuade me to a thing which you are already sensible, that I am very willing and very unable to do. I blush while I show this weakness, but sure there is some force of Mind required to show some sorts of weakness. You remember the Maxim of the wise Duke; La memê fermeté qui sert a resister al'amour, Sertaussi queque fois a le rendre violent et durable. If that be true, I beseech you to believe that this obstinate Lover is a constant Friend too, and unalterably,  
Dear Sir, Your most Humble Servant.  
Mr. Wycherly's Letter.  
Dear Sir,  
I Lately received from you so kind, and so witty a Reproach for my not writing to you, that I can hardly repent me of my fault, since it has been the occasion of my receiving so much satisfaction: But you have had a reasonable excuse for your silence, since you say I promised to write to you first, which is very true; and I had kept my promise, but for my Conjecture that you could not stay so long out of Northamptonshire; nor was I it seems, mistaken in that. But be assured, Dear Sir, I think there can be no better End, or Design of my writing, than in its procuring me the satisfaction of receiving something of yours; especially, since I have no other way left me now of conversing with you. But it seems, you forbear to relieve me out of Charity, since you say your trouble was so great, that you were unwilling to communicate it to me to mine. I see your Wit can do any thing, make an omission of a kindness a greater obligation, and if you complain but to your Mistress, as wittily as you do to your Friend, I wonder not at her Cruelty, nor that she should take pleasure to hear you complain so long. But, my Friend have a care of complaining to her, with so much true Sense, lest it should disparage your true Love; and indeed, that I fear is the only cause you are suffered to complain so long, without the success which is due to your Merit, Love, and Wit, from one who; you say has herself so much, which with your Pardon, I shall hardly believe, though you are her Voucher, if she does not do what you would have her, that is, do you and herself Reason as fast as she can; since she must need believe you a warm and sincere Lover, as much as I believe you a Zealous and a true Friend. And I am so well acquainted with Love and you, that I believe no body is able to alter your Love, or advise your Reason; the one being as Unalterable as the other infallible, and you (for aught I know) are the only Man, who at once can Love and be Wise. And to the Wise, you know, a word is enough, especially since you gave me a caution against opposing your passion; because it would be in vain. If Love be in you as in other Men, a violent Passion, it is therefore a short Frenzy, and should be cured like other Distempers of that kind, by your Friend's humouring it, rather than opposing it. Yet pardon me, if I prescribe the common remedy of curing one Love with another. But whether you will let me be your Doctor or no, I must at least wish you well, who am,  
(Dear Sir,) Your most Obliged Affectionate Friend, and humble Servant, W. Wicherly.  
Postscript.  
Pray thank my Friend Mr. W— for putting his Surtout of a Letter over yours of a finer Stuff, as the lining of a Garment is often finer than the outside. Pray give all the honest Gentlemen of the Coffee-house, of my acquaintance and yours, my humble Service, whom with you, I hope to see again, within these three weeks, at London.  
Cleve near Shrewsbury, August the 31st 1695.  
Mr. Dennis to Mr. Wycherly.  
Dear Sir,  
A Man who has the Vanity of pretending to write, must certainly love you extremely well, if he does not hate you after he has received from you such a Letter as yours: And he must undoubtedly show a great deal of Friendship, when he assures you he does not envy you the very Lines by which you commend him. A Man had need be very well acquainted with the goodness of your Nature, to be satisfied that you do not praise with a Wicked Design to mortify. There are few Writers so humble, whom Mr. Wycherly's Commendation would not render vain; but then there are few Writers so Proud, whom the Wit that Mr. Wycherly shows in commending them would not humble. So that a Man who did not know you, would be apt to believe that whenever you writ to Praise, you do but like a Wrestler who lifts People up on purpose to throw them down, and the Higher he raises them, makes their fall the Greater. Your Commendation is to a Modest Man, what the Second Bottle is to a Sober Man; it raises his Vigour while he is swallowing it; but the Wit is as sure to make the one Melancholy upon mature Reflection, as the Wine is certain to leave the other Spiritless after the third Concoction: But our Infirmity cannot be your fault; to whom we are obliged for your generous Intentions, which give you such a peculiar Distinction from ordinary Men of Wit. Indeed, by a Just, and a Noble Confidence, which you may repose in yourself, you may always very safely commend; because you may be always sure to surpass. 'Tis Prudent and Noble at once in a Conqueror to extol the Conquered. To praise the Excellence which he o'ercomes, is but to commend himself. Besides, it wins the very Heart and Soul of him that is overcome, if he has but Virtue enough to be so subdued; and makes him willing to leave his last Retrenchment. It would long since have had that Effect upon me, if the rest of your good Qualities had not prevented it; which have so Closely and so Entirely tied me to you, that whenever I receive a Letter from you, my Vanity is sure to gain on the one side, what it is certain to lose on the other: For if I am mortified as to my own Wit, I do not fail to value myself upon yours.  
London, Sept. 10. 95. I am, etc.  
To Mr. Wycherly.  
Dear Sir,  
THE last time I was at Wills, I had the Mortification to hear, that our Friend Mr.— had met with a Disappointment in—; at which, some who were present were glad, affirming, that Success would have thrown him out of his Element; For that a Man of Wit is not qualified for Business so well as a Blockhead: I have since had some Thoughts concerning that matter which I here send you, and of which I desire your Opinion.  
Upon Reflection I have found out the following Reasons, why Blockheads are thought to be fittest for Business, and why they really succeed in it.  
First, As their Brains are a great deal colder, than those are of Men of Wit, they must have but very straight Imaginations, and very barren Inventions; from whence it follows that they have but few thoughts, and that a few Objects fill their Capacities.  
Secondly, It is reasonable enough to believe, that since they are uncapable of many Thoughts, those few which they have, are determined by their Necessities, their Appetites, and their Desires, to what they call their Fortunes and their Establishments.  
Thirdly, It is not very hard to conceive, that since a Blockhead has but a few Thoughts, and perhaps but one all his Life-time, which is his Interest, he should have it more perfect, and better digested, than Men of Wit have the same thought, who perhaps have a thousand every hour.  
Fourthly, It is easy to comprehend, that since such a one has but a few thoughts, or perhaps but one, which by often revolving in his Mind, he has digested, and brought to Perfection, he should readily pass from Thought to Action. For he must grow weary of thinking so often of one and the same thing; and since the Nature of the Soul requires Agitation, as soon as his little Speculation ceases, he must of necessity act to divert himself.  
Fifthly, It will be certainly found, that as a little Thought often makes a Man active in Business, so a little Judgement often makes him Diligent; for he may well be eager in the Pursuit of those things, on which, seduced by Passion and Vulgar Opinion, he sets an exorbitant Value; and concerning whose Natures and Incertainty he is not very capable of making solid Reflections. For though Prudence may oblige a Man to secure a Competency, yet never was any one by right Reason induced to seek Superfluities.  
Sixthly, Penury of thought supposes Littleness of Soul, which is often requisite for the Succeeding in Business: For a Blockhead is Sordid enough to descend to Trick and Artifice, which in Business are often necessary to procure Success, unless they are more than supplied, by a Prudence derived from a Consummate Experience, or from a great Capacity.  
Thus have I endeavoured to give the reason, why a Fool succeeds better in Business than a Man of Wit, who has a Multitude of thoughts, and which fly at the Noblest Objects; and who finds that there is something of pleasing, and so noble, in thinking rightly, and more especially in the sublime Speculations of exalted Reason, that he finds it intolerably irksome to descend to Action, and abhors the very thought of being diligent in things, for which he has an extreme Contempt.  
Thus you see, that in some measure a Fool may be said to be better fitted out for Business, than a Man of Wit. But it is high time to distinguish. For first, when I say that a Blockhead is fitted for Business, I mean only for little Business: For to affirm, that he is qualified for Affairs that require Extent of Capacity, would be a Contradiction in Terms. Secondly, when I affirm, that a Man of Wit is less capacitated for Business, I mean that he is less so, as long as he keeps in his Natural Temper, and remains in a State of Tranquillity. But if once he comes to be thrown out of that by the Force of a Violent Passion, and fired with Zeal for his Country's Service, or inflamed by Ambition, and Business can be made subservient to the gratifying of those Passions, than I dare boldly affirm, that one Man of Wit will go further than a Thousand of those who want it. Of which it would be easy to give more than one Instance amongst our present Ministers. But I will be contented with putting you in mind that none of the Romans had more Wit than Caesar, and none of the French than Richelieu.  
Before I conclude, I must give you a Caution: Which is, that by the Word Blockhead, I do not mean one that is stupid, but that I apply that word according to the Language of you Men of Wit, to one who thinks but a little: And that on the other side, by a Man of Wit, I do not mean every Coxcomb whose Imagination has got the Ascendant of his little Reason; but a Man like you, Sir, or our most Ingenious Friend, in whom Fancy and Judgement are like a well-matched Pair; the first like an extraordinary Wife, that appears always Beautiful, and always Charming, yet is at all times Decent, and at all times chaste; the Second like a Prudent and well-bred Husband, whose very Sway shows his Complaisance, and whose very Indulgence shows his Authority.  
Octob. 30. I am, Dear Sir, Your most Humble Servant, John Dennis.  
To Mr. Dryden.  
Sir,  
Tho' no Man writes to his Friends with greater Ease, or with more Cheerfulness, than myself; and though I have lately had the Presumption to place you at the Head of that small Party, nevertheless I have experienced with Grief, that in writing to you I have not found my old Facility.  
Since I came to this place I have taken up my Pen several times in order to write to you, but have constantly at the very Beginning found myself damped and Disabled; upon which I have been apt to believe that extraordinary Esteem may sometimes make the Mind as Impotent as a Violent Love does the Body, and that the vehement Desire we have to exert it, extremely decays our Ability. I have heard of more than one lusty Gallant, who, though he could at any time with Readiness and Vigour▪ possess the Woman whom he loved but moderately, yet when he has been about to give his darling Mistress, whom he has vehemently and long desired, the first last Proof of his Passion, has found on a sudden that his Body has Jaded and grown resty under his Soul, and gone backward the faster, the more he has spurred it forward. Esteem has wrought a like effect upon my Mind. My extraordinary inclination to show that I honour you at an extraordinary rate, and to show it in words that might not be altogether unworthy Mr. Dryden's Perusal, incapacitates me to perform the very action to which it incites me, and Nature sinks in me under the fierce Effort: But I hope you will have the Goodness to pardon a Weakness that proceds from a Cause like this, and to consider that I had pleased you more if I had honoured you less. Who knows but that yet I may please you, if you encourage me to mend my Fault? to which if you knew but the Place I am in, Charity would engage you, though Justice could not oblige you. For I am here in a Desert, deprived of Company, and deprived of News; in a Place where I can hear nothing at all of the Public, and what proves it ten times more a Desert, nothing at all of you: For all who are at present concerned for their country's Honour, harken more after your Preparatives, than those for the next Campaigne. These last may possibly turn to our Confusion, so uncertain are the Events of War; but we know that whatever you undertake must prove Glorious to England, and though the French may meet with Success in the Field, by you we are sure to Conquer them. In War there are a thousand unlooked for accidents which happen every day, and Fortune appears no where more like herself; but in a Combat of Wit, the more Humane Contention, and the more Glorious Quarrel, Merit will be always sure to prevail: And therefore, though I can but hope that the Confederate Forces will give chase to De Lorges and Luxemburgh, I am very confident that Boileau and Racine will be forced to submit to you. Judge therefore if I, who very much love my Country, and who so much esteem you, must not with a great deal of Impatience expect to hear from you.  
Bushy-Health, jan. 1693/4. I am, Sir, Your most humble Servant.  
To Mr. Dryden.  
Dear Sir,  
YOU may see already by this Presumptuous greeting, that Encouragement gives as much Assurance to Friendship, as it imparts to Love. You may see too, that a Friend may sometimes proceed to acknowledge Affection, by the very same Degrees by which a Lover declares his Passion. This last-at first confesses Esteem, yet owns no Passion but Admiration. But as soon as he is Animated by one kind Expression, his Look, his Style, and his very Soul are altered, But as Sovereign Beauties know very well, that he who confesses he Esteems and Admires them, implies that he Loves them, or is inclined to Love them; a Person of Mr. Dryden's Exalted Genius, can discern very well, that when we esteem him highly, 'tis Respect restrains us if we say no more. For where great Esteem is without Affection. 'tis often attended with Envy, if not with Hate; which Passions Detract even when they Commend, and Silence is their highest Panegyric. 'Tis indeed impossible, that I should refuse to Love a Man, who has so often gi●en me all the pleasure that the most Insatiable Mind can desire; when at any time I have been Dejected by Disapointments, or Tormented by cruel Passions, the recourse to your Verses has Calmed my Soul, or raised it to Transports which made it contemn Tranquillity. But though you have so often given me all the pleasure I was able to bear, I have reason to complain of you on this account, that you have confined my Delight to a narrower compass. Suckling, Cowley and Denham, who formerly Ravished me in every part of them, now appear tasteless to me in most, and Waller himself, with all his Gallantry, and all that Admirable Art of his ●urns, appears three quarters Prose to me. Thus 'tis plain that your Muse has done me an injury; but she has made me amends for it. For she is like those Extraordinary Women, who, besides the Regularity of their Charming Features, besides their engaging Wit, have Secret, Unaccountable, Enchanting Graces, which though they have been long and often Enjoyed, make them always new and always desirable. I return you my hearty thanks for your most obliging Letter. I had been very unreasonable if I had Repined that the Favour arrived no sooner. 'Tis allowable to grumble at the delaying a payment, but to murmur at the deferring a Benefit, is to be impudently ungrateful beforehand. The Commendations which you give me, exceedingly soothe my Vanity. For you with a breath can bestow or confirm Reputation; a whole Numberless People Proclaims the praise which you give, and the Judgements of three mighty Kingdoms appear to depend upon yours. The People gave me some little applause before, but to whom, when they are in humour will they not give it, and to whom when they are froward will they not refuse it? Reputation with them depends upon Chance, unless they are guided by those above them. They are but the keepers as it were of the Lottery which Fortune sets up for Renown; upon which Fame is bound to attend with her Trumpet, and Sound when Men draw the Prizes. Thus I had rather have your Approbation than the applause of Fame. Her commendation argues good luck, but Mr. Dryden's implies desert. Whatever low opinion I have hitherto had of myself, I have so great a value for your Judgement, that, for the sake of that, I shall be willing henceforward to believe that I am not wholly desertless; but that you may find me still more Supportable, I shall endeavour to compensate whatever I want in those glittering Qualities, by which the World is dazzled, with Truth, with Faith, and with Zeal to serve you; qualities which for their rarity, might be objects of wonder, but that Men dare not appear to admire them, because their Admiration would manifestly declare their want of them. Thus Sir, let me assure you, that though you are acquainted with several Gentlemen, whose Eloquence and Wit may capacitate them to offer their service with more Address to you, yet no one can declare himself, with greater Cheerfulness, or with greater▪ Fidelity, or with more profound Respect than myself.  
Sir, Your most, etc. March 3. 1693.  
Mr. Dryden to Mr. Dennis.  
