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sive is the wildest speculation, when pursued with eagerness, and nourished with such arguments as the perverted ingenuity of such a mind as his can easily furnish! Judgment falls asleep upon the bench, while Imagination, like a smug, pert counsellor, stands chattering at the bar, and, with a deal of finespun, enchanting sophistry, carries all before

him.

If I had strength of mind, I have not strength of body for the task which, you say, some would impose upon me. I cannot bear much thinking. The meshes of that fine network, the brain, are composed of such mere spinners' threads in me, that when a long thought finds its way into them, it buzzes, and twangs, and bustles about at such a rate as seems to threaten the whole contexture. No-I must needs refer it again to you.

My enigma will probably find you out, and you will find out my enigma, at some future time. I am not in a humor to transcribe it now. Indeed I wonder that a sportive thought should ever knock at the door of my intellects, and still more that it should gain admittance. It is as if harlequin should intrude himself into the gloomy chamber where a corpse is deposited in state. His antic gesticulations would be unseasonable at any rate, but more especially so if they should distort the features of the mournful attendants into laughter. But the mind, long wearied with the sameness of a dull, dreary prospect, will gladly fix its eyes on anything that may make a little variety in its contemplations, though it were but a kitten playing with her tail.

TO MRS. COWPER.

July 20, 1780.

My dear Cousin,-Mr. Newton having desired me to be of the party, I am come to meet him. You see me sixteen years older, at the least, than when I saw you last; but the effects of time seem to have taken place rather on the outside of my head than within it. What was brown is become grey, but what was foolish remains foolish still. Green fruit must rot before it ripens, if the season is such as to afford it nothing but cold winds and dark clouds, that interrupt every ray of sunshine. My days steal away silently, and march on (as poor mad Lear would have made his soldiers march) as if they were shod with felt; not so silently but that I hear them: yet were it not that I am always listening to their flight, having no infirmity that I had not when I was much younger, I should deceive myself with an imagination that I am still young.

I am fond of writing as an amusement, but do not always find it one. Being rather scantily furnished with subjects that are good for anything, and corresponding only with those who have no relish for such as are good for nothing, I often find myself reduced to the necessity, the disagreeable necessity, of writing about myself. This does not mend the matter much, for, though in a description of my own condition, I discover abundant materials to employ my pen upon, yet as the task is not very agreeable to me, so I am sufficiently aware, that it is likely to prove irksome to others. A painter who should confine himself, in the exercise of his You would believe, though I did not say it art, to the drawing of his own picture, must at the end of every letter, that we remember be a wonderful coxcomb if he did not soon you and Mrs. Newton with the same affec- grow sick of his occupation, and be peculiartion as ever: but I would not therefore ex-ly fortunate if he did not make others as sick cuse myself from writing what it gives you as himself. pleasure to read. I have often wished indeed, when writing to an ordinary correspondent, for the revival of the Roman custom-salutis at top, and tale at bottom. But as the French have taught all Europe to enter a room and to leave it with a most ceremonious bow, so they have taught us to begin and conclude our letters in the same manner. However, I can say to you,

Sans ceremonie,

Adieu, mon ami! W. C.

The poet's affectionate effort in renewing his correspondence with Mrs. Cowper, to whom he had been accustomed to pour forth his heart without reserve, appears to have had a beneficial effect on his reviving spirits. His pathetic letter to that lady was followed, in the course of two months, by a letter of a more lively east, in which the reader will find some touches of his native humor, and s vein of pleasantry peculiar to himself.

That

Remote as your dwelling is from the late scene of riot and confusion, I hope that, though you could not but hear the report, you heard no more, and that the roarings of the mad multitude did not reach you. was a day of terror to the innocent, and the present is a day of still greater terror to the guilty. The law was, for a few moments, like an arrow in the quiver, seemed to be of no use, and did no execution; now it is an arrow upon the string, and many who despised it lately are trembling as they stand before the point of it.

I have talked more already than I have formerly done in three visits-you remember my taciturnity, never to be forgotten by those who knew me; not to depart entirely from what might be, for aught I know, the most shining part of my character, I here shut my mouth, make my bow, and return to Olney.

