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best; and as for the rest, I was betrayed into a good deal of it by Tacitus; only what he has said in five words, I imagine I have said in fifty lines: such is the misfortune of imitating the inimitable. Now, if you are of my opinion, una litura may do the business better than a dozen; and you need not fear unravelling my web. I am a sort of spider; and have little else to do but to spin it over again, or creep to some other place and spin there. Alas! for one who has nothing to do but amuse himself. I believe my amusements are as little amusing as most folks. But no matter; it makes the hours pass ; and is better than ἐν ἀμαδιᾳ καὶ ἀμουιᾳ καταβιῶναι. Adieu.

LETTER XIII.

MR. GRAY TO MR. WEST.

London, May 27, 1742.

MINE, you are to know, is a white melancholy, or rather leucocholy for the most part; which, though. it seldom laughs or dances, nor ever amounts to what one calls joy or pleasure, yet is a good easy sort of a state, and ça ne laisse que de s'amuser. The only fault of it is insipidity; which is apt now and then to give a sort of ennui, which makes one form certain little wishes that signify nothing.

The lines which he means here are from-thus ever grave and undisturb'd reflection—to Rubellius lives. For the part of the scene, which be sent in his former letter, began there.

But there is another sort, black indeed, which I have now and then felt, that has somewhat in it like Tertullian's rule of faith, Credo, quia impossibile est; for it believes, nay, is sure of every thing that is unlikely, so it be but frightful; and, on the other hand, excludes and shuts its eyes to the most possible hopes, and every thing that is pleasurable; from this the Lord deliver us! for none but He and sunshiny weather can do it. In hopes of enjoying this kind of weather, I am going into the country for a few weeks, but shall be never the nearer any society: so, if you have any charity, you will continue to write. My life is like Harry the Fourth's supper of hens: "Poulets à la broche, poulets en ragoût, poulets en háchis, poulets en fricassées.- -Reading here, reading there; nothing but books with different sauces. Do not let me lose my dessert then; for though that be reading too, yet it has a very different flavour. The May seems to be come since your invitation; and I propose to bask in her beams and dress me in her roses.

Et caput in vernâ semper habere rosâ.

I shall see Mr. and his wife, nay, and his child too, for he has got a boy. Is it not odd to consider one's contemporaries in the grave light of husband and father? There are my lordsand- —, they are statesmen; do not you remember them dirty boys playing at cricket? As for me, I am never a bit the older, nor the bigger, nor the wiser than I was then; no, not for having been be yond sea. Pray how are you?

LETTER XIV.

MR. GRAY TO DR. WHARTON*.

Cambridge, December 27, 1742.

I OUGHT to have returned you my thanks along time ago, for the pleasure, I should say prodigy, of your letter; for such a thing has not happened above twice within this last age to mortal man, and no one here can conceive what it may por tend. You have heard, I suppose, how I have been employed a part of the time; how, by my own indefatigable application for these ten years past, and by the care and vigilance of that worthy magistrate the man in bluet (who, I assure you, has not spared his labour, nor could have done more for his own son), I am got half way to the top of jurisprudence‡, and bid as fair as another body to open a case of impotency with all decency and circumspection. You see my ambition. I do not doubt but some thirty years hence I shall convince the world and you that I am a very

* Of Old-park, near Durham. With this gentleman Mr. Gray contracted an acquaintance very early; and though they were not educated together at Eton, yet afterwards at Cambridge, when the doctor was fellow of 'embroke-hall, they became intimate friends, and continued so to the time of Mr. Gray's death.

+ A servant of the vice-chancellor's for the time being, usually known by the name of Blue Coat, whose business it is to attend acts for degrees, &c.

i. e. Bachelor of civil law.

pretty young fellow; and may come to shine in a profession, perhaps the noblest of all except man-midwifery. As for you, if your distemper and you can but agree about going to London, I may reasonably expect in a much shorter time to see you in your three-cornered villa, doing the honours of a well-furnished table with as much dignity, as rich a mien, and as capacious a belly, as Dr. Mead. Methinks I see Dr. at the lower end of it, lost in admiration of your goodly person and parts, cramming down his envy (for it will rise) with the wing of a pheasant, and drowning it in neat Burgundy. But not to tempt your asthma too much with such a prospect, I should think you might be almost as happy and as great as this even in the country. But you know best, and I should be sorry to say any thing that might stop you in the career of glory; far be it from me to hamper the wheels of your gilded chariot. Go on, sir Thomas; and when you die (for even physicians must die) may the faculty in Warwick-lane erect your statue in the very niche of sir John Cutler's.

I was going to tell you how sorry I am for your illness, but I hope it is too late now: I can only say that I really was very sorry. May you live a hundred Christmasses, and eat as many collars of brawn stuck with rosemary. Adieu, &c.

LETTER XV.

MR. GRAY TO DR. WHARTON.

Peterhouse, April 26, 1744. You write so feelingly to Mr. Brown, and represent your abandoned condition in terms so touching, that what gratitude could not effect in several months, compassion has brought about in a few days; and broke that strong attachment, or rather allegiance, which I and all here owe to our sovereign lady and mistress, the president of presidents and head of heads (if I may be permitted to pronounce her name, that ineffable Octogrammaton), the power of Laziness. You must know she had been pleased to appoint me (in preference to so many old servants of hers who had spent their whole lives in qualifying themselves for the office) grand picker of straws and push-pin player to her Supinity (for that is her title). The first is much in the nature of the lord president of the council; and the other like a groom-porter, only without the profit; but as they are both things of very great honour in this country, I considered with myself the load of envy attending such great charges; and besides (between you and me), I found myself unable to support the fatigue of keeping up the appearance that persons of such dignity must do ; so I thought proper to decline it, and excused myself as well as I could. However as you see such an affair must take up a good deal of time, and it has always been the policy of

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