My Dear Mr. Dennis,  
WHen I read a Letter so full of my Commendations as your last, I cannot but consider you as the Master of a vast Treasure, who having more than enough for yourself, are forced to ebb out upon your Friends. You have indeed the best right to give them, since you have them in Propriety; but they are no more mine when I receive them, than the Light of the Moon can be allowed to be her own, who shines but by the Reflection of her Brother. Your own Poetry is a more Powerful Example, to prove that the Modern Writers may enter into comparison with the Ancients, than any which Perrault could produce in France; yet neither he, nor you who are a better Critic, can persuade me that there is any room left for a Solid Commendation at this time of day, at least for me. If I undertake the Translation of Virgil, the little which I can perform will show at least, that no Man is fit to write after him, in a barbarous Modern Tongue. Neither will his Machine's be of any service to a Christian Poet. We see how ineffectually they have been tried by Tasso, and by Ariosto. 'Tis using them too dully if we only make Devils of his Gods: As if, for Example, I would raise a Storm, and make use of Aeolus, with this only difference of calling him Prince of the Air. What invention of mine would there be in this; or who would not see Virgil through me; only the same trick played over again by a Bungling Juggler? Boileau has well observed, that it is an easy matter in a Christian Poem, for God to bring the Devil to reason. I think I have given a better hint for New Machine's in my Preface to juvenal; where I have particularly recommended two Subjects, one of King Arthur's Conquest of the Saxons, and the other of the Black Prince in his Conquest of Spain. But the Guardian Angels of Monarchys and Kingdoms, are not to be touched by every hand. A Man must be deeply conversant in the Platonic Philosophy to deal with them: And therefore I may reasonably expect that no Poet of our Age will presume to handle those Machine's, for fear of discovering his own Ignorance; or if he should, he might perhaps be Ingrateful enough not to own me for his Benefactor. After I have confessed thus much of our Modern Heroic Poetry, I cannot but conclude with Mr. Rym— that our English Comedy is far beyond any thing of the Ancients. And notwithstanding our irregularities, so is our Tragedy. Shakespeare had a Genius for it; and we know, in spite of Mr. R— that Genius alone is a greater Virtue (if I may so call it) than all other Qualifications put together. You see what success this Learned Critic has found in the World, after his Blaspheming Shakespeare. Almost all the Faults which he has discovered are truly there; yet who will read Mr. Rym— or not read Shakespeare? For my own part I reverence Mr. Rym— s Learning, but I detest his Ill Nature and his Arrogance. I indeed, and such as I, have reason to be afraid of him, but Shakespeare has not. There 〈◊〉 another part of Poetry in which the English stand almost upon an equal foot with the Ancients; and 'tis that which we call Pindaric; introduced but not perfected by our Famous Mr. Cowley: and of this, Sir, you are certainly one of the greatest Masters. You have the Sublimity of Sense as well as Sound, and know how far the Boldness of a Poet may lawfully extend. I could wish you would cultivate this kind of O●e; and reduce it either to the same Measures which Pinder used, or give new Measures of your own. For, as it is, it looks like a vast Tract of Land newly discovered. The Soil is wonderfully Fruitful, but Unmanured, overstocked with Inhabitants; but almost all Savages, without Laws, Arts, Arms, or Policy. I remember Poor Nat. Lee, who was then upon the Verge of Madness, yet made a Sober, and a Witty Answer to a B●d Poet, who told him, It was an easy thing to write like a Madman: No, said he, 'tis a very difficult to write like a Madman, but 'tis a very easy matter to write like a Fool. Otway and He are safe by Death from all Attacks, but we poor Poets Militant (to use Mr. Cowley's Expression) are at the Mercy of Wretched Scribblers: And when they cannot fasten upon our Verses, they fall upon our Morals, our Principles of State and Religion. For my Principles of Religion, I will not justify them to you. I know yours are far different. For the same Reason I shall say nothing of my Principles of State. I believe you in yours follow the Dictates of your Reason, as I in mine do those of my Conscience. If I thought myself in an Error I would retract it; I am sure that I suffer for them; and Milton makes even the Devil say, That no Creature is in love with Pain. For my Morals, betwixt Man and Man, I am not to be my own Judge. I appeal to the World if I have Deceived or Defrauded any Man: And for my private Conversation, they who see me every day can be the best Witnesses, whether or no it be Blameless and Inoffensive. Hitherto I have no reason to complain that Men of either Party shun my Company. I have never been an Impudent Beggar at the Doors of Noblemen: My Visits have indeed been too rare to be unacceptable; and but just enough to testify my Gratitude for their Bounty, which I have frequently received, but always unasked, as themselves will Witness. I have written more than I needed to you on this Subject: for I dare say you justify me to yourself. As for that which I first intended for the Principal Subject of this Letter, which is my Friend's Passion and his Design of Marriage, on better consideration I have changed my Mind: For having had the Honour to see my Dear Friend Wycherly's Letter to him on that occasion, I find nothing to be added or amended. But as well as I love Mr. Wycherly, I confess I love myself so well, that I will not show how much I am inferior to him in Wit and Judgement; by undertaking any thing after him. There is Moses and the Prophets in his Counsel. jupiter and juno, as the Poets tell us, made Tiresias their Umpire, in a certain Merry Dispute, which fell out in Heaven betwixt them. Tiresias you know had been of both Sexes, and therefore was a Proper Judge; our Friend Mr. Wycherly is full as competent an Arbitrator. He has been a Bachelor, and Married Man, and is now a Widower. Virgil says of Ceneus, 
Nunc Vir nunc Faemina Ceneus,  
Rursus & in veterem fato revoluta figuram.   
Yet I suppose he will not give any large commendations to his middle State: Nor as the Sailer said, will be fond after a Shipwreck to put to Sea again. If my Friend will Adventure after this, I can but wish him a good Wind, as being his and  
My Dear Mr. Dennis, Your most Affectionate and most Faithful Servant John Dryden.  
Written for My Lady C. to her Cousin R—. of the Temple. By Mr. Dennis.  
After she had received from him a Copy of Verses on her Beauty.  
Cousin,  
I Received yours with the Verses enclosed, and here return you my hearty thanks, for the Face, the Shape, the Mien, which you have so generously bestowed upon me. From looking upon your Verses I went to my Glass. But, Jesus! The difference! Tho' I bought it to Flatter me, yet Compared to you, I found it a Plain-Dealer. It showed me immediately that I have been a great deal more beholding to you, than I have been to Nature. For she only formed me not Frightful, but you have made me Divine. But as you have been a great dealkinder than Nature has been to me, I think myself obliged in Requital, to be a good deal more Liberal than Heaven has been to you, and to allow you as large a Stock of Wit as you have given me of Beauty. Since so Honest a Gentleman as yourself, has Stretched his Conscience to commend my Person, I am bound in Gratitude to do Violence to my Reason, to Extol your Verses. When I left the Town, I desired you to furnish me with the News of the Place, and the first thing I have received from you, is a Copy of Verses on my Beauty. By which you Dexterously infer, that the most extraordinary piece of News you can send me, is to tell me that I am Handsome. By which ingenious Inference, you had Infallibly brought the Scandal of a Wit upon you, if your Verses had not stood up in your Justification. But tell me truly Cousin, could you think that I should prove so easy a Creature as to believe all that you have said of me? How could you find in your heart to make such a Fool of me, and such a Cheat of yourself? To Intoxicate me with Flattery, and draw me in to Truck my little Stock of Wit and Judgement, for a mere Imagination of Beauty; when the Real thing too, falls so infinitely short of what you would make me exchange for the very Fancy of it. For, Cousin, there is this considerable Difference between the Merit of Wit and Beauty; that Men are never Violently Influenced by Beauty, unless it has weakened their Reason. And never feel half the force of Wit, unless their Judgements are Sound. The principal time in which those of your Sex admire Beauty in ours, is between Seventeen and Thirty, that is, after they are passed their Innocence, and before they are come to their Judgements. And now Cousin, have not you been Commending a pretty Quality in me, to Admire which, as I have just shown you, supposes not only a Corrupted Will, but a raw Understanding. Besides, how Frail, how Transitory is it! Nature deprives us of it at Thirty, if Diseases spare it till then. By which constant proceeding, she seems to Imply, that she gives it us as a Gugaw to please us in the Childhood of our Reasons; and takes it from us as a thing below us, when we come to years of Discretion. Thus Cousin, have you been commending a Quality in me, which has nothing of true Merit in it, and of which I have no greater a share, than to keep me from being scandalous. So that all I could have got by your kindness, if I had parted with my Judgement, in order to reap the benefit of it, had been nothing but wretched Conceit, and ridiculous Affectation. If I thought you had enough of the Gallant Man in you, to take what ●say in good part, I would advise you to engage no further in Poetry. Be ruled by a Woman for once, and mind your Cook upon Littleton. Rather Pettifog than Flatter. For if you are resolved to be a Cheat, you will show at least some Conscience, in resolving rather to chouse People of their Money, than to Bubbl● them of their Understandings. Besides, Cousin, you have not a Genius which will make a great Poet, and be pleased to consider, that a small Poet is a scandalous Wight, that indifferent Verses are very bad ones, and that an Insipid Panegyric upon another is a severe Libel upon yourself. Besides, there will start up a satire one day, and then woe be to Cold Rhymers. Old England is not yet so Barren, but there will arise some generous Spirit, who, besides a Stock of Wit and good Sense, which are no very common Qualities, will not only be furnished with a sound Judgement, which is an Extraordinary Talon; but with a true taste for Eloquence and Wit, which is scarce any where to be found, and which Comprehends not only a just Discernment, but a fine Penetration, and a delicate Criticism. Such a Satirist as this, Cousin, must arise, and therefore you had best take care, by a Judicious Silence, that whenever he appears, he may be sure to divert you, and not afflict you.  
I am etc.  
To Mr— at Will's Coffee-house in Covent-Garden.  
I Received your Panegyric upon Pun's▪ which I▪ so approve of, that I am resolved to get it Printed, and bound up with Erasmus his praise of Folly. Yet to confess a Truth, I was something dissatisfied to see Quibbling commended with so much Wit. For nothing can be writ with more Wit, than your Letter to the Reserve of the Quibbles; which I suppose you inserted amongst so many things which are so finely said, lest these should have rendered you too Vain, or too much have Mortified me● But pray, after this Panegyric upon Quibbles, give me leave to ask you the same Question that the Lacedæmonians asked the Sophister, who harangued in the Praise of Hercules. By the way, did you ever expect to hear a Quibble compared to Hercules? There's a Simile for you. I think, as Novel says, that's New. You, who are cried up for so great a Wit, tell me, without Envy, could you ever have thought upon that? But to return to my Question. Here you have spent a great deal of time in the Defence of Quibbles. Who said a Word against them? The Devil a Syllable did I mention of them in mine. It is true, I cited honest Mr. sweet— but it is a hard Case, if the Quoting an Author must be construed the Condemning his Works. I have a great Respect and Kindness for Mr. sweet— as I have for all who have any Excellence. And truly, I think that for the Management of Quibbles and Dice, there is no Man alive comes near him. And let me tell you, Sir, for all your new Emulation, he is a better Quibbler than you. But it is high time to give over Raillery: For if you were my Father a Thousand times, let me die if I would not rigorously examine that part of your Letter which pretends to defend Quibbling. You say that I am too Nice, and that my Aversion has something it in, that is very like Affectation: But here you must give me leave to turn your own Simile upon you. Can a Man be justly accused of Niceness or Affectation, because he appears offended at a Stink? When I tell you that Quibbling is extremely Foolish; You know it is Foolish enough, you reply; but it is a Foolish thing that diverts. And do you think this knowledge of it will excuse the Folly? Give me leave to resume the aforementioned Simile. Suppose a Fellow who breaks Wind, should say to the Company, while they are cajoling their offended Noses with Snuff, Look you Gentlemen, I know I am a Brutal Dog for this, this is very Nasty, but Begad it is very Diverting▪ Would the Excuse think you be currant● A Quibble diverts: Right; and so does ● Hobby-Horse, which in my mind, for those who can be diverted without reason, is th● better Bauble of the two. A Quibble diverts! Jesus! That this should be spoke● at Will's? Can there be a more Damnabl● satire upon Wit, than that so many Gentlemen who have so very much of it, shoul● be forced to play the Fool to divert one another? But for God's sake, what do yo● mean when you say a Quibble diverts yo●● It makes you Laugh, I warrant? Why 〈◊〉 greatest Coxcomb about the Town sha●● outdo you in Laughing at any time. Nurture who has dealt Impartially with he● Children, and who has given them 〈◊〉 two distinctions from Beasts, reason an● Laughter, has, where she has bestowed th● more of the One, conferred the less of th● Other: And therefore a Coxcomb will Laug●● at nothing. Ay, that indeed, say you, ● a sign of a Fool. Well! My Dear Friend I have so much kindness for thee, that 〈◊〉 out of thy own Mouth, thou shalt not be Judged: For if a Quibble is not Wit, it is nothing. But it is at as great a Distance from Wit, as an Idol is from the Deity; and I will no more believe nauseous Equivocals to be Wit, because some Sots have admired them, than I will believe Garlic to be God, because the Egyptians adored it. Nay, it is a more Damnable sign of Stupidity in an Englishman, to make Wit of a Quibble, than it was in the Egyptians, to make a God of their Garlic. But to return from whence I digressed; I have never appeared so much a Stoic, but that I have been as much for Diversion as any of you. But then am I for the Diversion of Reasonable Men and of Gentlemen. If there be any Diversion in Quibbling, it is a Diversion of which a Fool and a Porter is as capable as is the best of you. And therefore Ben. johnson, who writ every thing with Judgement, and who knew the Scum of the People, whenever he brings in a Porter or Tankard-Bearer, is sure to introduce him Quibbling. But if Punning be a Diversion, it is a very strange one. There is as much difference between the silly Satisfaction which we have from a Quibble, and the ravishing Pleasure which we receive from a Beautiful Thought, as there is betwixt a Faint Salute and Fruition. But what would you have us do, you cry. Men of the greatest Parts are no more to be found with Wit always about them, than rich Rogues with always the Ready. Why, look you, Sir, as the first Step to Wisdom is to be freed from Folly, so the first Approach to Wit is a Contempt of Quibbling. If it happens at any time that you have not your Wit about you, we will either have Patience such time as you have, or take good sense in the lieu of it; If you are not in a Condition to Delight us, we will be contented to be instructed; we will make your Instruction nourish our Vanity, so turn even that to Delight. Nay there is something Noble in right Reason, and consequently something Delightful. Truth is so divinely Beautiful, that it must please Eternally; but falsehood is base, and must shock all generous Minds, and every Equivocal is but ambiguous Falsehood, that is the Pittiful'st, the Bafest of Falsehoods.  
To Walter Moyle, Esq  
Dear Sir,  
Tho' you are already indebted a Letter to me, yet I think fit to give you credit for another; though perhaps you may little desire to run into Debt this way: But it is for two Reasons that I give you the trouble of this. For, in the first place, I am taking a turn for a little time into the Country, and I design that the Prevention of this should make some amends for the Delay of my next. In the Second place, I have made some provision of Scandal, which I am willing to make use of, before it grows stolen upon my hands. Just after I writ my last, I thre● myself into a Detached Party, which marched from Wills to Namur; with the same Design that the Volunteers went to Breast, to keep out of the Fray, and be Spectators of the Action. However, before they were come to Blows▪ I went amongst the Tents, and had some discourse with Major-General R— whom I found to be Father to Mr. Bays his Parthenope. For the Major-General is a very Honest Fellow, who sells Ale by the Town Wall: We had the Satisfaction to see that the Town was taken, and the whole Siege was carried on as Sieges generally are▪ with a great deal more Noise than Mischief. On Monday last which was the Second of September, I travelled into the City, where I had the Satisfaction to see two very ridiculous Sights. The First was a Bawd carted for an action which had some relation to that memorable Day. For she was convicted of being an Accomplice in setting Fire to an Ancient and Venerable Pile of the City, that is, she was found Guilty of being instrumental in the Clapping an Alderman. I stood in a Bookseller's Shop to see her pass, which Bookseller was packing up some Scoundrel Authors to send them away to the Plantations. These Authors are Criminals, which being se●enc'd to be burnt here, have at last found Grace and got off with Transportation. You remember the terrible News that we heard at P— which, as it sprung from a ridiculous Occasion, that is, my Lady Mayoresses Gossipping, has had a Comical Consequence. For the Common-Council have made an Order, by which my Lady Mayoress is dispensed during the Wars, from seeing those Children born in the City, which are got in the Suburbs; that is from being present at one of their Wive's Labours. But 'tis time to return to the Fair. Last Night I took a turn in the Cloisters, where I was entertained with a great many Dialogues between Vizour and Vallancy Wig, upon which I leave you to be Judge, whether my Eyes or my Ears were the better Entertained of the two. For I heard a great deal of Unintelligible Language, addressed to a great many Invisible Faces. As if because the Women had resolved not to be Seen, the Men had determined not to be Understood; and had in revenge Eclipsed the Light of their Understanding by Fustian, as the others had obscured the Lustre of their Eyes by Velvet. Formerly the Ladies made use of White and Red to atract, but within these Thirty Years black has succeeded, and the Devil is found more tempting in his proper Colour. I have neither time nor place for any more. You shall have the rest by the first Opportunity.  
Yours, etc.  
To Mr. Congreve.  
Dear Sir,  
I Have now read over the Fox, in which though I admire the strength of Ben. Johnson's Judgement, yet I did not find it so accurate as I expected. For first the very thing upon which the whole Plot turns, and that is the Discovery which Mosca makes to Bonario; seems to me, to be very unreasonable. For I can see no Reason, why he should make that Discovery which introduces Bonorio into his Master's House. For the Reason which the Poet makes Mosca give in the Ninth Scene of the third Act, appears to be a very Absurd one. Secondly, Corbaccio the Father of Bonario is exposed for his Deafness, a Personal defect; which is contrary to the end of Comedy Instruction. For Personal Defects cannot be amended; and the exposing such, can never Divert any but half-witted Men. It cannot fail to bring a thinking Man to reflect upon the Misery of Human Nature; and into what he may fall himself without any fault of his own. Thirdly, the play has two Characters, which have nothing to do with the design of it, which are to be looked upon as Excrescencies. Lastly, the Character of Volpone is Inconsistent with itself. Volpone is like Catiline, alieni appetens, sui profusus; but that is only a double in his Nature, and not an Inconsistence. The Inconsistence of the Character appears in this, that Volpone in the fifth Act behaves himself like a Giddy Coxcomb, in the Conduct of that very Affair which he managed so Craftily in the first four. In which the Poet offends first against that Famed rule which Horace gives for the Characters.  
Servetur ad imum,  
Qualis ab incepto processerit, et sibi constet.  
And Secondly, against Nature, upon which, all the rules are grounded. For so strange an Alteration, in so little a time, is not in Nature, unless it happens by the Accident of some violent passion; which is not the case here. Volpone on the sudden behaves himself without common Discretion, in the Conduct of that very Affair which he had managed with so much Dexterity, for the space of three Years together. For why does he disguise himself? or why does he repose the last Confidence in Mosca? Why does he cause it to be given out that he's Dead? Why, only to Plague his Bubbles. To Plague them, for what? Why only for having been his Bubbles. So that here is the greatest alteration in the World, in the space of twenty-four hours, without any apparent cause. The design of Volpone is to Cheat, he has carried on a Cheat for three years together, with Cunning and with Success. And yet he on a sudden in cold blood does a thing, which he cannot but know must Endanger the ruining all.  