W. C.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, July 27, 1780.

you

My dear Friend,-As two men sit silent, after having exhausted all their topics of conversation; one says, "It is very fine weather." and the other says, "Yes;"-one blows his nose, and the other rubs his eye-brows; (by the way, this is very much in Homer's manner;) such seems to be the case between you and me. After a silence of some days, I wrote you a long something, that (I sup pose) was nothing to the purpose, because it has not afforded you materials for an answer. Nevertheless, as it often happens in the case above stated, one of the distressed parties, being deeply sensible of the awkwardness of a dumb duet, breaks silence again, and resolves to speak, though he has nothing to say, so it fares with me. I am with again in the form of an epistle, though, considering my present emptiness, I have reason to fear that your only joy upon the occasion will be, that it is conveyed to you in a frank. When I began, I expected no interruption. But, if I had expected interruptions without end, I should have been less disappointed. First came the barber; who, after having embellished the outside of my head, has left the inside just as unfurnished as he found it. Then came Olney bridge, not into the house, but into the conversation. The cause relating to it was tried on Tuesday at Buckingham. The Judge directed the jury to find a verdict favorable to Olney. The jury consisted of one knave and eleven fools. The last-mentioned followed the afore-mentioned as sheep follow a bell-wether, and decided in direct opposition to the said judge: then a flaw was discovered in the indictment:-the indictment was quashed, and an order made for a new trial. The new trial will be in the King's Bench, where said knave and said fools will have nothing to do with it. So the men of Olney fling up their caps, and assure themselves of a complete victory. A victory will save me and your mother many shillings, perhaps some pounds, which, except that it has afforded me a subject to write upon, was the only reason why I said so much about it. I know you take an interest in all that concerns us, and will consequently rejoice with us in the prospect of an event in which we are concerned so nearly.

Yours affectionately,

TO THE REV. JOHN NEWTON.

W. C.

Olney, July 30, 1780. My dear Sir,-You may think perhaps that I deal more liberally with Mr. Unwin, in the way of poetical export, than I do with you, and I believe you have reason. The truth is this if I walked the streets with a fiddle

under my arm, I should never think of per-
forming before the window of a privy coun-
make free with ears more likely to be open
cillor or a chief justice, but should rather
to such amusement. The trifles I produce
in this way are indeed such trifles that I can-
Mr. Unwin himself would not be offended if
not think them seasonable presents for you.
I was to tell him that there is this difference
between him and Mr. Newton; that the latter
undergoing the business of incubation, with
is already an apostle, while he himself is only
a hope that he may be hatched in time.
When my muse comes forth arrayed in sa-
bles, at least in a robe of graver cast, I make
no scruple to direct her to my friend at Hox.
ton. This has been one reason why I have
so long delayed the riddle. But lest I should
seem to set a value upon it that I do not, by
making it an object of still further inquiry,
here it comes.

I am just two and two, I am warm, I am cold,
And the parent of numbers that cannot be told,
I am lawful, unlawful-a duty, a fault,
I am often sold dear-good for nothing when
An extraordinary boon, and a matter of course,
bought,
And yielded with pleasure-when taken by force

W. C.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, Aug. 6, 1780. My dear Friend,-You like to hear from me-this is a very good reason why I should write-but I have nothing to say-this seems equally a good reason why I should not; yet if you had alighted from your horse at our door this morning, and, at this present writing, being five o'clock in the afternoon, had found occasion to say to me-"Mr. Cowper, you have not spoke since I came in; have you resolved never to speak again ?”—it would be but a poor reply, if, in answer to the summons, I should plead inability as my best and only excuse. And this, by the way, suggests to me a seasonable piece of instruction, and reminds me of what I am very apt to forget when I have any epistolary business in hand; that a letter may be written upon anything or nothing, just as that anything or nothing happens to occur. that has a journey before him twenty miles in length, which he is to perform on foot, will not hesitate and doubt whether he shall set out or not, because he does not readily conceive how he shall ever reach the end of it; for he knows that, by the simple operation of moving one foot forward first and then the other, he shall be sure to accomplish it. So it is in the present case, and so it is in every similar case. A letter is written, as a conversation is maintained or a journey performed, not by preconcerted or

