Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 2.djvu/40

xxxiv account they could, at that time, furnish out only four volumes. There was but one point in which he interfered; that of not suffering his name to be prefixed, but only the initial letters.

"The avidity with which these works were devoured by the Publick, brought on a search for all the other writings of the Author, not contained in this collection, and several successive volumes were published as they were found out. Out of these the ingenious Dr. Hawkesworth formed an elegant edition enriched with notes, many of which are retained in this.

"When all that had hitherto been printed was exhausted, the curiosity was keener with regard to original pieces, and such manuscripts as had never seen the light. Among these none have met with a more favourable reception from the Publick, than the collection of his Epistolary Correspondence; for, though it is evident that none of these letters (if we except only Mr. Pope's) were intended for the press, yet this very circumstance seems to have enhanced their value, according to an observation of lord Bolingbroke's in one of his Epistles to Swift, where he says 'Pliny writ his letters for the publick; so did Seneca; so did Balsac, Voiture, &c. Tully did not, and therefore these give us more pleasure than any which have come down to us from antiquity. When we read them, we pry into a secret which was intended to be kept from us. That is a pleasure. We see Cato, and Brutus, and Pompey, and others, such as they really were, and not such as the gaping multitude of their own age took them to