I am, Dear Sir, Your most Humble Servant.  
To Mr. Congreve.  
Dear Sir,  
I will not augment the Trouble which I give you by making an Apology for not giving it you sooner. Tho' I am hearty sorry that I kept such a trifle as the enclosed, and a trifle writ Extempore, long enough to make you expect a laboured Letter. But because in the Enclosed, I have spoken particularly of Ben. Johnson's Fox, I desire to say three or four words of some of his Plays more generally. The Plots of the Fox, the silent Woman, the Alchemist, are all of them very Artful. But the Intrigues of the Fox, and the Alchemist, seem to me to be more dexterously perplexed, than to be happily disentangled. But the Gordian knot in the Silent Woman is untied with so much Felicity, that that alone, may Suffice to show Ben johnson no ordinary Hero. But, then perhaps, the Silent Woman may want the very Foundation of a good Comedy, which the other two cannot be said to want. For it seems to me, to be without a Moral. Upon which Absurdity, Ben johnson was driven by the Singularity of Moroses Character, which is too extravagant for Instruction, and fit, in my opinion, only for Farce. For this seems to me, to Constitute the most Essential Difference, betwixt Farce and Comedy, that the Follies which are exposed in Farce are Singular; and those are particular, which are exposed in Comedy. These last are those, with which some part of an Audience may be supposed Infected, and to which all may be supposed Obnoxious. But the first are so very odd, that by Reason of their Monstrous Extravagance, they cannot be thought to concern an Audience; and cannot be supposed to instruct them. For the rest of the Characters in these Plays, they are for the most part true, and Most of the Humorous Characters Masterpieces. For Ben Johnson's Fools, seem to show his Wit a great deal more than his Men of Sense. I Admire his Fops, and but barely Esteem his Gentlemen. Ben seems to draw Deformity more to the Life than Beauty. He is o●ten so eager to pursue Folly, that he forgets to take Wit along with him. For the Dialogue, it seems to want very often that Spirit, that Grace, and that Noble Raillery, which are to be found in more Modern Plays, and which are Virtues that ought to be Inseparable from a finished Comedy. But there seems to be one thing more wanting than all the rest, and that is Passion, I mean that fine and that delicate Passion, by which the Soul shows its Politeness, even in the midst of its trouble. Now to touch a Passion is the surest way to Delight. For nothing agitates like it. Agitation is the Health and Joy of the Soul, of which it is so entirely fond, that even then, when we imagine we seek Repose, we only seek Agitation. You know what a Famous Modern Critic has said of Comedy.  
It faut que ses acteurs badinent noblement,  
Que son Noeud bien formé se denove aisement;  
Que l'action Marchant ou la raison la guide,  
Ne see perd● jamma dans une Scens vuide,  
Que son Style humble et doux se releue a propos,  
Q●e ses discours par tout fertiles en bons mots,  
Soient pleins de passions finement maniéès,  
Et les Scenes toujours l'une al'autre lieés,  
I leave you to make the Application to johnson— Whatever I have said myself of his Comedies, I submit to your better Judgement. ● For you who, after Mr. Wicherly, are incomparably the best Writer of it living; aught to be allowed to be the best Judge, too,  
I am, Yours, etc.  
Mr. Congreve, to Mr. Dennis.  
Concerning Humour in Comedy.  
Dear Sir,  
YOU writ to me, that you have Entertained yourself two or three days, with reading several Comedies, of several Authors; and your Observation is, that there is more of Humour in our English Writers, than in any of the other Comic Poets, Ancient or Modern. You desire to know my Opinion, and at the same time my Thought; of that which is generally called Humour in Comedy.  
I agree with you, in an Impartial Preference of our English Writers, in that Particular. But if I tell you my Thoughts of Humour, I must at the same time confess, that what I take for true Humour, has not been so often written even by them, as is generally believed: And some who have valued themselves, and have been esteemed by others, for that kind of Writing, have seldom touched upon it. To make this appear to the World, would require a long and laboured Discourse, and such as I neither am able nor willing to undertake. But such little Remarks, as may be continued within the Compass of a Letter, and such unpremediated Thoughts, as may be Communicated between Friend and Friend, without incurring the Censure of the World, or setting up for a Dictator, you shall have from me, since you have enjoined it.  
To Define Humour, perhaps, were as difficult, as to Define Wit; for like that, it is of infinite variety. To Enumerate the several Humours of Men, were a Work as endless, as to sum up their several Opinions. And in my mind the Quot homines tot Sententiae, might have been more properly interpreted of Humour; since there are many Men, of the same Opinion in many things, who are yet quite different in Humours. But though we cannot certainly tell what Wit is, or, what Humour, is yet we may go near to show something, which is not Wit or not Humour; and yet often mistaken for both. And since I have mentioned Wit and Humour together, let me make the first Distinction between them, and observe to you that Wit 〈◊〉 often mistaken for Humour.  
I have observed, that when a few things have been Wittily and Pleasantly spoken by any Character in a Comedy; it has been very usual for those, who make their Remarks on a Play, while it is acting, to say, Such a thing is very Humorously spoken: There is a great Deal of Humour in that Part. Thus the Character of the Person speaking, may be, surprisingly and Pleasantly, is mistaken for a Character of Humour; which indeed is a Character of Wit. But there is a great Difference between a Comedy, wherein there are many things Humorously, as they call it, which is Pleasantly spoken; and one, where there are several Characters of Humour, distinguished by the Particular and Different Humours, appropriated to the several Persons represented, and which naturally arise, from the different Constitutions, Complexions, and Dispositions of Men. The saying of Humorous Things, does not distinguish Characters; For every Person in a Comedy may be allowed to speak them. From a Witty Man they are expected; and even a Fool may be permitted to stumble on 'em by chance. Tho' I make a Difference betwixt Wit and Humour; yet I do not think that Humorous Characters exclude Wit: No, but the Manner of Wit should be adapted to the Humour. As for Instance, a Character of a Splenetic and Peevish Humour, should have a Satirical Wit. A Jolly and Sanguine Humour, should have a Facetious Wit. The Former should speak Positively; the Latter, Carelessly: For the former Observes, and shows things as they are; the latter, rather overlooks Nature, and speaks things as he would have them; and his Wit and Humour have both of them a less Alloy of Judgement than the others.  
As Wit, so, its opposite, Folly, is sometimes mistaken for Humour.  
When a Poet brings a Character on the Stage, committing a thousand Absurdities, and talking Impertinencies, roaring Aloud, and Laughing immoderately, on every, or rather upon no occasion; this is a Character of Humour.  
Is any thing more common, than to have a pretended Comedy, stuffed with such Grotesques, Figures, and Farce ●ools? Things, that either are not in Nature, or if they are, are Monsters, and Births of Mischance; and consequently as such, should be stifled, and huddled out of the way, like Sooterkins; that Mankind may not be shocked wi●h an appearing Possibility of the Degeneration of a Godlike Species▪ For my part, I am as willing to Laugh▪ as any body, and as easily diverted with an Object truly ridiculous: but at the same time, I can never care for seeing things, that force me to entertain low thoughts of my Nature. I dont know how it is with others, but I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a Monkey, without very Mortifying Reflections; though I never heard any thing to the Contrary, why that Creature is not Originally of a Distinct Species. As I dont think Humour exclusive of Wit, neither do I think it inconsistent with Folly; but I think the Follies should be only such, as men's Humours may incline 'em to; and not Follies entirely abstracted from both Humour and Nature.  
Sometimes, Personal Defects are misrepresented for Humours.  
I mean, sometimes Characters are barbarously exposed on the Stage, ridiculing Natural Deformities, Casual Defects in the Senses, and Infirmities of Age. Sure the Poet must both be very Ill-natured himself, and think his Audience so, when he proposes by showing a Man Deformed, or Deaf, or Blind, to give them an agreeable Entertainment; and hopes to raise their Mirth, by what is truly an object of Compassion. But much need not be said upon this Head to any body, especially to you, who in one of your Letters to me concerning Mr. Johnson's Fox, have justly excepted against this Immoral part of Ridicule in Corbaccio's Character; and there I must agree with you to blame him, whom otherwise I cannot enough admire, for his great Mastery of true Humour in Comedy.  
External Habit of Body is often mistaken for Humour.  
By External Habit, I do not mean the Ridiculous Dress or Clothing of a Character, though that goes a good way in some received Characters. (But undoubtedly a Man's Humour may incline him to dress differently from other People) But I mean a Singularity of Manners, Speech, and Behaviour, peculiar to all, or most of the same Country, Trade, Profession, or Education. I cannot think, that a Humour, which is only a Habit, or Disposition contracted by Use or Custom; for by a Disuse, or Compliance with other Customs, it may be worn off, or diversified.  
Affectation is generally mistaken for Humour.  
These are indeed so much alike, that at a Distance, they may be mistaken one for the other. For what is Humou● in one, may be Affectation in another; and nothing is more common, than for some to affect particular ways of saying, and doing things, peculiar to others, whom they admire and would imitate. Humour is the Life, Affectation the Picture. He that draws a Character of Affectation, shows Humour at the Second Hand; he at best but publishes a Translation, and his Pictures are but Copies.  
But as these two last distinctions are the Nicest, so it may be most proper to Explain them▪ by Particular Instances from some Author of Reputation. Humour I take, either to be born with us, and so of a Natural Growth; or else to be grafted into us, by some accidental change in the Constitution. or revolution of the Internal Habit of Body; by which it becomes, if I may so call it, Naturalised.  
Humour is from Nature, Habit from Custom; and Affectation from Industry.  
Humour, shows us as we are.  
Habit, shows us, as we appear, under a forcible Impression.  
Affectation, shows what we would be, under a Voluntary Disguise.  
Tho' here I would observe by the way, that a continued Affectation, may in time become a Habit.  
The Character of Moro●e in the Silent Woman, I take to be a Character of Humour. And I choose to Instance this Character to you, from many others of the same Author, because I know it has been Condemned by many as Unnatural and Farce: And you have yourself hinted some dislike of it, for the same Reason, in a Letter to me, concerning some of Johnson's Plays.  
Let us suppose Morose to be a Man Naturally Splenetic and Melancholy; is there any thing more offensive to one of such a Disposition, than Noise and Clamour? Let any Man that has the Spleen (and there are enough in England) be Judge. We see common Examples of this Humour in little every day. 'Tis ten to one, but three parts in four of the Company that you dine with, are Discomposed and Startled at the Cutting of a Cork, or Scratching a Plate with a Knife: It is a Proportion of the same Humour, that makes such or any other Noise offensive to the Person that hears it; for there are others who will not be disturbed at all by it. Well; But Morose you will say, is so Extravagant, he cannot bear any Discourse or Conversation, above a Whisper. Why, It is his excess of this Humour, that makes him become Ridiculous, and qualifies his Character for Comedy. If the Poet had given him, but a Moderate proportion of that Humour, 'tis odds but half the Audience, would have sided with the Character, and have Condemned the Author, for Exposing a Humour which was neither Remarkable nor Ridiculous. Besides, the distance of the Stage requires the Figure represented, to be something larger than the Life; and sure a Picture may have Features larger in Proportion, and yet be very like the Original. If this Exactness of Quantity, were to be observed in Wit, as some would have it in Humour; what would become of those Characters that are designed for Men of Wit? I believe if a Poet should steal a Dialogue of any length, from the Extempore Discourse of the two Wittiest Men upon Earth, he would find the Scene but coldly received by the Town. But to the purpose.  
The Character of Sir john Daw in the same Play, is a Character of Affectation. He every where discovers an Affectation of Learning; when he is not only Conscious to himself, but the Audience also plainly perceives that he is Ignorant. Of this kind are the Characters of Thraso in the Eunuch of Terence, and Py●gopolinices in the Miles Gloriosus of Pla●tus. They affect to be thought Valiant, when both themselves and the Audience know they are not. Now such a boasting of Valour in Men who were really Valiant, would undoubtedly be a Humour; for a Fiery Disposition might naturally throw a Man into the same Extravagance, which is only affected in the Characters I have mentioned.  
The Character of Cob in Every Man in his Humour, and most of the under Characters in Bartholomew-Fair, discover only a Singularity of Manners, appropriated to the several Educations and Professions of the Persons represented. They are not Humours but Habits contracted by Custom. Under this Head may be ranged all Country-Clowns, Sailors, Tradesmen, Jockeys, Gamesters and such like, who make use of Cants or peculiar Dialects in their several Arts and Vocations. One may almost give a Receipt for the Composition of such a Character: For the Poet has nothing to do, but to collect a few proper Phrases and terms of Art, and to make the Person apply them by ridiculous Metaphors in his Conversation, with Characters of different Natures. Some late Characters of this kind have been very successful; but in my mind they may be Painted without much Art or Labour; since they require little more, than a good Memory and Superficial Observation. But true Humour cannot be shown, without a Dissection of Nature, and a Narrow Search, to discover the first Seeds, from whenc● it has its Root and growth.  
If I were to write to the World, I should be obliged to dwell longer, upon each of these Distinctions and Examples; for I know that they would not be plain enough to all Readers. But a bare hint is sufficient to inform you of the Notions which I have on this Subject: And I hope by this time you are of my Opinion, that Humour is neither Wit, nor Folly, nor Personal defect; nor Affectation, nor Habit; and yet, that each, and all of these, have been both written and received for Humour.  
I should be unwilling to venture even on a bare Description of Humour, much more, to make a Definition of it, but now my hand is in, I'll tell you what serves me instead of either. I take it to be, A singular and unavoidable manner of doing, or saying any thing, Peculiar and Natural to one Man only; by which his Speech and Actions are distinguished from those of other Men.  
Our Humour has relation to us, and to what proceeds from us, as the Accidents have to a Substance; it is a Colour, Taste, and Smell, Diffused through all; though our Actions are never so many, and different in Form, they are all Splinters of the same Wood, and have Naturally one Complexion; which though it may be disguised by Art, yet cannot be wholly changed: We may Paint it with other Colours, but we cannot change the Grain. So the Natural sound of an Instrument will be distinguished, though the Notes expressed by it, are never so various, and the Divisions never so many. Dissimulation, may by Degrees, become more easy to our practice; but it can never absolutely Transubstantiate us into what we would seem: It will always be in some proportion a Violence upon Nature.  
A Man may change his Opinion, but I believe he will find it a Difficulty, to part with his Humour, and there is nothing more provoking, than the being made sensible of that difficulty. Sometimes, one shall meet with those, who perhaps, Innocently enough, but at the same time impertinently, will ask the Question; Why are you not Merry? Why are you not Gay, Pleasant, and Cheerful? then instead of answering, could I ask such one; Why are you not handsome? Why have you not Black Eyes, and a better Complexion? Nature abhors to be forced.  
The two Famous Philosophers of Ephesus and Abdera, have their different Sects at this day. Some Weep, and others Laugh at one and the same thing.  
I dont doubt, but you have observed several Men Laugh when they are Angry▪ others who are Silent; some that are Loud▪ Yet I cannot suppose that it is the passion of Anger which is in itself different, 〈◊〉 more or less in one than t'other; but tha● it is the Humour of the Man that is Predominant, and urges him to express it in that manner. Demonstrations of pleasure are as Various; one Man has a Humour of retiring from all Company, when any thing has happened to please him beyond expectation; he hugs himself alone, and thinks it an Addition to the pleasure to keep it Secret. Another is upon Thorns till he has made Proclamation of it; and must make other people sensible of his happiness, before he can be so himself. So it is in Grief▪ and other Passions. Demonstrations of Lov● and the Effects of that Passion upon several Humours, are infinitely different; but here the Ladies who abound in Servants are the best Judges. Talking of the Ladies, methinks something should be observed of the Humour of the Fair Sex; since they are sometimes so kind as to furnish out a Character for Comedy. But I must confess I have never made any observation of what I Apprehend to be true Humour in Women. Perhaps Passions are too powerful in that Sex, to let Humour have its Course; or may be by Reason of their Natural Coldness, Humour cannot Exert itself to that extravagant Degree, which it often does in the Male Sex. For if ever any thing does appear Comical or Ridiculous in a Woman, I think it is little more than an acquired Folly, or an Affectation. We may call them the weaker Sex, but I think the true Reason is, because our Follies are Sronger, and our Faults are more prevailing.  
One might think that the Diversity of Humour, which must be allowed to be diffused throughout Mankind, might afford endless matter, for the support of Comedies. But when we come closely to consider that point, and nicely to distinguish the Difference of Humours, I believe we shall find the contrary. For though we allow every Man something of his own, and a peculiar Humour; yet every Man has it not in quantity, to become Remarkable by it: Or, if many do become Remarkable by their Humours; yet all those Humours may not be Diverting. Nor is it only requisite to distinguish what Humour will be diverting, but also how much of it, what part of it to show in Light, and what to cast in Shades; how to set it off by preparatory Scenes, and by opposing other humours to it in the same Scene. Through a wrong Judgement, sometimes, men's Humours may be opposed when there is really no specific Difference between them; only a greater proportion of the same, in one than t'other; occasioned by his having more Phlegm, or Choler, or whatever the Constitution is, from, whence their Humours derive their Source.  