A man

premeditated means, a new contrivance, or an invention never heard of before; but merely by maintaining a progress, and resolving, as a postilion does, having once set out, never to stop till we reach the appointed end. If a man may talk without thinking, why may he not write upon the same terms? A grave gentleman of the last century, a tiewig, square-toe, Steinkirk figure, would say, "My good sir, a man has no right to do either." But it is to be hoped that the present century has nothing to do with the mouldy opinions of the last; and so, good Sir Launcelot, or St. Paul, or whatever be your name, step into your picture-frame again, and look as if you thought for another century, and leave us moderns in the mean time to think when we can, and to write whether we can or not, else we might as well be dead as you are.

When we look back upon our forefathers, we seem to look back upon the people of another nation, almost upon creatures of another species. Their vast rambling mansions, spacious halls, and painted casements, the gothie porch, smothered with honeysuckles, their little gardens, and high walls, their boxedgings, balls of holly, and yew-tree statues, are become so entirely unfashionable now, that we can hardly believe it possible that a people who resembled us so little in their taste should resemble us in anything else. But in everything else I suppose they were our counterparts exactly, and time, that has sewed up the slashed sleeve, and reduced the large trunk hose to a neat pair of silk stockings, has left human nature just where it found it. The inside of the man at least

has undergone' no change. His passions, appetites, and aims, are just what they ever were. They wear perhaps a handsomer disguise than they did in the days of yore, for philosophy and literature will have their ef fect upon the exterior; but in every other respect a modern is only an ancient in a dif

ferent dress.

Yours, W. C.

TO JOSEPH HILL, ESQ.*

Olney, Aug. 10, 1780.

bitual practice, you are not only enabled to endure your occupation, but even find it agreeable. I remember the time when it would not have suited you so well to have devoted so large a part of your vacation to the objects of your profession; and you, I dare say, have not forgot what a seasonable relaxation you found, when lying at full stretch upon the ruins of an old wall, by the sea side, you amused yourself with Tasso's Jerusalem and the Pastor Fido. I recollect that we both pitied Mr. De Grey, when we called at his cottage at Taplow, and found, not the master indeed, but his desk, with his white-leaved folio upon it, which bespoke him as much a man of business in his retirement as in Westminster Hall. But by these steps he ascended the bench. Now he may read what he pleases, and ride where he will, if the gout will give him leave. And you, who have no gout, and probably never will, when your hour of dismission comes, will, for that reason, if for no other, be a happier man than he.

I am, my dear friend,
Affectionately yours,

W. C.

P. S.-Mr. - has not thought proper to favor me with his book, and having no interest in the subject, I have not thought proper to purchase it. Indeed I have no curiosity to read what I am sure must be erroneous before I read it. Truth is worth everything that can be given for it; but a mere display of ingenuity, calculated only to mislead, is worth nothing.

The following letter shows the sportiveness of his imagination on the minutest subjects.

TO THE REV. JOHN NEWTON.

Olney, Aug. 21, 1780. The following occurrence ought not to be passed over in silence, in a place where so

few notable ones are to be met with. Last Wednesday night, while we were at supper, between the hours of eight and nine, I heard an unusual noise in the back parlor, as if one of the hares was entangled and endeavoring to disengage herself. I was just going to rise from table when it ceased. In about

five minutes a voice on the outside of the parlor door inquired if one of my hares had got away. I immediately rushed into the next room, and found that my poor favorite puss had made her escape. She had gnawed in sunder the strings of a lattice work, with which I thought I had sufficiently secured

My dear Sir-I greet you at your castle of Buen Retiro, and wish you could enjoy the unmixed pleasures of the country there. But it seems you are obliged to dash the cup with a portion of those bitters you are always swallowing in town. Well-you are bonorably and usefully employed, and ten times more beneficially to society than if you were piping to a few sheep under a spread- per's, having married Mary, daughter of William Cowper, ing beech, or listening to a tinkling rill. Be-of the Park, near Hertford, Esq. After having successively passed through the offices of Solicitor and Attorney sides, by the effect of long custom and General, he was advanced to the dignity of Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, and subsequently elevated • Private correspondence. to the Peerage by the title of Baron Walsinghain.

ha

This distinguished lawyer was connexion of Cow

who was never much acquainted with her, she had reached those years that are always found upon the borders of another world. As for you, your time of life is comparatively of a youthful date. You may think of death as much as you please, (you cannot think of it too much,) but I hope you will live to think of it many years.

