Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/227

Rh you will endeavour to forget me. I am sure I never can forget you till I meet with (what is impossible) another, whose conversation I can delight so much in, as Dr. Swift's, and yet that is the smallest thing I ought to value you for. That hearty sincere friendship, that plain and open ingenuity in all your commerce, is what I am sure I can never find in another man. I shall want often a faithful monitor, one that would vindicate me behind my back, and tell me my faults to my face. God knows I write this with tears in my eyes."

The other is in a letter from Pope to lord Orrery, where, speaking of Swift, he says, "My sincere love for this valuable, indeed incomparable man, will accompany him through life, and pursue his memory, were I to live a hundred lives, as many as his works will live; which are absolutely original, unequalled, unexampled. His humanity, his charity, his condescension, his candour, are equal to his wit, and require as good and true a taste to be equally valued."

But Pope wrote this to a man who had no such true taste. To one, who in all his remarks on Swift's life, has endeavoured to depreciate the memory of that great man, and place all his actions in the worst light. Not content with attacking his private character, and often with the malice of an Iago (so much worse indeed as being utterly unprovoked) turning his very virtue into pitch, he has endeavoured to reduce his political one to the lowest line; as may be seen in the following passage. "He was elated with the appearance of enjoying ministerial confidence. He enjoyed the shadow, VOL. I.