There is infinitely more to be said on this Subject; though perhaps I have already said to much; but I have said it to a Friend, who I am sure will not expose it, if he does not approve of it. I believe the Subject is entirely new, and was never touched upon before; and if I would have any one to see this private Essay, it should be some one, who might be provoked by my Errors in it, to Publish a more Judicious Treatise on the Subject. Indeed I wish it were done, that the World being a little acquainted with the scarcity of true Humour, and the difficulty of finding and showing it, might look a little more favourably on the Labours of them, who endeavour to search into Nature for it, and lay it open to the Public View.  
I dont say but that very entertaining and useful Characters, and proper for Comedy, may be drawn from Affectations, and those other Qualities, which I have endeavoured to distinguish from Humour: but I would not have such imposed on the World, for Humour, nor esteemed of Equal value with it. It were perhaps, the Work of a long Life to make one Comedy true in all its Parts, and to give every Character in it a True and Distinct Humour. Therefore, every Poet must be beholding to other helps, to make out his Number of ridiculous Characters. But I think such a One deserves to be broke, who makes all false Musters; who does not show one true Humour in a Comedy, but entertains his Audience to the end of the Play with every thing out of Nature.  
I will make but one Observation to you more, and have done; and that is grounded upon an Observation of your own, and which I mentioned at the beginning of my Letter, viz, That there is more of Humour in our English Comic Writers than in any others. I do not at all wonder at it, for I look upon Humour to be almost of English Growth; at least, it does not seem to have found such Increase on any other Soil. And what appears to me to be the reason of it, is the great Freedom, Privilege, and Liberty which the Common People of England enjoy. Any Man that has a Humour, is under no restraint, or fear of giving it Vent; they have a Proverb among them, which, may be, will show the Bent and Genius of the People, as well as a longer Discourse: He that will have a Maypole, shall have a Maypole. This is a Maxim with them, and their Practice is agreeable to it. I believe something Considerable too may be ascribed to their feeding so much on Flesh, and the Grossness of their Diet in general. But I have done, let the Physicians agree that. Thus you have my Thoughts of Humour, to my Power of Expressing them in so little Time and Compass. You will be kind to show me wherein I have Erred; and as you are very Capable of giving me Instruction, so, I think I have a very Just title to demand it from you; being without Reserve,  
july 10. 1695. Your real Friend, and humble Servant, W. Congreve.  
To Mr. Congreve, at TUNBRIDGE.  
Dear Sir,  
MR. Moyle and I have impatiently expected to hear from you. But if the Well which you Drink of had sprung up from Lethe, you could not have been more forgetful of us. Indeed, as the Tunbridge-Water is good for the Spleen, it may be said in some manner to cause Oblivion. But I will yet a while hope that Mr. Moyle and I are not of the Number of things that plague you. However I am so sensible of your being mindful of me in Town, that I should be Ungrateful, if I should complain that you do not remember me where you you are. Mr. Moyle tells me that you have made a Favourable mention of me, to a certain Lady of your Acquaintance, whom he calls— But then to mortify the Old Man in me, or indeed rather the Young, he assured me, that you had given a much better Character of him. However, for that which you gave of me I cannot but own myself obliged to you, and I look upon your Kindness as so much the greater, because I am sensible that I do not deserve it. And I could almost wish that your good Qualities, were not quite so numerous, that I might be able to make you some Return in specie. For commending you now, I do you but Justice, which a Man of Honour will do to his Enemy; whereas you, by partial Praise, have treated me like a Friend. I make no doubt, but that you do me the Justice to believe that I am perfectly yours; and that your Merit has engaged me, and your Favours obliged me to be all my Life time,  
London, August 8. 95. Dear Sir, You most Humble Servant, John Dennis.  
Mr. Congreve, to Mr. Dennis.  
Dear Sir,  
IT is not more to keep my Word, than to gratify my Inclination, that I writ to you; and though I have thus long deferred it, I was never forgetful of you, nor of my Promise. Indeed I waited in Expectation of something that might enable me to return the Entertainment I received from your Letters: but you represent the Town so agreeable 〈◊〉 me, that you quite put me out of Conceit with the Country; and my Designs of making Observations from it.  
Before I came to Tunbridge, I proposed to myself the Satisfaction of Communicating the Pleasures of the Place to you: But if I keep my Resolution, I must transcribe, and return you your own Letters; since I must own I have met with nothing else so truly Delightful. When you suppose the Country agreeable to me, you suppose such Reason's why it should be so, that while I read your Letter, I am of your Mind; but when I look off, I find I am only Charmed with the Landscape which you have drawn. So that if I would see a fine Prospect of the Country, I must desire you to send it me from the Town; as if I would eat good Fruit here▪ Perhaps the best way were, to beg a Basket from my Friends in Covent-Garden. After all this, I must tell you, there is ● great deal of Company at Tunbridge; and some very agreeable; but the greater part● is of that sort, who at home converse onl●● with their own Relations; and consequently when they come abroad, have few Acquaintance, but such as they bring with them. But were the Company better, or worse, I would have you expect no Characters from me; for I profess myself 〈◊〉 Enemy to Detraction; and who is there▪ that can justly merit Commendation? I have a mind to write to you, without the pretence of any manner of News, as I might drink to you without naming a Health● for I intent only my Service to you. I wis● for you very often, that I might recommend you to some new Acquaintance that I have made here, and think very well worth the keeping; I mean Idleness and a good Stomach. You would not think how People Eat here; every Body has the Appetite of an O●strich, and as they Drink Steel in the Morning, so I believe at Noon they could d●gest Iron. But sure you will laugh at me for calling Idleness a New Acquaintance; when, to your Knowledge, the greatest part of my Business, is little better. Ay, But here's the Comfort of the Change; I am Idle now, without taking pains to be so, or to make other People so; for Poetry is neither in my Head, nor in my Heart. I know not whether these Waters may have any Communication with Lethe, but sure I am, they have none with the Streams of Helicon. I have often wondered how those wicked Writers of Lampoons, could crowd together such quantities of Execrable Ver●es, tagged with bad Rhimes, as I have formerly ●een sent from this place: but I am half of Opinion now, that this Well is an Anti-Hypocrene. What if we should get a Quantity of the Water privately conveyed into the Cistern at Will's Coffeehouse, for an Experiment? But I am Extravagant— Tho' I remember Ben. johnson in his Comedy of Cynthia's Revels, makes a Well, which he there calls the Fountain of Self-Love, to be the Source of many Entertaining and Ridiculous Humours. I am of Opinion, tha● something very Comical and New, might be brought upon the Stage, from a Fiction of the like Nature. But now I talk of the Stage, pray if any thing New should appear there, let me have an Account of it: for though Plays are a kind of Winter-Fruit, ye● I know there are now and then, some Windfalls at this time of Year, which must be presently served up, lest they should not keep till the proper Season of Entertainment. 'Tis now the time, when the Sun breeds Infects; and you must expect to have the Hum and Buz about your Ears, of Summer Flies and small Poets. Cuckoos have this time allowed 'em to Sing, though they are damned to Silence all the rest of the Year. Besides, the approaching Feast of St. Bartholomew both creates an Expectation and bespeaks an Allowance of unnatural Productions and Monstrous Births. Methinks the Days of Bartholomew-fair are like so many Sabbaths, or Days o● Privilege, wherein Criminals and Malefactors in Poetry, are permitted to Creep abroad. They put me in mind (though at a different time of year) of the Roman Saturnalia, when all the Scum, and Rabble, and Slaves of Rome, by a kind of Annual and limited Manumission, were suffered to make Abominable Mirth, and Profane the Days of jubilee, with Vile Buffonery, by Authority. But I forget that I am writing a Post Letter, and run into length like a Poet in a Dedication, when he forgets his Patron to talk of himself. But I will take care to make no Apology for it, lest my Excuse (as Excuses generally do) should add to the Fault. Besides, I would have no appearance of Formality, when I am to tell you, that  
Tunbridge-Wells, Aug. 11. 95. I am, Your real Friend, and Humble Servant, W. Congreve.   

LETTERS OF LOVE, Written by—  
Dear Madam,  
NOT believe that I love you? You cannot pretend to be so incredulous. If you do not believe my Tongue, consult my Eyes, consult your own. You will find by yours, that they have Charms; by mine, that I have a heart which feels them. recall to mind what happened last Night. That at least was a Lover's Kiss. It's Eagerness, its Fierceness, its Warmth, expressed the God its Parent. But oh! It's Sweetness, and its melting Softness expressed him more. With Trembling in my Limbs, and Fevers in in my Soul I Ravished it. Convulsions, Pant, Murmur showed the mighty Disorder within me. The mighty Disorder increased by it. For those Dear Lips sh●● through my Heart, and through my bleed●ing Vitals, Delicious Poison, and an avoidless but yet a Charming Ruin. What cannot a day produce? The Night before, I thought myself a Happy Man. In want of nothing, and in fairest expectation of Fortune; Approved of by Men of Wit, and Applauded by others; Pleased, nay Charmed with my Friends, my then Dearest Friends; Sensible of e●'ry Delicate pleasure, and in their turns possessing all. But Love, Almighty Love, seems in a moment to have removed me to a Prodigious distance from every Object but you alone. In the midst of Crowds I remain in Solitude. Nothing but you can lay hold of my Mind, and that can lay hold of nothing but you. I appear Transported to some Foreign Desert with you, (Oh that I were really thus Transported,) where abundantly supplied with every thing in thee, I might live out an Age of uninterrupted Extacy. The Scene of the World's great Stage, seems suddenly and sadly changed. Unlovely Objects are all around me, excepting thee. The Charms of all the World appear to be Translated to thee. Thus in this sad, but Oh too pleasing State, my Soul can fix upon nothing but thee. Thee it Contemplates, Admires, Adores, nay, depends on; trusts in you alone. If you and Hope forsake it, Despair and endless Misery attend it.  
Dear Madam,  
THIS I send by the Permission of a Severe Father, I will not say a Cruel one, since he is yours. What is it that he has taken so Mortally ill of me? That I die for his Daughter is my only Offence. And yet he has refused, to let me take even my Farewell of you. Thrice happy be the Omen! May I never take my Farewell of thee, till my Soul takes leave of my Body. At least, he cannot restrain me from Loving. No, I will Love thee in spite of all opposition. Tho' your Friends and mine prove equally Averse, yet I will Love thee with a Constancy that shall appear to all the World, to have something so Noble in it, that all the World shall confess, that it deserved not to be unfortunate. I will forsake even my Friends for thee. My Honest, my Witty, my Brave Friends; who had always been till I had seen thee, the Dearest part of Mankind to me. Thou shalt supply the place of them all with me. Thou shalt be my Bosom my Best-loved Friend, and at the same time, my only Mistress, and my Dearest Wife. Have the goodness to pardon this Familiarity. 'tis the tenderest leave of the Faithfulest Lover; and here to show an over Respectfulness would be to wrong my Passion. That I Love thee more than Life, nay, even than Glory, which I courted once with a burnning Desire, bear Witness all my unquiet Days, and every restless Night, and that Terrible Agitation of Mind and Body, which proceed from my fear of losing thee. To lose thee is to lose all Happiness: Tormenting Reflection to a Sensible Soul! How often has my Reason been going upon it? But the loss of Reason would be but too happy upon the loss of thee. Since all the advantage that I could draw from its presence, would be to know myself Miserable. But the time calls upon me. I am obliged to take an Odious Journey and leave thee behind with my Enemies. But thine shall never do thee harm with me. Adieu thou Dearest, thou Loveliest of Creatures! No change of Time of Place, or the remonstrances of the best of Friends, shall ever be able to alter my Passion for thee. Be but one quarter so Kind, so Just to me, and the Sun will not shine on a happier Man than myself.  
Dear Madam,  
MAY I presume to Beg pardon for the Fault I committed? So Foolish a Fault, that it was below not only a Man of Sense, but a Man; and of which nothing could ever have made me Guilty, but the Fury of a Passion with which none but your lovely self could inspire me. May I presume to beg Pardon for a Fault which I can never forgive myself? To purchase, that Pardon what would I not endure? You shall see me prostrate before you, and use me like a Slave, while I kiss the Dear Fee● that Trample upon me. But if my Crime be too great for Forgiveness, as indeed it is very great, deny me not one dear parting Look; Let me see you once before I must never see you more. Christ! I want Patience to support that accursed Thought. I have nothing in the World that is Dear to me, but you. You have made every thing else indifferent. And can I resolve never to see you more? In spite of myself I must always see you. Your form is fixed by Fate in my Mind, and is never to be removed. I see those lovely piercing Eyes continually, I see each Moment those ravishing Lips, which I have gazed on still with desire, and still have touched with Transport; and at which I have so often flown with all the Fury of the most Violent Love. Jesus! From whence, and whither am I fallen▪ From the hopes of Blissful Ecstasies to black Despair. From the Expectation of Immortal Transports, which none but your Dea● self can give me, and which none but he who loves like me, could ever so much 〈◊〉 think of, to a Complication of Cruel Passions, and the most Dreadful Condition of Humane Life. My Fault, indeed, has bee● very great, and cries aloud for the Severe●● Vengeance. See it inflicted on me. See 〈◊〉 Despair and Die for that Fault. But let me 〈◊〉 die Unpardoned. Madam I Die for you, but Die in the most Cruel and Dreadful manner▪ The Wretch that lies broken on the Wheel alive, feels not a Quarter of what I endure▪ Yet Boundless Love has been all my Crime▪ unjust, Ungrateful, Barbarous return of it▪ Suffer me to take my Eternal leave of you▪ When I have done that, how easy will it be to bid all the rest of the World Adieu.  
Dear Madam,  
THis is the Third Letter that I have sent you since I came hither. Those which went before it were all the Overflowings of a Heart more full of Passion than ever was Man's before. It is impossible for me to be distant from you, but I must send to you by every Occasion. And yet you can resolve to take no Notice of all my Tenderness. Yes, my Dearest, Inhuman Creature, you can. You have been Sick, nay dangerously Sick, and have never sent to me. Have I left all the World for you, and could you resolve to leave the World without me; Nay, without so much as giving me the least Notice of it? C●rist! Can you resolve to leave me to Despair and to endless Misery, without expressing the least concern for me! And can I persist in loving one so Ingrateful! Is there such another Ingrateful Creature alive! No, there lives not so Ingrateful a Creature, but the●e l●v●s not one ●o Charming.  
Dear Madam,  
CAN you be angry still with yo●● Poor Penitent? You cannot have the Ill-N●ture sure. Yes, but you can, you say, since he could have the Presumption to be angry with you. But, My Dearest, there 〈◊〉 this Difference betwixt your Anger and 〈◊〉 Mine was caused by the Cruelty of your supposed Infidelity, and Yours by the Kindness of your Lover's Resentment: For if I had not been Fond of thee to the last degree, I had not been so Incensed against you▪ Yet even when I was most so▪ I could sooner have plucked out an Eye, than have resolved to have Parted with thee. Nay, I could sooner have torn out both Eyes, if the Loss of both would not have for ever deprived me of the Dear, the Ravishing sight of thee. But if you still think that my Anger had Gild in it, and that I ought to suffer for it, the means to punish me with utmost Severity, and to make me my own Tormentor, is to tell me, you Love me▪ Then I shall Curse myself and my Rage, and feel all the Plague of Remorse for having offended thee. I shall look upon myself as the Basest, the most Ungrateful of Men for abusing thy Goodness, and thy Charming Tenderness. I shall believe that I can never humble myself enough, and never suffer enough to deserve Forgiveness. Thus, Madam, you have your Revenge in your Power. It is a False Modesty which restrains you from taking it. In order to it, you have nothing to do, but to prove yourself tender, and to show yourself Grateful. If you must be ashamed, blush at your Cruelty; blush at your Inhumanity: But Gratitude is Reason, and Love is Nature, never be ashamed of those. Do but consider, there was a time, when I was happy in your Esteem; yes there has been a time, in which I was thought not altogether void of Reason by you. How then can you Blush at the owning a Passion, which you Command with an absolute Sway, at the very t●me that it Tyrannises over me.  
Dear Madam,  
MY Friend's stratagem gave me an opportunity of seeing you by finding Fault with you. It must proceed from Design or Madness if I find fault with thee▪ Thy Lovely Face is the very same that set all my Blood in a Flame; and I am sure my Heart can never be altered. How it trembled in my Breast when I saw you last, and by its trouble confessed its Conqueror! How it has burnt ever since with redoubled Fury! When I shall be free from this Flame● Heaven only knows, for the Hour of my Death Heaven only knows. 'Tis a Flame that h●s incorporated with that of my Life, and both will go out together. In vain I invoke my Reason to resist my Senses. My Reason finds you more Lovely than my Eyes did before; shows me all the Graces of thy beauteous Mind, and grows pleased and prides itself in its own Captivity. You accuse me, they say, of some extraordinary Crime. A Crime against whom? Against you whom I love! Against you, for whom I could die! Strange Accusation! Yet at the same time you refuse to see me, you refuse to receive my Letters: And must I be condemned Unheard? Robber● are allowed to speak before they are sentenced: Murderers have the Privilege to plead for their Live●: And shall the Tenderest Love be denied the Privilege which is granted to the Blackest Malice? I have been guilty of nothing but too much Love if too much Love, be a Fault. Why have you given credit to my Enemies, before you have heard me? I may indeed be convinced of an Error, but I can never be convicted of a Crime against you. The Man must be Mad, nay, desperately, Mad, who can design to injure himself, and Thou art, by much the Better, the Dearer part of me. Give me leave to see you once more before I depart. Let me see once more that Face which has Undone me, yet Charms me even in Ruin.  