It costs me not much difficulty to suppose that my friends, who were already grown old when I saw them last, are old still, but it costs me a good deal sometimes to think of those who were at that time young as being older than they were. Not having been an

the window, and which I preferred to any other sort of blind, because it admitted plenty of air. From thence I hastened to the kitchen, where I saw the redoubtable Thomas Freeman, who told me that, having seen her just after she dropped into the street, he attempted to cover her with his hat, but she screamed out, and leaped directly over his head. I then desired him to pursue as fast as possible, and added Richard Coleman to the chase, as being nimbler, and carrying less weight than Thomas; not expecting to see her again, but desirous to learn, if possible, what became of her. In something less than an hour, Richard returned, almost breath-eye-witness of the change that time has made less, with the following account: that, soon after he began to run, he left Tom behind him, and came in sight of a most numerous hunt of men, women, children, and dogs; that he did his best to keep back the dogs, and presently outstripped the crowd, so that the race was at last disputed between himself and puss: she ran right through the town, and down the lane that leads to Dropshot. A little before she came to the house, he got the start and turned her; she pushed for the town again, and soon after she entered it sought shelter in Mr. Wagstaff's tan-yard, adjoining to old Mr. Drake's. Sturges's harvest men were at supper, and saw her from the opposite side of the way. There she encountered the tan-pits full of water, and, while she was struggling out of one pit, and plunging into another, and almost drowned, one of the men drew her out by the ears, and secured her. She was then well washed in a bucket to get the lime out of her coat, and brought home in a sack at ten o'clock.

This frolic cost us four shillings, but you may believe that we did not grudge a farthing of it. The poor creature received only a little hurt in one of her claws and one of her ears, and is now almost as well as ever.

I do not call this an answer to your letter, but such as it is I send it, presuming upon that interest which I know you take in my minutest concerns, which I cannot express better than in the words of Terence, a little varied-Nihil mei a te alienum putas. Yours, my dear friend,

W. C.

in them, and my former idea of them not being corrected by observation, it remains the same; my memory presents me with this image unimpaired, and, while it retains the resemblance of what they were, forgets that by this time the picture may have lost much of its likeness, through the alteration that succeeding years have made in the original, I know not what impressions Time may have made upon your person, for while his claws (as our grannams called them) strike deep furrows in some faces, he seems to sheath them with much tenderness, as if fearful of doing injury, to others. But, though an enemy to the person, he is a friend to the mind, and you have found him so; though even in this respect his treatment of us depends upon what he meets with at our hands: if we use him well, and listen to his admonitions, he is a friend indeed, but otherwise the worst of enemies, who takes from us daily something that we valued, and gives us nothing better in its stead. It is well with them, who, like you, can stand a-tiptoe on the mountain-top of human life, look down with pleasure upon the valley they have passed, and sometimes stretch their wings in joyful hope of a happy flight into eternity. Yet a little while, and your hope will be accomplished.

When you can favor me with a little account of your own family, without inconvenience, I shall be glad to receive it, for, though separated from my kindred by little more than half a century of miles, I know as little of their concerns as if oceans and continents were interposed between us. Yours, my dear cousin,

W. C.

TO MRS. COWPER.

Olney, Aug. 31, 1780. My dear Cousin,-I am obliged to you for your long letter, which did not seem so, and for your short one, which was more than I had any reason to expect. Short as it was, it conveyed to me two interesting articles of intelligence, an account of your recovering from a fever, and of Lady Cowper's death. The latter was, I suppose, to be expected, for, by what remembrance I have of her Ladyship,

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, Sept. 3, 1780. My dear Friend,-I am glad you are so provident, and that, while you are young, you have furnished yourself with the means of comfort in old age. Your crutch and your pipe may be of use to you, (and may they be so!) should your years be extended to an antediluvian date; and, for your perfect ac

commodation, you seem to want nothing but a clerk called Snuffle, and a sexton of the name of Skeleton, to make your ministerial equipage complete.

