Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 14.djvu/179

Rh in the whole, more consistent, and more clearly deduced from, and related to each other. But what I gain on the side of philosophy, I lose on the side of poetry: the flowers are gone, when the fruits begin to ripen, and the fruits perhaps will never ripen perfectly. The climate (under our Heaven of a court) is but cold and uncertain; the winds rase, and the winter comes on. I find myself but little disposed to build a new house; I have nothing left but to gather up the relicks of a wreck, and look about me to see how few friends I have left. Pray whose esteem or admiration should I desire now to procure by my writing? whose friendship or conversation to obtain by them? I am a man of desperate fortunes, that is, a man whose friends are dead: for I never aimed at any other fortune than in friends. As soon as I had sent my last letter, I received a most kind one from you, expressing great pain for my late illness at Mr. Cheselden's. I conclude you was eased of that friendly apprehension in a few days after you had despatched yours, for mine must have reached you then. I wondered a little at your quere, who Cheselden was? it shows that the truest merit does not travel so far any way as on the wings of poetry; he is the most noted, and most deserving man, in the whole profession of chirurgery; and has saved the lives of thousands by his manner of cutting for the stone. I am now well, or what I must call so.

I have lately seen some writings of lord Bolingbroke's, since he went to France. Nothing can depress his genius: whatever befals him, he will still Rh