O Face industriously contrived by Heaven,  
To fix my Eyes, and captivate my Soul!  
Nay, I will see you, if it be but to upbraid you with your barbarous Wish. If at the time that you made it, you had struck a Dagger in my Heart, you had given it a Gentler wound.  
The only Wish that I have to make is to be happy in thee; if that succeeds not, I have another, and that is, to lie at rest in my Grave.  
The End of the Love Letters.   

To Mr.—  
Sir,  
I Received yours, which was the more Welcome, because it came without Invitation. I take it very kindly that you would write to me, more kindly than if you had made me a Present: For we certainly show most Kindness for any one, in that which we do for him contrary to the Bent of our Natural Tempers. Now I have observed that you have been constantly less inclined to show your Parts than your Generosity. At the very time that you have been Prodigal of Pelf, you have been a Niggard of Wit. By a Greatness of Mind you have squandered the first, as a very worthless thing; and by a just Discernment been thrifty of the last, as a very valuable Treasure. But your Letter has given me some hopes, that you begin to take the Advice which I have so often given you; and that is, that for the Conveniency of Life, you would grow a little more frugal of Gold, and a little more free of your Sense. And I begin to imagine that you have till now been covetous of the Latter, only because you were laying in a Stock, that for the time to come you may be never without the Ready. I was sorry to hear my Friend— Quibble, though, to give the Devil his Due, it was not the worst that ever I heard. But I was in hopes that Quibbles and Puns, might have been cried down with the White Farthings. And I have been credibly informed that Will Erwin has refused to take Cannudrums of S— for Usquebaugh any longer; though one would Swear that Irish Wit might go for Irish Liquor. I wish you had sent me some more News, though I can make you but small Return in spi●ie. My humble Service to Mr. Congreve, tell him that I wish him good Luck, and expect that he should reconcile Fortune to Merit.  
Dec. 6. 1694. I am, Yours, etc.  
To Mr.—  
Dear—,  
THou it seems hast a mind to pass for a Wit, by the very same means that Aes●p● jack-dam thought fit to set up for a Beaux. (By the way I must tell you, that the Transformation of Beau to Wit, has something more of the Miracle in it▪ than the change of jack-daw to Beau) Yes, B—, with borrowed plumes hast thou imped thy wings. But I took more particular notice of a couple, that were plucked from a certain Bird of night; which if we give Credit to W— the knower is a very filthy obscene Animal; from which ominous Creature, may Heaven def●nd us. Mortals, that is, we in the Country here, call him Bell, but the Gods, that is, those in Covent-Garden, have named him Break-a-day. But it is time to begin to speak plain English, for you, if I am not mistaken, pretend to no other Language. But then, as you have writ for the Witty Club, the Witty Club may understand for you. I look upon your last to be the Act and Deed of them all. And you shall henceforward be Secretary to them, as julian was to their Mistresses. Tho' I must tell you by the way, that the Affection which some of them show for the Muses, is not unlike th●● merry passion, which put the little French Parson into an Amorous Fit for the Queen. Return them all thanked in my name, for the Honour they have done me, in offering to admit me in my absence, a Member of their Noble Society. But, Domine, non sum Dignus. However, I think myself obliged to make them as extraordinary a Compliment, as the Morocco Ambassador would have thought himself engaged to return the University of Oxford, if in the midst of their extreme civility, they had offered to make him D. D. But to speak to that part of your Letter which concerns yourself. I do not wonder, that you go to the Playhouse only for the sake of your Mistress; but methinks, at the Musick-meeting the Italians Voice might have Charms for you. But as you go thither too, you say, only for the sake of your Mistress, I will believe to oblige you, that she does not go for the Eunuches. Now I go to your Comedy here, purely for the Comedy sake, which is a politic Country Club; and partly for the Music sake I go to our Musick-meeting, which is a pack of Shrill mouthed Beagles for Treebles, and a pack of deep mouthed Bumkins for Bases. And whenever our Consort gins, half the Men in Bucks, in spite of their Souls, are our Audience. Once more I salute the Witty Club. Tell them, that they little deserve that name, if they have not more Wit, than to take any thing ill I have said. Assure them, that I know how to respect their Good Qualities, and that I shall endeavour to set of their Bad, which is a Friends part.  
I am Dear— Yours, etc.  
Postscript.  
In your first Letter you ga●e me notice of some Gentlemen who designed to write to me. The Post before that, I had a very very Witty Letter from one of them. It is no hard matter to guests that it was from Mr. Wycherly. But Changed— Wit, if he sent any, either went astray or came short. Who should wonder at either;  
To Walter Moyle, Esq at Bake in Cornwall.  
Dear Sir,  
YOUR long silence made me Conjecture, that you are so intent upon being Burgess of Bodmyn, that you had forgot the Citizens of Covent-Garden. At last I received an agreeable Letter from you. You had best have a care of talking in Cornwall, at the rate that you writ to your Friends. If you do, the Cornish-men may not think you rightly Qualified to Represent them. When you left the Town, you talked of a Critical Correspondence between us. But Idleness on your side, and ill Humour on mine, have baulked a very ●opeful design. But an accident has lately happened, which obliges me to provoke you. For there has just been a Play Acted, called The Mock-Marriage, the Author of which, whose name I have forgot, asserts Dogmatically in his Preface, that he who writes by rule shall only have his Labour for his Pains. I know not what this Author can mean by this. For, whom does he pretend to persuade by this fine assertion? Not Mr. Moyle, and me at least. We know indeed very well, that a Man may write regularly, and yet fail of pleasing; and that a Poet may please in a play that is not regular. But this is Eternally true, that he who writes regularly cetene paribus, must always please more, than he who transgresses the rules. Nothing can please in a Play but Nature, no not in a Play which is written against the Rules, and the more there is of Nature in any Play, the more that Play must Delight▪ Now the Rules are nothing but an observation of Nature. For Nature is Rule and Order itself. There is not one of the Rule● but what might be used to evince this. But But I shall be contented with showing some instances of it, even in the Mechanical Rules of the Unities. And first for that of place; it is certain that it is in Nature impossible, for a Man who is in the Squa●● in Covent-Garden, ●o see the things, that at the same time are transacted at Westm●nst●●▪ And then for that of Time, a Reasonable Man may delude himself so far, as to fancy that he sits for the space of twelve hours, without removing, Eating or Sleeping, but he must be a Devil that can Fancy he does it for a Week. What I have said may evince a necessity of observing the Unities of Time and of Place, if a Poet would throughly write up to Nature. And then the Unity of Action follows on course. For, that two Actions that are Entire, and Independent, should happen in the same short space of time, in the same little compass of Place, begin together, go on together, and end together, without Obstructing or Confounding one another, this indeed may be done upon the Stage, but in Nature it is highly improbabl●● Well then, since the Rules are nothing but Nature itself, and and nothing but Nature can please, and and since the more that any Play has of Nature, the more that Play must Delight, it follows, that a Play which is regularly Written, ceteris Paribus, must please more than a Play which is written against the Rules, which is a Demonstration. Rule may be said to be a Play; what Symmetry of parts is known to be to a Face? The Features may be Regular, and yet a Great or a Delicate air may be wanting. And there may be a Commanding or Engaging air, in a Face whose Features are not Regular. But this all the World must allow of, that there can never be seen any Sovereign Beauty, where air and Regularity of Features are not United. Thus is Reason against this Author, but the mischief is, that experience is against him too. For all your Dramatic Poets must confess 〈◊〉 the Plays which they have writ with 〈…〉 have been they whic● 〈…〉 most. I must trouble you 〈…〉 Dramatical Criticism, but not 〈…〉 next opportunity.  
I am Yours, etc. London, Oct▪ 26. ●5.  
Mr.— to Mr. Congreve.  
Dear Sir,  
I Came home from the Lands-End Yesterday, where I found Three Letters from Mr. Dennis, and one from you with a humorous Description of john Abassus, 
A Country Poet.  since the dubbing of Don Quixote; and the Coronation of Petrarch in the Capitol, there has not been so great a Solemnity as the Consecration of john Abassus. In all the Pagan Ritual, I never met with the Form of Poetical Orders; but I believe the Ceremony of Consecrating a Man to Apollo, is the same with devoting a Man to the Dii Manes, for both are Martyrs to Fame. I believe not a Man of the Grave-Club durst assist at this ridiculous Scene, for fear of laughing outright. W. was in his Kingdom, and for my part I would ●ave rathe● sat there than in the House of Commons. Would to God I could ●augh with you for one hour or two at all the ridiculous things that have happened at Wills Coffeehouse since I left it, 'tis th● merriest place in the World. Like Africa, every day it produces a Monster; and they are got there just as Pliny says the● are in Africa, Beasts of different kind● come to drink, mingle with one another and beget Monsters. Present my humble Duty to my new Lord, and tell him, that I am preparing an Address to Congratulate his Accession to the Throne of the Rabble. Tell the Lady who was the Author of the Hue and Cry after me, she might have sent out a hundred Hues and Cries before she would ha●● found a Poet. I took an effectual Cou●● not to be apprehended for a Poet, for ● went down clad like a Soldier, with ● new Suit of clothes on, and, I think there could not have been a better Disguise for a Poet, unless I had stolen 〈◊〉 B—'s Coat. Mr. Dennis sent 〈◊〉 down P— M— Parody. I can say very little of the Poem, but as for the Dialogue, I think, 'twas the first time tha● M— suffered any body to talk with him, though indeed here he inertupt●● Mr. Boileau in the midst of the first word My humble Service to Mr. Wych●rly, ● desire you would write me some News 〈◊〉 the Stage, and what Progress you have made in your Tragedy.  
October 7. 95. I am, Your affectionate Friend and Servant,  
Mr. Congreve to Mr.—  
Dear Sir,  
I Can't but think, that a Letter from me in London, to you in C— is like some ancient Correspondence between an Inhabitant of Rome and a Cimmerian. May be, my way of Writing may not be so modestly compared with Roman Epistles; but the resemblance of the Place will justify the other part of the Parallel. The Subterraneous Habitations of the Miners, and the Proximity of the Bajae help a little and while you are at B-let B-be Cumae, and do you supply the Place of Sibylla. You may look on this as raillery, but I can assure you, nothing less than Oracles are expected from you, in the next Parliament, if you succeed in your Election, as we are pretty well assured you will. You wish yourself, with us at Wills Coffee-house; and all here wish for you, from the precedent of the Grave Club, to the most puny Member of the Rabble; they who can think, think of you, and the rest talk of you. There is no such Monster in this Africa, that is not sensible of your absence, even the worst natured People, and those of least Wit lament it, I mean, Half Critics and Quiblers. To tell you all that want you, I should name all the Creatures of Covent-Garden, which like those of Eden-garden would want some Adam to be a Godfather and give them Names. I can't tell whether I may justly compare our Covent-garden, to that of Eden, or no; for tho' I believe we may have variety of Strange Animals equal to Paradise, yet I fear we have not amongst us, the Tree of Knowledge. It had been much to the disadvantage of Pliny, had the Coffee-house been in his days; for sure he would have described some who frequent it; which would have given him, the reputation of a more fabulous Writer than he has now. But being in our age it does him a Service, for we who know it, can give faith to all his Monsters. You who took care to go down into the Country unlike a Poet, I hope will take care not to come up again like a Politician; for then, you will add a new Monster to the Coffee-house, that was never seen there before. So you may come back again, in your Soldier's Coat, for in that you will no more be suspected for a Politician, than a Poet. Pray come upon any terms, for you are wished for by every body, but most wanted by your  
〈◊〉 Coffeehouse, August 13. 95. Affectionate Friend and Servant, W. Congreve.  
Mr. R—. to Mr. C—.  
Dear Tom▪  
I Received your Letter, and give you thanks for your News. In requital I shall send you some concerning our Friend: In doing which, I comply both with his desire and yours. He has been sick almost ever since he came hither, tho, excepting once, he has lived with exact Regularity. He says, he believes the Devil restrained his Surfeit from breaking out till he was reconciled to Sobriety, to render it odious, and set them afresh at variance. I remember when I was at Paris▪ there was a Young-Nun, whose Circumstances in some measure resembled our Friends. She had a Pox broke out upon her immediate after she had taken her Vow of Chastity. He bids me tell you, that he has been once Drunk since he came to this place, and once witty, and a damnable Sot ever since. Our Friend, I suppose, rallies. But one thing is certain; that Wine is as sure to exalt Wit, as Paint is to heighten Beauty, but then as the Devil will have it (harken to this and tremble Tom) they both decay the very things they embellish, even while they are giving them Lustre. But Tom, he bids me tell you, 〈◊〉 must not believe him vain because he say● he was witty. For he says it was amongst such prodigious 'Squires, that none but a 〈◊〉 would have been witty in such Company● Our Friend, methinks, has reason. For 〈◊〉 is as much more scandalous to be witt● with Fools, than it is to be dull among● Men of wit, as an Error in Judgement 〈◊〉 more ridiculous than a Defect in Fancy. H● says, he has a hundred times since he cam● to this place regretted the Rabble, nay, he has regretted the Grave Club; Nay, he has wished himself even in the Witty Club, which he believes is by this time erected. He gins to look upon Ball— as a great Man, upon jack G.— as a Prodigy, and upon W— as a Demigod. Indeed a days we do well enough here. For a days we converse with the living dead; that is, with those who being dead yet speak: but the Night, Tom, the Night, in which we are doomed to the dead living, that is, to those who being alive, say nothing, is insupportably irksome, Darkness in Greenland is not more grievous to the Wretch that is left there, than it is dismal to us in Bucks.  
jan. 10. 93. I am yours.  
To Mr. Gabriel B—  
Dear Gabriel,  
WHen thy last was written, thou hadst put on the Lion's Skin, and▪ mad'st a wonderful Comical Figure in it. But I did not think to incense thee, nor the rest of the Rabble, quite contrary I thought to divert you. You say, you take it ill, that I should upbraid you with Understanding no Language but English. Why, what a Pagan Apprehension hast thou Gabriel? The Devil a jot did I upbraid thee. Quite contrary, I commended thee for being willing to understand no Language but plain English. And that as I take it, has quite a different meaning. With what unreasonable Wights have I had to do? Who are offended at my endeavour to please them, and take my Commendations for Injuries. I am accused, you say, of ill Breeding for that Letter. Why, Prithee, Gabriel, every Man has not had the Breeding that thou hast. I wish you had sent me the Names of the Sparks who would reconcile Punctilio to satire. It has been a damned inveterate Quarrel, and requires wise Mediators. But now I talk of satire, that you say is the Disease of some People's Minds. Alas, poor Devil, thou dost not know that it is a Maxim in Physic, that some Diseases show the Health and Strength, and Vigour of the Party affected. If we believe Hippocrates, Hunger is a Disease; nay reason tells us the same thing. For like other Distempers, it shows a defect in Nature. But where it shows a defect it shows a force too, and when that Disease is pretty acute, the Patient is sure to do well, I will let the Application alone. For in writing to one of thy Communicative Spirit, a Man is sure to write to some body who can understand. But this I will say, that if satire be a Disease, the acuter it is, the better. But why do I talk of Diseases to thee? For indeed Gabriel (without satire) thou art no Physician.  
I am, etc.  
To Mr. Congreve at Tunbridge.  
Dear Sir.  
MY Business and my Thanks for your Kindness, you will find in the enclosed, which I had sent by the last Post, had not an Accident hindered it. All the Return that I can make you at present is, to acquaint you with such News as we have. Our Friend, Mr.— went last Friday to the Bath. He promised to write to me from that place, but it would be unreasonable indeed to expect it. For W— takes up his Afternoons, and his Mornings, I suppose, are spent in Contemplation at the Cross Bath. Most of your Friends of the Coffeehouse are dispered; Some are retreated into the Country in hopes of some Favours, which they expect from the Muses: Two or Three of them are retired in Town to ruminate on some Favours, which they have received from their Mistresses.  
So that the Coffeehouse is like to grow into Reputation again. For if any one gives it the scandalous Denomination of the Wit's Coffeehouse, he must call it so by Antiphrasis, because there comes no Wit there. Here are two or three indeed, who set up for Wits at home, and endeavour to pass for wise at the Coffeehouse. For they hold their Tongues there. Indeed the Coffeehouse is generally the Exchange for Wit, where the Merchants meet without bringing the Commodity with them, which they leave at home in their Warehouses, alias their Closets, while they go abroad to take a prudent care for the vending it. But you are of the number of those happy few, who so abound in Hereditary Possessions and in rich returns from Greece and from Italy▪ that you always carry some of it about you to be liberal to your Friends of that which you sell to Strangers. Mr.— babbles eternally according to his old rate, and as extravagantly as if he talked to himself, which he certainly does, if no body minds him any more than I do. He has been just now enquiring of me, what sort of Distemper the Spleen is; an infallible sign that he is the only Man in Covent-Garden, who does not know he is an Ass. To make him sensible what the Spleen is, I could find in my heart to show him himself and give it him. If any thing restrains me from being revenged of his Impertinence this way, 'tis the Consideration that it will make him wiser. This Coxcomb naturally puts me in mind of the Stage, where they have lately acted some new Plays; but had there been more of them, I would not scruple to affirm, that the Stage is at present a Desert and a barren place, as some part of Africa is said to be, though it abounds in Monsters. And yet those prodigious Things have met with Success. For a Fool is naturally fond of a Monster, because he is incapable of knowing a Man. While you drink Steel for your Spleen at Tunbridge, I partake of the benefit of the Course. For the gaiety of your Letters relieves me considerably. Then what must your Conversation do? Come up and make the Experiment; and impart that Vigour to me which Tunbridge has restored to you.  