The three following letters are interesting, as containing Cowper's sentiments on the subject of education.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, Sept. 7, 1780. My dear Friend, -As many gentlemen as there are in the world, who have children, and heads capable of reflecting upon the im

I think I have read as much of the first volume of the Biographia as I shall ever read. I find it very amusing; more so, perhaps, than it would have been, had they sifted their characters with more exactness, and admitted none but those who had in some way or other entitled themselves to immortality by deserv-portant subject of their education, so many ing well of the public. Such a compilation would perhaps have been more judicious, though I confess it would have afforded less variety. The priests and monks of earlier and the doctors of later days, who have signalized themselves by nothing but a controversial pamphlet, long since thrown by and never to be perused again, might have been forgotten, without injury or loss to the national character for learning or genius. This observation suggested to me the following lines, which may serve to illustrate my meaning, and at the same time to give my criticism a sprightlier air.

O fond attempt to give a deathless lot
To names ignoble, born to be forgot!
In vain recorded in historic page,

They court the notice of a future age;
Those twinkling, tiny lustres of the land,
Drop one by one, from Fame's neglecting hand;
Lethean gulphs receive them as
they fall,
And dark Oblivion soon absorbs them all.
So when a child (as playful children use)
Has burnt to cinder a stale last year's news,
The fame extinct, he views the roving fire,
There goes my lady, and there goes the 'squire,
There goes the parson-O illustrious spark!
And there-scarce less illustrious-goes the clerk!

Virgil admits none but worthies into the Elysian fields; I cannot recollect the lines in which he describes them all, but these in par

ticular I well remember:

Quique sui memores alios fecere merendo,
Inventas aut qui vitam excoluere per artes.

A chaste and scrupulous conduct like this Would well become the writer of national biography. But enough of this.

Our respects attend Miss Shuttleworth, with many thanks for her intended present. Some purses derive all their value from their contents, but these will have an intrinsic Value of their own; and, though mine should he often empty, which is not an improbable supposition, I shall still esteem it highly on

is own account.

If you could meet with a second-hand Virgil, ditto Homer, both Iliad and Odyssey, gece with a Clavis, for I have no Lexicon, and all tolerably cheap, I shall be obliged to you if you will make the purchase. Yours, W. C.

opinions there are about it, and many of them just and sensible, though almost all differing from each other. With respect to the educa tion of boys, I think they are generally made to draw in Latin and Greek trammels too soon. It is pleasing no doubt to a parent to see his child already in some sort a proficient in those languages, at an age when most others are entirely ignorant of them; but hence it often happens that a boy, who could construe a fable of Esop at six or seven years of age, having exhausted his little stock of attention and diligence in making that notable acquisition, grows weary of his task, conceives a dislike for study, and perhaps makes but a very indifferent progress afterwards. The mind and body have, in this respect, a striking resemblance to each other. In childhood they are both nimble, but not strong; they can skip and frisk about with wonderful agility, but hard labor spoils them both. In maturer years they become less active, but more vigorous, more capable of a fixed application, and can make themselves sport with that which a little earlier would have affected them with intolerable fatigue. I should recommend it to you, therefore, (but after all you must judge for yourself,) to allot the two next years of little John's scholarship to writing and arithmetic, together with which, for variety's sake, and because it is capable of being formed into an amusement, I would mingle geography, (a science which, if not attended to betimes, is seldom made an object of much consideration,) essentially necessary to the accomplishment of a gentleman, yet, as I know (by sad experience) imperfectly, if at all, inculcated in the schools. Lord Spencer's son, when he was four years of age, knew the situation of every kingdom, country, city, river, and remarkable mountain in the world. For this attainment, which I suppose his father had never made, he was indebted to a play-thing; having been accustomed to amuse himself with those maps which are cut into several compartments, so as to be thrown into a heap of confusion, that they may be put together again with an exact coincidence of all their angles and bearings, so as to form a perfect whole.

If he begins Latin and Greek at eight, or even at nine years of age, it is surely soon enough. Seven years, the usual allowance

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