Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 14.djvu/100

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DUBLIN, APRIL 5, 1729.

DO not think it could be possible for me to hear better news than that of your getting over your scurvy suit, which always hung as a dead weight on my heart; I hated it in all its circumstances, as it affected your fortune and quiet, and in a situation of life that must make it every way vexatious. And as I am infinitely obliged to you for the justice you do me in supposing your affairs do at least concern me as much as my own; so I would never have pardoned your omitting it. But before I go on, I cannot forbear mentioning what I read last summer in a newspaper, that you were writing the history of your own times. I suppose such a report might arise from what was not secret among your friends, of your intention to write another kind of history; which you often promised Mr. Pope and me to do: I know he desires it very much, and I am sure I desire nothing more for the honour and love I bear you, and the perfect knowledge I have of your publick virtue. My lord, I have no other notion of economy than that it is the parent of liberty and case, and I am not the only friend you have who has chid you in his heat for the neglect of it, though not with his mouth, as I have done. For there is a silly errour in the world, even among friends otherwise very good, not to intermeddle with men's affairs in such nice matters. And my lord, I have made a maxim,