I am your most humble Servant, John Dennis.  
Mr.— to Mr. Dennis.  
NAmur taken, and a Letter from Mr▪ Dennis, were two of the most agreeable Surprises I ' ever met with. And nothing but the Reflection, how dear the Conquest will cost us, I mean, the innumerable ill poems it will produce, could allay the Pleasure. A— has watched for a Victory a long time, and will not miss this Opportunity to mortify the Day of Thanksgiving, and Scribble a way the public Joy. The Devil take Wills Coffe-house. I could be the easiest Man in the World under my Calamity, if it were not for some of the Company there; who are now the greatest Enemies I have in the World, worse than the Company from which I am just now Stolen to write this Letter. Among the rest is a Country Gentleman who dictates Politics abundantly, for with us as well, as at Old Rome we take Dictator's from the Blow, but ours are such as ought never to remove their Hands from it.  
I am yours, etc.  
Mr.— to Mr.— Dennis,  
WHile you are happy in the Politics of the Grave Club, 
* Two Covent-garden Clubs.  and the Puns of the Rabble, you have no regard to the forlorn State of your poor Friend. Before I left London, I feigned an hundred agreeable Melancholy Pleasures, with which I might Fool away a Retirement, but now I destest being alone, and question whither Mankind or Solitude be the fit Subject for a satire. Of this, I am sure, that God Allmighty rather than be alone Created the Devil, and Man rather than be alone chose a Wife. Whatever advantage I have lost by my Country Life, I believe, I have gained the gift of Prophecy in the Wilderness, for I foretold the Poem with which A— has visited us.  
I am yours, etc.  
Mr.— to Mr. Dennis.  
TO your Business hereafter, 
* Note, That whereas in some of the last Letters, there is found this Mark A's, the Letter A is not set for the first Letter of the Man's own Name, but of his Nom de Guerre, which is remarked to prevent a Mistake, because a very Ingenious Gentleman, whose Name gins with A has lately written a Poem upon the Taking of Namur.  but first let's have a Dance, as Mr. Bays says. When I came home from the West, where I had passed a Fortnight, I found your three Letters full of Wit and Humour. I was charmed with the Scandal you writ in the first, and enclosed in the last, viz. A's Poem. I found the Preamble before the Poem to be like a Suterkin before a Dutch Child. I read it over in great haste, in hopes to be pleased at last with the end of it, but this is the first time I ever disliked his Conclusion. For he threatens strange things. I hope, 'tis only in terrorem, if not, I hope God in his goodness will send us a Peace, and prevent his Songs of Triumph. Certainly, since the Devil was Dumb there never was such a Poet.   

A Dedication designed to the Volunteers. By Mrs. Shadwell.  
To the QUEEN. Written By Mr. Dennis.  
Madam,  
I Presume to lay at your Majesty's Feet this last Poem, which was written by my deceased Husband. The Obligations which he had to the King and Your Majesty are of that high Nature, that all I can do, is to take this Occasion of Humbly acknowledging the Mighty Debt. My Husband so truly Honoured You living, that if he has now any Sense of what is done here below, I cannot do a more grateful thing for him, than in giving him an opportunity of appearing before You after his Death, and entertaining you in a Form, which I hope will not seem frightful to you. I have often heard him say in his life time, that Wit, wherever it grows in your Majesty's Dominions, aught, no less than Silver or Gold to be a Royal Mine, unless as it happened lately in Wales, the Noble Ore has too great a mixture of base Meta●● That Wit, which is nothing but Gay Wisdom, is no less than Gold Subservient to Government, and when it is made current by the Royal Stamp, contributes no less to the Public Prosperity. That the end of the Drama was to reform mankind, which as Tragedy attained by purging the passions, Comedy arrived at by Correcting the Humours, which though they may no● lead Men into great Crimes immediately, yet when they are irregular, they most ce●●tainly prepare the way to them. Tha● Comedy never fails to make a good Subject▪ whenever it makes a good Man. That more particularly, the Humours which are ex●pos'd in this Comedy, were at this Conjuncture utterly inconsistent with the Duty of a good Subject. That the Vicious Follies of these times were very prejudicial to your Majesty's Service. That the Affecta●ions of F●ance, had done England more harm than all its Matchivillian Principles. That where these last had made ten bad Subjects, by rendering them Interested or Discontented, the former had made a Hundred by making them Fops and Beaus. English Gentlemen he used to say, in the times of our Brave Ancestors; were always the Flower of English Armies, in ●imes, when to die bravely in the Service of King and Country, was esteemed a desirable Fate, and more than Recompensed with Eternal Fame. But now said he, our Gentlemen either go not to the Wars, or if they go, they very often make us hearty wish that they had sta●d at home. What indeed can be expected from a degenerate Race, whose worthiest Ambition is either to be Wicked with a good Grace, or to be dextrously Foppish? Who emulating one another spend their live times in dressing, to see who shall run away with the Immortal Reputation of having the profoundest Capacity for a Valet de Chambre. He has often told me, that the design of this Comedy was to reclaim them, if they were not incorrigible, and that what was writ with such an immediate regard to your Majesty's Service, should be Dedicated to none but your Majesty. According to his intention, I here with all Humility Present it to you. You, Madam, who have so much of Heaven in you, will, like that, accept this offering from me, though it was yours before▪ and though it is made by a Disconsolate Widow. Yes, Madam, your Universal goodness, your Clemency and Compassion on all in Affliction give me Assurance that you wil● accept it. Qualities, for which you are so Renowned, that I have often heard these Noble Verses of Waller very justly applied to your Majesty.  
All her Affections are to one inclined,  
Her Bounty and Compassion to Mankind;  
To whom while she so far extends her Grace,  
She makes but good the promise of her Face.  
For M●rcy has (could Mercy's self be seen)  
No Sweeter look than this Propitious Queen.  
So the fair Tree, on which the Eagle builds,  
Poor Sheep from Tempests, and their Shepherd Shields.  
The Royal Bird possesses all the Boughs,  
But Shade and Shelter to the Flock allows.  
This, Madam, is the language of the Gods, applied to so Divine a Subject, that nothing but the Language of Gods, can express it with Dignity. And therefore your Majesty will have no Patience to hear me speak, after one who can speak so well.  
I am, Your Majesty's Most Humble and Devoted Subject and Servant, A. Shadwell.   


Select Letters OF VOITURE.  
The First, Translated By Mr. DRYDEN. And the rest By Mr. DENNIS.   

To my Lord Cardinal de la VALETTE.  
My Lord,  
I Am satisfied, that you Old Cardinals take more Authority upon you, than those of the last Promotion; because, having written many Letters to you, without receiving one from you, yet you complain of my Neglect. In the mean time, seeing so many well-bred Men, who assure me that you do me too much Honour to think of me at all; and that I am bound to write to you, and to give my Acknowledgements, I am resolved to take their Counsel, and to pass over all sorts of Difficulties and Considerations of my own Interest. This than will give you to understand, that six days after the Eclipse, and a Fortnight after my Decease, Madam the Princess, Mademoisell● de Bourbon, Madam du Vigean, Madam Aubry, Mademoiselle de Rambouill●●, M●demoiselle Paulet, Monsieur de Cha●●e●onne, and myself, left Paris about six in the Evening, and went to La Bar, where Madam du Vigean was to give a Collation to the Princess. In our way thither we found nothing worth our Observation; but only that at Ormesson, an English Mastiff came up to the Boot of the Coach, to make his Compliment to me. Be pleased to take this along with you, My Lord, that as often as I express myself in the Plural Number, as for Example, We went, we found, or We beheld, 'tis always to be Understood, that I speak in the Quality of a Cardinal. From thence we happily arrived at La Bar; and entered a Hall, where we trod upon nothing but Roses and Orange-Flowers. Madam the Princess, after she had sufficiently admired this Magnificence, had a mind to see the Walks before Supper: The Sun was then just setting in a Cloud of Gold and Azure, and gave us no larger a share of his Beams, than to supply a Soft and Pleasing Light. The Air was not disturbed either with Wind o● Heat; and it seemed that Heaven and Earth were conspiring with Madam d● Vigean, in her Treating the Fairest Princess upon Earth. After she had passed through a great Parterre, and Gardens full of Orange-Trees, she arrived at the Entrance of an Enchanted Wood, so thick and shady, that Authors conclude the Sun, since the Day of his Birth, never entered it, till now that he waited on her Highness thither. At the end of an Alley, which carried the sight out of distance, we found a Fountain, which alone cast up a greater Quantity of Water, than all those of Tivoli together. About it were placed four and twenty Violins, which had much ado to make themselves be heard, for the rumbling of the Streams in falling. When we were got near enough, we discovered in a certain Nich, within a Palisade, a Diana, of about Eleven or Twelve Years of Age, and fairer than the Forests of Greece and Thessaly had ever seen. She bore her Bow and Arrows in her Eyes, and was encompassed with all the Glories of her Brother. In another Nich, not far distant, was another Nymph, Fair and Gentile enough to pass for one of her Train: Those who are not given to believe Fables, took them for Mademoiselles de Bourbon and la Priande; and to confess the Truth, they resembled them exactly. All the Company was in a profound Silence▪ admiring so many different Objects, which at once astonished their Eyes and Ears, when on a Sudden the Goddess leapt down from her Nich; and with a Grace, impossible to be described, began a Ball, which lasted for some time about the Fountain. 'Twas somewhat strange, My Lord, that in the midst of so many pleasures, which were▪ sufficient to engage the whole attention of their Spirits, who enjoyed them, yet we could not forbear to think of you; and it was generally concluded, that something was wanting to our Happiness, since neither you, nor Madam de Rambovillet were present. Then I took up a Harp and Sung this Spanish Stanza; 
Pues quiso mi suerte dura,  
Que faltando mi sennor  
Tambie● faltasse mi Dama.  And continued the rest of the Song so very Melodiously▪ and with such an Air of Sadness, that there was not one of the Company, but the Tears came into their Eyes, and they wept abundantly. Their sorrow had endured much longer, had not the Violins struck up a Sarabrand, with great speed and presence of Mind▪ Upon which the Company got upon their Feet, with as much Gaiety▪ as if nothing in the World had happened, and fell into the Dance; thus Leaping, Capering, turning Round, and hoping, we returned to the House, where we found a Table already Spread, and served as if it had been served by Fairies. This, My Lord, is one passage 〈◊〉 the Adventure, which is so stupendous tha● no words are capable of expressing it▪ 〈◊〉 there are neither colours of Speech, nor Figures in the Art of Rhetoric, which 〈◊〉 describe six several sorts of Po●ages, which were at once presented to the Sight. And what was particularly remarkable, that there being none but Goddesses, and 〈◊〉 Demigods at the Table, (viz.) Mons●e●● Ohandebnonne and I, yet every one eat as hearty, and with as good Appetites, as if we had been neither more nor less, than plain Mortals. And to con●ess the Truth, a better Treat could not have been provided. Amongst other things, there were twelve Dishes, besides other Eatables in disguise, which were never seen before on any Humane Table: and whose very names have never been so much as mentioned in any History. This Circumstance, My Lord, by some disastrous accident, has been related to Madam La Ma●eschalle— And though immediately upon it, she ●ook twelve Drams of Opium, beyond her ordinary Dose; yet she has never been able to close her Eyes, from that fatal Moment. During the first Course, there was not so much as one single Cup went round to your Health; the Company was so intent upon the present Affair; and at the Deser●, we quite forgot it. I beg your permission▪ My Lord, to relate all things as they passed, like a Faithful Historian as I am, and without Flattery: For I would no● for the World, that Posterity should mistake one thing for another; and that at the end of two thousand years hence, or thereabouts, Posterity should imagine your Health was drunk, when really there was no such thing in Nature. Yet I must give this testimony to Truth, that it was not for want of Memory. For, during all Supper time, you were often mentioned. All the Ladies wished you there, and some of them very hearty, or I am much mistaken▪ As we risen from Table, the Sound of the Violins summoned us up Stairs, where we found a Chamber so gloriously lighted up, that it looked as if the Day, which was now below the Earth, had retired hither, and was assembled in one body of Light. Here the Ball began again, in better order and with more grace, than it had been danced about the Fountain. And the most Magnificent Part of it, my Lord, was, that I footed it there in Person. Mademoiselle de Bourbon, I must confess, was of opinion, that I Danced aukwardly; but she concluded, to my advantage, that I must be allowed to Fenc● well; because, that at the end of every Cadence, I put myself upon my Guard. The Ball continued with much Pleasure till all of a sudden a great Noise which was heard without Doors, caused the Company to look out at the Windows. Where from a great Wood, which was about three hundred Paces from the House, we beheld so vas● a Number of Fire-Works issuing out, that we verily believed all the Branches and Trunks of the Trees had been Metamorphosed into Guns. That all the Stars were falling from the Firmament, and that the Element of Fire, was descending into the Middle Region of the Air. Here, My Lord, are three Hyperboles tacked together, which being valued at a moderate Price, are worth three dozen of Fusees at the least. After we were recovered out of this great fit of Ecstasy, into which so many Miracles had plunged us, we resolved on our Departure; and took the way to Paris by the Light of twenty Flambeaux. We passed through all the Ormessonnois, and the wide Plains of Espinay, without resistance, and went through the middle of St. Dennis. Being placed in the Coach by the side of Madam— I said a whole Miserere to her, on your behalf; to which she replied, with much Gallantry, and no less Civility. We sung in our Journey a World of Songs, Roundeaux, Roundelays, Lampoons, and Ballads; and were now half a League beyond St. Dennis, it being two a Clock in the Morning precisely; the Fatigue of the Journey, Watching, Walking, and the painful Exercise of the Ball, having made me somewhat heavy, when there happened an Accident, which I verily believed would have been my total Ruin▪ There is a certain little Village, situate, say the Geographers, betwixt Paris and St. Dennis, and Vulgarly called, La Valette: At our going out of this Place, we overtook three Coaches, in which were those Numerical Violins which had been Playing to us▪ Hereupon, Satan entering into the Spirit of Mademoiselle, she commanded them to follow us, and to give Serenades all Night long to the Poor innocent People of Paris who were asleep and dreamt not of her Malice. This Diabolical Proposition, made my Hair rise an end upon my Head: Yet all the Company passed a Vote in Favour of it; and the word was just ready to be given, but by a Signal Providence, they had left their Violins behind them at lafoy Bar; for which the Lord reward them. From hence, my Lord, you may reasonably conclude, that Mademo●●selle is a dangerous Person in the Night, if ever there was any in the World: and that I had great reason at Madam— 〈◊〉 House to say, that the Violins ought to be turned out of doors, when that Pestilent Lady was in Company. Well, we continued our way happily enough, but only that as we entered the Fauxbourgh, we met six Lusty Fellows, as Naked as ever they were Born, who passed directly by the Coach, to the terror of the Ladies. In fine, we arrived at Paris; and what I am now going to relate, is indeed Prodigious. Could you imagine it, My Lord? the Obscurity was so great, that it covered all that Vast City. And instead of what we left it, no● full seven hours before, filled with Noise, and with a Crowd of Men, Women, Horses, and Coaches; we now found nothing but a deep Silence, a dismal Desert, a frightful Solitude, dispeoled Streets, not meeting with any Mortal Man; but only certain Animals, who fled from the Lustre of our Torches. But the remaining part of the Adventure, you shall have, My Lord, another time. As Boyando tells you, 
Qui' é il fin del Canto; e torno ad Orlando,  
Ad●o Signor, a voi me raccomando.   
To Mademoiselle▪ Paulet.  
Madam,  
SO great a Misfortune as mine, wanted no less Consplation than that which I lately received from you, and I looked on your Letter, as a Pardon which Heaven granted me after my Sentence. I can call by no other name, the News which obliged me to return to this Place, and I can assure you that ●entence of Death is oftentimes less rigorous. But since in the midst of all my Misfortunes, I have the honour to be remembered by you, to complain would be illbecoming of me: For methinks he may dispense with the Favours of Fortune, who is happy enough to obtain yours. This is the Reason that I shall make use of to comfort myself, for the Necessity of remaining here, and not that which you urged in yours, That it is better to be an Exile in a Foreign Land, than to be a Prisoner in one's own Country: For alas! you know 〈◊〉 one half of my Misery, if you are 〈◊〉 convinced that I am both together; and 〈◊〉 you judge of the Matter rightly, you 〈◊〉 find that a thing, which seems very inconsistent, is to be be found in me, which 〈◊〉 be banished from the same Person by wh●● I am kept a Prisoner. You will find 〈◊〉 difficult to interpret this Riddle, 〈◊〉 you call to mind, that I have always 〈◊〉 used to mingle a Dram of Love in my 〈◊〉. For, if as you say I am allowed 〈◊〉 Liberty here, of which I should be depri●●● in France, I beseech you let it be that 〈◊〉 assuring you, that there is a great deal of Passion mixed with the Affection which I express for your Service. I should indeed be ungrateful, if I should discover but an Ordinary Friendship for a Person who doe● such Extraordinary Things for me, and 〈◊〉 am obliged to fall in love at least with you● Generosity. I have been acquainted what care a Gentleman and a Lady has taken to inquire of my Welfare, which is an additional Obligation to one whom they ha● extremely obliged before. For all the rest▪ they have seemed buried in so profound a Silence, that for six Months together I have heard not the least mention of them. Whether this comes from their Forgetfulness 〈◊〉 from their Prudence, I am unable to determine. Yet Forgetfulness may be allowed an Excuse for Silence, but a dumb remembrance is without Defence. I leave you to conclude, Madam, how much Lustre this reflects upon what you have done for me, ●nd how much I am obliged to you for a 〈◊〉 Letter at a time, when others have 〈◊〉 afraid to send me their Service. Therefore let me assure you, that though I am unable to make suitable returns to such Good●ess, I esteem it at least, and extol it as it deserves, and that I am as much as a Man ●an possibly be,  
Madam, Yours, etc.  
