117

V.

Englische Briefe.

Pope.

Der Briefwechsel dieses berühmten Dichters mit seinen Freunden, Blount, Digby, Dr. Atterbury, Gay, Swift, u. a. m. macht einen interessanten Theil seiner Werke aus, und if durch Inhalt und Schreibart sehr unterhaltend. ́ Pope's eigne Briefe verrathen indeß mehr absichtliche Kunst, als die meisten übrigen, wie Dr. Blair mit Recht bemerkt und an Beis spielen zeigt. Noch strenger aber ist das Urtheil Dr. Warton's (Effay, Vol. II, p. 407.): „Sie enthalten allerdings manche ins teressante Umßtånde; aber sie haben einen sehr fehlerhaften Ans ftrich von Eitelkeit und Selbstgefälligkeit, und Pope macht darin zu viele Lobsprüche auf seine Rechtschaffenheit, unabhängigkeit und Tugend. Pope, Swift und Bolingbroke scheinen, dies fen Briefen zufolge, eine Art von ftolzem Triumvirat ausgemacht ́ zu haben, um Achtserklärungen wider alle die ausgehen zu lass fen, die nicht ihren Meinungen und Gesinnungen beitreten wolls ten. Und durch ihre Erklärungen über sich selbst möchten sie gern den Leser einbilden, daß fie alles Genie und alle Rechts schaffenheit der damaligen Zeit als Monopol gepachtet håtten, in welcher fie, ihrer Meinung nach, das Unglüď hatten, zu leben." Hier nur zwei Proben von Pope's eignen Briefen, deren erster das Lob menschenfreundlicher Gesinnungen und die Vortheile der Gleichheit für die Freundschaft zum Inhält hat. Der zweite ist eine Antwort auf einen Brief, den Dr. Arbuths not in feiner legten Krankheit geschrieben hatte.

1

I.

TO HUGH BETHE L.

June 17. 1728.

After the publifhing of my boyish letters to Mr. Cromwell, you will not wonder if 1 fhould forswear writing a letter again, while I live; fince I do not correfpond with a friend upon the terms of any other free fubject of this kingdom. But to you I can never be filent, or reserved; and, I am fure, my opinion of your heart is fuch, that I could open mine to you in no manner which I could fear the whole world should know. I could publish my own heart too, I will venture to say, for any mifchief or malice there is in it: but a little too much folly or weakness might (I fear) appear, to make such a spectacle either inftructive or agreeable to others.

I am reduced to beg of all my acquaintance to secure me from the like usage for the future, by returning me any letters of mine which they may have preserved; that I may not be hurt, after my death, by that which was the happiness of my life, their par tiality and affection to me.

I have nothing of myself to tell you, only that I have had but indifferent health. I have not made a vifit to London: curiofity and the love of diffipation a pace in me. I am not glad nor forry for it, but I am verry forry for those who have nothing else to

die

live on.

!

I have

I have read much, but write no more. I have small hopes of doing good, no vanity in writing, and little ambition to please a world not very candid or deferving. If I can preferve the good opinion of a few friends, it is all I can exfpect, considering how little good I can do even to them to merit it. Few people have your candour, or are so willing to think well of another from whom they receive no benefit, and gratify no vanity. But of all the foft fenfations, the greatest pleasure is to give and receive mutual trust. It is by belief and firm hope, that men are mad happy in this life, as well as in the other. My confidence in your good opinion, and dependence upon that of one or two more, is the chief cordial drop I taste, amidst the infipid, the disagreeable, the cloying or the dead-sweet, which are the common draughts of life. Some pleasures are too pert, as well as others too flat, to be relifhed long; and vivacity in some cases is worse than dulnefs. Therefore indeed for many years I have not chofen my companions for any of the qualities in fashion, but almost entirely for that which is the most out - of- fashion, fincerity. Before I am aware of it, I am making your panegyric, and perhaps my own too; for next to poffeffing the best of qualities is the esteeming and distinguishing those who poffels them. I truly love and value you, and so I stop short.

II.

TO DR. ARBUTH NOT.

July 26. 1734.

I thank you for your letter, which has all those genuine marks of a good mind by which I have ever distinguished yours, and for which I have so long loved you. Our friendship has been conftant; because it was grounded on good principles, and therefore not only uninterrupted by any diftruft, but by any vanity, much less any interest.

What you recommend to me with the folemnity of a last request, shall have its due weight with me. That disdain and indignation against vice, is (I thank God) the only disdain and indignation I have: it is fincere, and it will be a lafting one. But fure it is as impoffible to have a juft abhorrence of vice, without hating the vitious, as to bear a true love for virtue, without loving the good. To reform and not to chastise, I am afraid, is impossible; and that the best precepts, as well as the best laws, would prove of small use, if there were no examples to enforce them. To attack vices in the abstract, without touching perfons, may be safe fighting indeed, but it is fighting with shadows. General propofitions are obscure, misty, and uncertain, compared with plain, full and home examples: precepts only apply to our reafon, which in most men is but weak: examples are pictures, and strike the senses, nay, raise the paffions, and call in those (the strongest and most general of all motives) to the aid of reformation. Every vitious man makes the case his own, and that is the only way by which such men

can

can be affected, much lefs deterred. So that to chastise is to reform. The only fign by which I found my writ ings ever did any good, or had any weight, has been that they raised the anger of bad men. And my greatest comfort, and encouragement to proceed, has been to fee, that those who have no fhame, and no fear of any thing else, have appeared touched by my satires.

As to your kind concern for my safety, I can guess what occafions it at this time. Some characters I have drawn are such, that if there be any who deserve them, it is evidently a service to mankind to point those men out; yet fuch as, if all the world gave them, none, I think, will own they take to themsel ves! But if they should, thofe of whom all the world think in such a manner, must be inan I cannot fear! Such in particular as have the meannefs to do mis chiefs in the dark, have feldom the courage to juftify thein in the face of day; the talents that make a cheat or a whisperer, are not the fame that qualify a man for an infulter; and as to private villany, it is not fo safe to join in a affaffination, as in a libel. I will con Tult my fafety fo far as I think becomes a prudent man; but not fo far as to omit any thing which I think becomes a honeft one. As to personal attacks beyond the law, every man is liable to thein: as for danger within the law, I am not guilty enough to fear any. For the good opinion of all the world, I know, it is not to be had: for that of worthy men, I hope, I fhall not forfeit it: for that of the great, or those in power, I may wish I had it; but if, through misrepresentations (too coinmon about perfons in that station) I have it not, I fhall be forry, but not miferable in the want of it.