To Monsieur de Chaudebonne.  
I Writ to you ten or twelve days age, and returned you thanks for the 〈◊〉 Letters, which I have at length received from you. If you were but sensible of the Satisfaction they brought with them, you would be sorry for not having writ to me oftener, and for not frequently repeating the Consolation, of which I had so much need. Madrid which is the agreeablest Place in the World, for those who at once are Lustily and Libertines, is the most Disconsolate, for those who are Regular, or those who are Indisposed. And in Lent, which is the Player's Vacation, I do not know so much as one Pleasure that a Man can enjoy with Conscience. My Melancholy here and my want of Company have produced a good Effect in me; For they have reconciled me to Books, which I had for a time forsaken; and being able to meet with no o●her Pleasures, I have been forced 〈…〉 has studied, or has been sick: For if one of the Chief Things that Philosophy aims at, is a Contempt of Life; the Stone Colic is certainly the best of Masters, and Plato and Socrates persuade us less efficaciously. It has lately re●d me a Lecture, that lasted seventeen Days, and which I shall not quickly forget: and which has often made me consider how very feeble we are, since three Grains of Sand, are sufficient to cast us down. But if it determines me to any Sect, it shall not at least be that which maintains that Pain is not an Evil; and that he who is Wi●e is at all times happy. But whatever befalls me, I can neither be Happy nor Wise, without being near to you, and nothing can make me one or the other, so much as your Presence, or your Example. Yet am I very uncertain when I shall be able to leave this place, and expecting both Money and Men, which are coming by Sea, and which are two things that do not always keep touch with us, I apprehend my remaining here longer than I could wish: Therefore I make it my humble Request to you, that you would not forget me so long as you have done, and that you would testify by doing me the Honour of Writing to me, that you are convinced of the real Affection with which  I am Yours, etc. 
To Monsieur de Gordeau.  
Sir,  
YOU ought to give me time to recover our Tongue, before you oblige me to write to you. For it appears to me to be something absurd, that I, who have been now so long a Foreigner, and but just come from breathing the Air of Barbary, should presume to expose my Letters, to one of the most Eloquent Men in France. This consideration has kept me silent till now. But though I forbear to answer your Challenges, I cannot refuse to return your Civilities. By these you have found a way to vanquish me, in spite of all my Evasions: In my present condition it is more reputable to you, to Conquer me this way, than to overcome me by Force. You would have acquired but small Glory by Vig●rusly Attacking a Man, who is already dr●ven to Extremity, and to whom Fortune has given so many Blows, that the least may satisfy to over-whelm him. Amidst the Darkness in which ●he hath placed us, we can have no defence; but here all our Art and o●r Skill in parring are useless. The case perhaps might be otherwise; if you h●d set before my Eyes the Sun of which you make mention; and as Dejected as you see me now, I should grow daring enough to enter the Lists against you, if the Light of that were divided between us Equally▪ 'Tis more to have that alone on your side, than all the rest of Heaven. The Beauties which Sparkle in all that you do, are only derived from hers, and it is the Influence of her Rays on you, which produces so many Flowers. Nothing can ever appear more Lively, than those which you scatter o● every thing that comes from you. I have seen them up●n the Ocean's extremest Shores, and in places where Nature cannot produce, no, not one Blade of Grass. I have received Nosegays of them, which made me meet in Deserts, with the choicest Delicacies of Gre●●e and of Fruitful Italy. And though they had been carried 〈◊〉 Hundred Leagues, neither the length of way, nor of time had in the least diminished their Lustre. They are indeed Immortal and cannot Decay, and so vastly different from all Terrestrial Productions, that that it is with a great deal of Justice, that you have offered them up to Heaven▪ for Altars alone are worthy of them. Believe me, Sir, in what I am saying, I speak but my real Sentiments; when my Curiosity, as you say, had obliged me to pass the Bounds of the Ancient World, to find out Rare and Surprising Objects, your Works were the wonderfullest things that I saw, and Africa could show me nothing more New, and no more Extraordinary sight. Reading them under the Shade of its Palms, I wished you Crowned with them all, and at the very time that I saw, that I had gone beyond Hercules, I found I came short of you. All this, which was capable of producing Envy in any Man's Soul but mine, filled mine with so much Esteem and Affection, that you then took the place there, which you are now desiring, and perfectly finished what you think you are still to begin. After the knowledge which I have had of you, how can I form such an Image of you, as you are willing to give me? How can I Fancy you to be that little Creature you say you are? How could I Comprehend that Heaven could place, such mighty things in so small a space? When I give my Imagination a lose, it gives you four yards at least, and Represents you of the Stature of Men engendered by Angels. Yet I shall be very glad to find that it is as you would have me believe. Amongst the rest of the Advantages, which I expect to derive from you, I am in hopes that you will bring our Stature into some Credit, and that it is ours which henceforward will be accounted the Noblest; and that by you, we shall be Exalted above those who believe themselves higher that we. As we pour the most exquisite Essences into the smallest Bottles, Nature infuseth the Divinest Souls into the smallest Bodies, and mixes more or less of matter with them, as they have more or less in them of their Almighty Original. She seems to place the most Shining Souls, as jewellers set the most Sparkling Stones, who make use of as little Gold as they can with them, and no more than just suffices to bind them. By you the World will be undeceived of that sottish error of valuing Men by their weight, and my littleness with which I have been so often upbraided by Madamoiselle de Rambovillet, for the future may recommend me to her. For what remains the Affection is very just, which you tell me, she has for you, and with her, six more of the Loveliest Creatures that illustrate the Light. But I wonder that you should think to get mine by such a discovery; and to gain it by the very means, which were sufficient to make you lose it. You had need to have a high opinion of my goodness, to believe that I can Love a Man who enjoys my Right, and who has obtained the Confiscation of my most valued Possessions. But yet I am so just, that even this shall be no Impediment, and I believe you to have so much Justice on your side, that I do not Despair but that we may accommodate even this matter between us. They may very well have given you my place without your putting me out of it, and my room in their hearts was but very small, if it cannot contain us both. As for my part, I shall do my utmost, that I may not incommode you there; and shall take care to to take up my Station so that we may not clash; since so powerful an Interest cannot make me cease to be yours, you may believe, that in spite of the worst of Accidents, I shall be Eternally  
Yours, etc.  
BILLET From Madam d● Saintot, to Monsieur De Voiture.  
I Have promised to bestow you, for a Gallant, upon two Fine Women, my Friends. I am confident that you will not find the Exploit too many for you, and do not doubt but that you will confirm my Promise as soon as you have but see● them.  
The Answer of Monsieur De Voiture.  
LET me see what I Love as soon as you can▪ For I die with Impatience t●ll that happy Moment. And since at your Command I have fallen in Love, it 〈◊〉 hoves you to take some care that I am belov'd too. I have thought all Night upon the two Ladies that— In short upo● you know whom. I writ this 〈◊〉 to one of them; Deliver it, I beseech you, to her, whom you believe that I love the mo●e Passionately of the two. In acknowledgement of the Good Offices which I receive from you, I assure you, that you shall always dispose of my Affections; and that I will never love any one so much as yourself, till I am convinced that you have in good earnest a Mind that I should.  
To his Unknown Mistress.  
WAS there ever so Extraordinary a Passion, as that which I have for you? For my part, I do not know any thing of you; and to my Knowledge I never so much as heard of you. And yet, I Gad, I am desperately in Love with you▪ and it is now a whole Day, since I have Sighed and looked Silly, and Languished, and Died, and all that for you. Without having ever seen your Face, I am taken with its Beauty; and am charmed with your Wit, though I never have heard one Syllable of it. I am ravished with your every Action, and I fancy in you a kind of I know not what, that makes me passionately in Love with I know not whom. Sometimes I fancy you Fair, and at other times Black. Now you appear Tall to me, by and by Short; Now with a Nose of the Roman Shape, and anon with a Nose turned up. But in whatever form I describe you, you appear the Loveliest of Creatures to me; and though I am ignorant what sort of Beauty yours is, I am ready to pawn my Soul, that it is the most Bewitching of all of them. If it be your Luck to know me as little, and to Love me as much, than thanks be to Love, and the Stars. But lest you should a little impose upon yourself, in fancying me a Tall Fair Fellow, and so be surprised at the Sight of me, I care not for once, if I venture to send you my Picture. My Stature is three Inches below the Middle one; My Head appears tolerable enough, and is decently set off with a large Grey Head of Hair: Then with Eyes that languish a little, yet are something Haggard, I have a sort of a Cudden cast of a Face. But in requital one of your Friends will tell you, that I am the honestest Fellow in the World, and that for Loving Faithfully in five or six Places at a time, there is no Man alive comes near me. If you think that all this will accommodate you, it shall be at your Service as soon as I see you. Till that long longed for time I shall think of you; that is, of I know not whom. But if any one should chance to ask me for whom I sigh, don't be afraid, I warrant I keep the Secret; I would fain see any one catch me at naming you to him.  
To Mademoiselle Paulet.  
Madam,  
THere was only one thing wanting to your Adventures, and that was to be a Prisoner of State; I have given you here the happy Occasion of being such. Fortune, who has omitted no Opportunity of bringing you into Play, will in all probability, make her advantage of this. I know very well that I bring you into da●ger by writing to you; Yet cannot eve● that Reflection-restrain me. From whe●●● you may conclude, that there is no Ri●k which I would refuse to run, to refresh your remembrance of me, since I can resolve to endanger even you, you who are Dear and Valuable above all the rest of the World to me. I tell you this, Madam, at a time; when I would not lie, no not in a Compliment: For I would have you to know, that I am much the be●ter for the Distemper which I have lately had. It has caused me to assume such good Resolutions, that if I had them not, I could be contented to purchase them with all my Health▪ I plainly foresee, that this will but divert you, you who are Conscious to so much of my Weakness; and who will never believe that I can keep single Resolutions, I who have broken so many Vows; yet nothing is more certain than that I have hitherto beheld the Spanish Beauties with as much Indifference, as I did the Flemish at Brussels; and I hope to grow a Convert in the very Place of the World in which the Tempter is strongest, and where the Devil resumes as glorious Shapes as what he put off when he fell. The Reformation is so great in me, that I have but one Scruple remaining, which is, that I think too often of you; and that I desire to see you again with a little too much Impatience. I who have moderated the rest of my Passions, have been unable to reduce that which I have for you, to the Measure with which we are permitted to love our Neighbours; that is to say, as much as we do ourselves; and I fear you have a larger share in my Soul, than I ought to allow a Creature. Look out I beseech you for a Remedy for this, or rather for an Excuse for it: For as for a Remedy, I believe there is none, and that I must be always with utmost Passion,  
Madam, Yours.  
TO THE Marchioness of Rambovillet.  
In Answer to a Letter of Thanks of hers.  
Madam,  
Tho' my Liberality should, as you tell me, surpass the Bounty of Alexander, it would nevertheless be richly recompensed, by the Thanks which you have returned me for it. He himself, as boundless as his Ambition was, would have confined it to so rare a Favour. He would have set more value upon this Honour, than he did on the Persian Diadem; and he would nev●r have envied Achilles the Praise which ●e received from Homer, if he could but himself have obtained Yours. Thus, Madam, on this Pinnacle of G●or● on which I stand, if I bear any Envy to his, 'tis not so much ●o that which he acquired himself, as to that which you have bestowed upon him, and he has received no Honours, which I do no● hold Inferior to mine, unless it be that which you did him, when you declared him your Gallant. Neither his Vanity, nor the rest of his Flatterers, could ever persuade him to believe any thing that was so advantageous, to him, and the Quality of Son of jupiter Hammon, was by much less glorious to him than this. But if any thing comforts me for the Jealousy which it has raised in me, 'tis this, Madam, that knowing you as well as I know you, I am very well assured, that if you have done him this Honour, 'tis not so much upon the account of his having been the greatest of Mankind, as of his having been now these two thousand years no more. However, we here find cause to admire the Greatness of his Fortune, which not being able yet to forsake him so many years after his Death, has added to his Conquests a Person that gives them more●ustre than the Daughters and Wife of Darius; and which has gained him a Mind more great than the World he Conquered. I ought here to be afraid, after your Example of Writing, in too lofty a Style. But how can the Writer be too sublime who writes of you, and of A●exander? I humbly beseech you, Madam, to believe that I have equal Passion for you, with that which you show for him; and that the Admiration of your Virtues will oblige me to be always,  
Madam, Yours, etc.  
An Imitation of Monsieur De Voiture's Letter to Mademoiselle De Rambovillet.  
Being an Answer to that by which she had informed him, who was then with Monsieur in Exile, that the Academy designed to abolish the Particle Car. [For.]  
That the Reader may be diverted with this Letter, he is desired to suppose, that there is a Club of Wits erected in London, for the Regulation of the Tongue, who have a Design to abolish [For.]  
Madam,  
FOR, being of so great Importance in our Tongue as it is, I extremely approve of the Resentment you show for the Wrong they design to do it; and I must needs declare, that I expect no good from this Club of Wits, which you mention, since they are resolved to establish themselves by so great an● Oppression. Even at at a time like this, when Fortune is acting her Tragedies throughout all Europe. I can behold nothing so deserving of Pity, as when I see they are ready to Arraign and to Banish a Word, which has so faithfully served this Monarchy, and which amidst all our English Confusions, has always been of the side of those who were truly English. For my part, I cannot for my heart comprehend, what reason they can allege against a Word, whose only business is to go before Reason▪ and which has no other Employment than to usher it in. I cannot imagine what Interest can oblige them, to take away that which belongs to For, to give it to Because that, nor why they have a Mind, to say with three Syllables, that which they say with three Letters. That which I am afraid of, Madam, i● this, that after they have been guilty of this one Injustice, they will not scruple at more; perhaps they may have the Impudence to attack But, and who knows if If may be any longer secure. So that, after they have deprived us of all those words, whose business it is to bring others together, the Wi●● will reduce us to the Language of Angels▪ or, if they cannot do that, they will at least oblige us, to speak only by Signs: And here I must confess, that your Observation is true, viz. That no Example can more clearly show us the Instability of Humane Affairs. He who had told me some Years ago, that I should have outlived For, I had thought had promised me a longer Life than the Patriarches. And yet we see that after he has maintained himself for some hundreds of years, in full Force and Authority, after he has been employed in the most Important Treaties, and has assisted in the Councils of our Kings with Honour, he is all of a Sudden fallen into Disgrace, and threatened with a Violent end. I now expect nothing less, than to be terrified with lamentable Cries in the Air, declaring to the World, that the great For is Dead: For the Death of the Great Cam, or of the Great Pan, was, in my mind, less Important. I know if we consult one of the finest Wits of the Age, and one whom I esteem with Passion, he will tell us, that 'tis our Duty to condemn an Innovation like this, that we ought to use the For of our Fathers, as well as their Sun and their Soil, and that we should by no means banish a Word, which was in the Mouths of our Edward's and of our Henrys. But you, Madam, are the Person, who ar● principally obliged to undertake his Protection. For since the Supreme Grace, and the Sovereign Beauty of the English Tongue lies in yours, you ought to command here with an Absolute Sway, and with a Smile or a Frown, give Life o● give Death to Syllables, as uncontrolled as you do to Men. For this, I believe you have already secured it, from the imminent Danger which threatened it, and by vouchsafing it a Place in your Letter, have fixed it i● a Sanctuary and a Mansion of Glory, to which neither Envy nor Time can reach. But here, Madam, I beg leave to assure you, that I could not but be surprised to see how Fantastic your Favours are, I could not but think it strange, that you, who without Compassion could see a Thousand Lovers expire, should not have the Heart to see a Syllable die. If you had but had half the Care of me, which you have shown of For, I should then have been happy in spite of ill Fortune: Then Poverty, Exile, and Grief, would scarce have had force to come near me. If you had not delivered me from these Evils themselves, you had freed me at least from the Sense of them. But at a Time that I expected to receive consolation from yours, I found that your kindness was only designed to For, and that his Banishment troubled you more than ours. I must confess, Madam, it is but just, you should undertake his Defence; but you ought to have taken some care of me too, that People might not Object to you, that you forsake your Friends for a Word. You make no Answer at all to that which I writ about; You take not the least Notice of that which so much concerns me: In three or four Pages you scarce remember me once, and the Reason of this is For. Be pleased to consider me a little more for the Future, and when you undertake the Defence of the Afflicted, remember t●at I am of the Number. I shall always make use of him himself to oblige you to grant me this Favour, and to convince you that it is but my Due. For,  
I am, etc.  
To the Duke of Enguien, upon his Taking of DUNKIRK.  
I Am so far from wondering that you have taken Dunkirk, that I believe you could take the Moon by the Teeth, if you did but once attempt it. Nothing can be impossible to you; I am only uneasy about what I shall say to your Highness on this occasion, and am thinking by what extraordinary terms I may bring you to reach my Conceptions of you. Indeed, my Lord, in that Height of Glory, to which you have now attained, the Honour of your Favour is a singular Happiness, but it is a troublesome thing to us Writers, who are obliged to Congratulate you upon every good Success, to be perpetually upon the Hunt for words whose Force may answer your Actions▪ and to be every day inventing of new Panegyrics. If you would but have the Goodness to suffer yourself to be beat sometime, or to rise from before some Town, the variety of the matter might help to support us, and we should find out some fine thing or other to say to you, upon the inconstancy of Fortune, and the Glory that is gotten by bearing her Malice ●bravely. But having, from the very first of your Actions, Ranked you Equal with Alexander, and finding you rising upon us continually; upon my word, my Lord, we are at a loss what to do, either with you or ourselves. Nothing that we can say, can come up to that which you do, and the very Flights of our Fancy flag Below you. Eloquence, which Magnifies smallest things, cannot reach the height of those which you do, no, not by its boldest Figures. And that which is called Hyperbole on other occasions, is but a cold way of speaking when it comes to be applied to you. Indeed it is different to Comprehend, how your Highness each Summer has still found out means to Augment that Glory, which every Winter seemed at its full Perfection; and that having begun so greatly, and gone on more greatly, still your last Actions should Crown the rest, and be found the most Amazing. For my own part, my Lord, I congratulate your Success, as I am in Duty obliged, but I plainly foresee, the very thing that Augments your Reputation with us, may prejudice that which you expect from after Ages; and that so many Great and Important Actions, done in so short a space, may render your life Incredible to future times, and make your History be thought a Romance by Posterity. Be pleased then, my Lord, to set some Bounds to your Victories, if it be only to accommodate yourself to the Capacity of Human Reason, and not to go further than Common Belief can follow you. Be contented to be quiet and secure, at least for a time, and suffer France which is Eternally alarmed for your safety, to enjoy Serenely, for a few Months, the Glory which you have acquired for her. In the mean time, I Beseech you to believe, that among so many Millions of Men who Admire you, and who continually pray for you, there is not one who does it, with so much Joy, with so much Zeal and Veneration, as I, who am,  
My Lord, Your Highnesses, etc.  
To the Duke of Enguien (Afterwards the Great Prince of CONDE) Upon his gaining the Battle of ROCROY.  
My Lord,  
AT a time that I am so far removed from your Highness, that you cannot possibly lay your Commands upon me, I am fully resolved to speak freely my Mind to you, which I have so long been obliged to disguise, lest it should bring me into the same Inconvenience, with those, who before me, have taken the like Liberties with you. But let me tell you, My Lord, you have done too much, to let it pass without taking notice of it; and you are unreasonable if you think to behave yourself as you do, without being loudly told of it. If you did but know how strangely all Paris talks of you, I am very confident that you would be ashamed of it; and you could not without confusion hear, with how little Respect, and how little Fear of Displeasing you, all the World presumes to discourse of what you have done. I must confess, my Lord, I wonder what you could mean: You have shown yourself bold with a Vengeance, and Violent to the last Degree▪ in putting such an Affront upon two or three old Captains, whom you ought to have Respected, if it had been only for their Antiquity. In killing the poor Count de la Fountain, who was the ve●y best Man in the Lo●-C●untrys; In taking sixteen pieces of Cannon, the proper Goods of the King's Uncle▪ and the Queen's own Brother; and in confounding the Spanish Troops, after they had shown so much goodness in letting you pass. I heard indeed, you are Obstinate as a Devil, and that it was not to much purpose to Dispute about any thing with you. But yet I never thought, that your heat woudd have transported you so far. If you go on at the R●te you have begun, you will shortly grow Intolerable I assure you, to all Europe, and neither the Emperor nor the King of Spain, will either of them be able to endure you. But now, my Lord, laying the Man of Conscience aside, and Resuming the Man of State, I Felicitate your Highness for the Victory I hear you have gained, the most Complete, and the most Important, which has happened in our Age. France, which you have sheltered from all the Storms that it Dreaded, is amazed to see that you have begun your Life with an Action, with which Caesar would gladly have Crowned his own, and which alone, reflects more Luster upon the Kings your Progenitors, than all theirs have transferred to you. Well, my Lord, you have Verified what has been formerly said, that Virtue comes to the Caesars preventing Time. For you who are a true Caesar both in Wit and in Knowledge; Caesar in Diligence and in Vigilance; in Courage Caesar, and per omnes Casus Caesar; you have outrun the hopes, and surpassed the Expectation of Men; you have clearly shown that Experience is necessary to none but Ordinary Souls, that the Virtue of Heroes comes by a more Compendious way, and that the Works of Heaven are finished when but begun. After this I leave you to Judge, how you are like to be Received and Carress'd by the Lords of the Court, and with what pleasure the Ladies heard, that he whom they had seen Triumphant in Balls, had been Victorious in Armies; and that the finest Head of all France, was likewise the Best and the Strongest. There is not a Man, even to Monsieur Beaumond, who does not Declaim in your Praise. They who had revolted against you, are now reduced, and they who complained that you were always laughing, have been forced to confess, that you have shown yourself now in good earnest; and every one's afraid of being of the Number of your Enemies▪ since you have defeated such Multitudes of them. Pardon O Caesar the Liberty which I have taken; Receive the Praise that is due to you, and permit us to Render to Caesar, that which is due to Caesar.  
To Monsieur de BALZAC.  
Sir,  
IF it be true that I have always kept the Rank, which you tell me I have held in your Memory. Methinks you have shown but an indifferent concern for my Satisfaction, in delaying so long to impart the pleasing News to me, and in suffering me so long to be the Happiest of Men, without Dreaming I was so. But perhaps you were of opinion that this very good Fortune, was so infinitely above any thing that I could in reason hope for, that it was necessary you should take time to invent Arguments, which might render it credible, and that you had an occasion to employ all the power of Rhetoric to persuade me, that you had not forgot me. And thus far at least I must needs confess, that you have been very just, that resolving to let me have nothing but words for all the Affection you own me, the Choice which you have made of them, has been so Rich, and so Beautiful, that let me die if I believe the thing they assure me of would be of greater value. This at least I ●m sure of, that they would suffice to Counterbalance any Friendship but mine. I am only Discontented at one thing, and that is, that so much Artifice and so much Eloquence, should not be able to Disguise the Truth from me, and that in this, I should resemble your own Shepherdess', who are too silly to be Beguiled by a Man of Wit. But indeed, you must excuse me if I am something inclined to suspect an Art, which could invent commendations for a Quartan-Ague, and an Art which you have at more Command than ever Man had before you. All those Graces, and that Air of the Court, which I so much admire in yours, Convince me rather of the Excellence of your Wit, then of the goodness of your Will. And from all the fine things which you have said in my Favours, all that I can conclude, even when I am inclined to flatter myself, is, that Fortune has been pleased to give me a place in your Dreams. Nay, I know not if the very Extravagancies of a Soul so Exalted as yours, are not too Serious, and too Reasonable, to Descend so low as to me. And I shall esteem myself too obligingly used by you, if you have but so much as Dreamt that you Love me. For to imagine, that you have reserved a place for me amidst those Sublime thoughts, which are at present employed, in recompensing the Virtues of all the World, and distributing Shares of Glory to Mankind, to imagine this would be extreme presumption in me. I have too great an opinion of your Understanding, to believe that you could be Guilty of any thing that is so much below you, and I should be unwilling, that your Enemies should have that to object to you. I am perfectly satisfied, that the only Affection which you can have justly for any one, is that which you own to yourself; and that Precept of Studying one's self, which is a Lesson of Humility to all besides you, aught to have a contrary Effect in Relation to you, and oblige you to Contemn, whatever you find without you. And therefore here let me swear to you, that without pretending to any share in your Affection, I should have been very well satisfied▪ if you had preserved with never so little care, the Friendship which I have vowed Eternally to have for you, and to have placed it if not amongst the things which you value, at least amongst those which you are not forward to lose. But in leaving me here with that lovely Rival, of whom you made mention of in yours, you have shown, let me tell you, too little Jealousy, and you have suffered her to gain so much Advantage of you, that I have Reason to suspect that you have Conspired with her, to do me a mischief. And therefore I have more Reason than you to Complain, that she has enriched yourself by your Losses, and that you have suffered her to get into her power, that which I thought to have secured from her Tyranny, by entrusting it in your hands. If you had been willing to have made never so little defence, the better part of myself, had yet been our own, but you by your negligence have suffered her to surprise it, and to Advance her Conquests at such a rate over me, that though I should surrender to you, all that remains of me, you would not have so much as one half of that which you have lost. Nevertheless, let me assure you, that you have gained in my Esteem, as much as you have lost in my Affection, and that at the very time that I was beginning to Love you less, I was forced to Honour you more. I have seen nothing of yours since your Departure, which does not go beyond all that you had done before. And by your last works, you have the Honour of Excelling him who surpassed all others, It cannot therefore but appear strange, that when you have so much Reason to be contented, you should yet be complaining, and that you yourself, should be the only great Man who remains dissatisfied with you. At present all France is listening to you, and yvo are indifferent to no Man who has but Learned to Read. All who are concerned for the Honour of their Country, are not more inquisitive, after what the Marshal de Crequi is doing, than they are after what is doing by you. And you are the Person who can make more Noise in your Solitude, than the most Happy and most Renowned of our Generals, at the Head of Forty Thousand Men. Can you wonder then, that with so much Glory, you should be Obnoxious to Envy, and that the very same Judges with whom Scipi was Criminal, and who Condemned Aristides and Socrates, should not unanimously do Justice to your Desert. The People can plead Prescription for Hating the very Qualities which they Admire in any one. Every thing which Transcends 'em, they think Affronts 'em; and they can better bear with a Common Vice, than an Extraordinary Virtue. So that if that Law was in Force amongst us, of Banishing the most powerful for Authority or Reputation, I make no doubt, but that you would stand the Mark of the Public Envy, and I believe e●nv Cardinal Richlieu would not run greater hazard. But, for God sake, have a care of calling that your Misfortune, which is but that of the Age. And complain no more of the Injustice of Men, since all who have worth, are of your side, and that amongst them, you have found a Friend, whom yet perhaps, you may lose once more▪ At least, I shall do my utmost to put you into a condition of doing so. For every Man's Darling Vanity, at present, is to be accounted yours. For my own part, I have always in so Public a manner professed myself so, that if through ill Fortune I should not be able to Love you so much as I have done, yet here let me Swear to you, that you shall be the only Man to whom I will dare to declare it, and that I will always own myself to the rest of the World, to be as much as ever,  
Yours, etc.  
To the Marquis of Pisani;  
Who had lost all his Money and his Baggage, at the Siege of Thionville.  
The Character of the Marquis of Pisani, was a Man of Honour, Generosity, and Courage; but ●n Extravagant, Ignorant, Obstinate, Disputing Gamester.  
Sir,  
THE Man would be to blame, or I have been very much misinformed, who should upbraid you with having had the Mules to keep, at your Camp of Thionville. The Devil a Mule have you kept there Sir. They tell me, that upon the weighty Consideration, that several Armies have been formerly lost by their Baggage; you have made all possible haste to be disencumbered of yours. And that having often read in the Roman Histories, (this it is to be such a Man of Reading, look you) that the greatest Exploits that were done by their Cavalry, were done on Foot, after having voluntarily dismounted in the Extremity of the most doubtful Battles, you took a Resolution to dispatch away all your Horses, and have managed matters so swimmingly, that you have not so much as one left. And now, the Important Person stands on his own Legs.  
Perhaps, you may receive some small Inconvenience from this. But let me die, if it be not much for your honour, that you as well as Bias, honest Old Bias, I warrant you know him so wondrous well, should be able to say, that you carry all that is yours about you. No great Quantity I must confess of Foppish Accoutrements, nor a long Train of Led-Horses, nor abundance of that which they call the Ready; but Probity, Generosity, Magnanimity, Constancy in Dangers, Obstinacy in Disputes, a Contempt of all Foreign Languages, Ignorance of False Dice, and a surprising Tranquillity upon the Loss of Transitory Things. Qualities, Sir, which are properly and Essentially yours; and of which neither Time nor Fortune can ever deprive you. Now as Euripides, who was, as you know, or as you know not, one of the Gravest Authors of Greece, writes in one of his Tragedies, that Money was one of the Evils, and one of the most pernicious ones, that flew from Pandora's Box, I admire as a Divine quality in you; the incompatibility which you show for it, and look upon it to be a distinguishing Mark, of a Great and Extraordinary Soul, that you are uneasy till you are rid of this Corrupter of Reason, this Poisoner of Souls, this Author of so much Disorder, of so much Injustice, and of so many Violences. Yet, I could hearty wish, that your Virtue were not arrived at such an extraordi-Pitch, and that you could be brought to some accommodation with this Enemy of Humane kind, and that you might be persuaded to make Peace with it, as we do with the Great Turk, for Politic Reasons, and the Advantage of Commerce. Now upon Consideration, that it is a Difficult matter to be much at one's ease without it, and fancying that as I played for you at Narbonne, you threw for me at Thionville; and that it is perhaps in my Name, that you have packed off your Baggage; I here send you a Hundred Pistols at present in part of Payment; and that these may not meet with the same Fate which befell their Predecessors, I desire you not to defile your Hands with them, but to deliver them to the French Gentlemen who are with you, for whose sake I chief remit them.  
I am, etc.    

This Letter ought to have been amongst the Original Letters.  
Colonel D. to my Lady D.  
Written in the beginning of King James his Reign.  
Madam,  
Tho' your last was extremely Obliging, yet the Praises which you so handsomely gave me, did not so much prove my Merit, as show your own. Your praise of my imaginary Virtues declared but my want of real ones. For the Politeness of your Letter made me so sensible of the Defects of mine; that at the same time that it loaded me with Praise, it covered me with Shame. And therefore, Madam, let me tell you again, that in what I said of you, I was not Generous but Just: And here you have driven me upon a tender Point, viz. of Derogating from my own Praises, and detracting from that Action which you impute to me as an extraordinary Virtue. But I hope you will be convinced, that the Air of the Court has not yet blasted my Native sincerity, nor given me Gallantry at the Expense of Truth, since I have the Rudeness to contradict you. The Repetition of your invitation, more than makes amends for the Coldness of my Brothers: But at the same time that it obliges it troubles me to think that I cannot accept of it. I passionately love the Country; but cannot possibly come thither, though both the Spring and yourself invite me. Methinks the Vilest Insect which Nature has lodged in the Fields, is in a more desirable State than we are, whom our Employment chains to the Town. The very Serpent still remains in that Paradise out of which it has cast us: For if it had not been for the Deceit of the First Serpent, there had been neither Soldier nor City. Thus you see, Madam, to what a Condition my Unhappy Circumstances reduce me; viz. of envying a Creature which Humane Nature abhors: For that about this time can leave its Hole, to lie basking on Sunny and Flowery Banks, and throwing off its Old one can assume a Coat as fresh and gay as the Season. But I must despair of getting o●t of the Town, and my old Honourable Livery, (which I hate yet more) to enjoy a free Air, and as free a Prospect: So that I almost esteem it a Blessing to be drawn out some times to Hyde-park, for the Diversion of the King and the Rabble. But here I am sensible I▪ have erred in indulging Thoughts and Expressions, purely Poetical: Yet since my Subject required it, I am confident you cannot but Pardon me. For to speak as one should do, who must not speak in extraordinary terms of th● Country, of the Spring, and of you,  
I am Madam, Yours, etc.  
FINIS.   

ERRATA.  
PReface, for Invention r. Intention. p. 1. for Will Er— r. Will Vr— p. 9 for Extravagant blindness r. Ex●rvagance▪ and blindness p. 59 for after having r. after she had. p, 108 do not close the Parenthesis till the full stop. p. 109. for Proceed r. Proceeded.   

A Catalogue of Books jately Printed for Samuel Briscoe, at the Corner of Charles-street, Covent-Garden.  
1. ESSAYS and Maxims, Political, Moral, and Divine; Divided into four Centuries. 12ᵒ.  
2. The Young Lawyer's Recreation; Being a Collection of several Pleasant Cases in the Law, as for the Diversion of the Reader.  
3. The Satyrs of Petronius Arbiter, a Roman Knight, with his Fragments recovered at Belgrade: Made English by Mr. Burnaby of the Middle-Temple, and another Hand. 8ᵒ.  
4. The History of Polybius the M●galapolitan; Containing a General Account of the Transactions of the World, and principally of the Roman People, during the First and Second Punic Wars: Whereto is prefixed a Character of the Author, and his Writings, by Mr. Dryden, 2 Vol. 8ᵒ.  
5. A Moral Essay on Solitude, preferred to public Employments, and all its Appanages, such as Fame, Riches, Command, Pleasures and Conversation; By the Ingenious Sir G. ' Mackenzie. 12o. Second Edition.