drinking hogan, either of which here would be sufficient to lay your honour in the dust. To-morrow se'nnight I hope to be in Town, and not long after at Cambridge. I am, &c. Burnham, Sept. 1737. XI. MR. WEST TO MR. GRAY. RECEIVING no answer to my last letter, which I writ above a month ago, I must own I am a little uneasy. The slight shadow of you which I had in Town, has only served to endear you to me the more. The moments I past with you made a strong impression upon me. I singled you out for a friend, and I would have you know me to be yours, if you deem me worthy.-Alas, Gray, you cannot imagine how miserably my time passes away. My health, and nerves, and spirits are, thank my stars, the very worst, I think in Oxford. Four-and-twenty hours of pure unalloyed health together, are as unknown to me as the 400,000 characters in the Chinese vocabulary. One of my complaints has of late been so over-civil as to visit me regularly once a month-jam certus conviva. This is a painful nervous head-ach, which, perhaps you have sometimes heard me speak of before. Give me leave to say, I find no physic comparable to your letters. If, as it is said in Ecclesiasticus, "Friendship be the physic of the mind," prescribe to me, dear Gray, as often and as much as you think proper, I shall be a most obedient patient. Non ego Fidis irascar medicis, offendar amicis. I venture here to write you down a Greek epigram*, which I lately turned into Latin, and hope you will excuse it. Perspicui puerum ludentem in margine rivi Languidus, æternúm lumina composuit. Adieu! I am going to my tutor's lectures on one Puffendorff, † a very jurisprudent author as you shall read on a summer's day. Believe me yours, &c. Christ Church, Dec. 2, 1738. * Of Posidippus. Vide Anthologia, H. Stephan. p. 220. Mr. Gray in his MS. notes to this edition of the Anthologia (of which I shall give an account in a subsequent section) inserts this translation, and adds "Descriptio pulcherrima & quæ tenuem illum græcorum spiritum mirificè sapit;" and in conclusion, "Posidippus inter principes Anthologia poetas emicat, Ptolemæi Philadelphi seculo vixit."Mason. + Professor D. Stewart, in his first Dissertation prefixed to the Supplement to the Encyclop. Britannica, (p. 135) has quoted this passage in the name of Gray, and not of West.-Ed. XII. MR. WEST TO MR. GRAY. LITERAS mi Favonî ! * abs te demum, nudiustertiùs credo, accepi planè mellitas, nisi fortè quà de ægritudine quâdam tuâ dictum : atque hoc sane mihi habitum est non paulò acerbiùs, quod te capitis morbo implicitum esse intellexi; oh morbum mihi quam odiosum! qui de industria id agit, ut ego in singulos menses, dii boni, quantis jocunditatibus orbarer! quàm ex animo mihi dolendum est, quod Medio de fonte leporum Surgit amari aliquid. Salutem mehercule, nolo, tam, parvipendas, atq; amicis tam improbè consulas: quanquam tute fortassis-æstuas angusto limite mundi, viamq; (ut dicitur) affectas Olympo, nos tamen non esse tam sublimes, utpote qui hisce in sordibus & fæce diutius paululum versari volumus, reminiscendum est: illæ tuæ Musæ, si te ament modo, derelinqui paulisper non nimis ægrè patientur: indulge, amabo te, plusquam soles, corporis exercitationibus: magis te campus habeat, aprico magis te dedas otio, ut ne id ingenium quod tam cultum curas, diligenter nimis * Mr. Gray, in all his latin compositions addressed to this gentleman, calls him Favonius, in allusion to the name of West.-Mason. dum foves, officiosarum matrum ritu, interimas. Vide quæso, quam 'arpixos tecum agimus, ηδ ̓ ἐπιθήσω Φάρμαχ ̓ ἅ κεν πάυσησι μελαινάων ὀδυνάων. * si de his pharmacis non satis liquet; sunt festivitates meræ, sunt facetiæ & risus; quos ego equidem si adhibere nequeo, tamen ad præcipiendum (ut medicorum fere mos est) certè satis sim; id, quod poeticè sub finem epistolæ lusisti, mihi gratissimum quidem accidit; admodum latinè coctum & conditum tetrasticon, græcam tamen illam å¿ɛλɛíav mirificè sapit tu quod restat, vide, sodes, hujusce hominis ignorantiam; cum, unde hoc tibi sit depromptum, (ut fatear) prorsus nescio: sane ego equidem nihil in capsis reperio quo tibi minimæ partis solutio fiat. Vale, & me ut soles, ama. A. D. 11, Kalend. Februar. XIII.+ MR. WEST TO MR. GRAY. I OUGHT to answer you in Latin, but I feel I dare not enter the lists with you-cupidum, pater optime, * Hom. Il. A. v. 191. + This was written in French, but as I doubted whether it would stand the test of polite criticism so well as the preceding would of learned, I chose to translate so much of it as I thought necessary in order to preserve the chain of correspondence.—Mason. vires deficiunt. Seriously, you write in that language with a grace and an Augustan urbanity that amazes me: Your Greek too is perfect in its kind. And here let me wonder that a man, longè græcorum doctissimus, should be at a loss for the verse and chapter whence my epigram is taken. I am sorry I have not my Aldus with me that I might satisfy your curiosity; but he with all my other literary folks are left at Oxford, and therefore you must still rest in suspence. I thank you again and again for your medical prescription. I know very well that those " 'risus, festivitates & facetiæ" would contribute greatly to my cure, but then you must be my apothecary as well as physician, and make up the dose as well as direct it; send me, therefore, an electuary of these drugs, made up secundùm artem, 66 et eris mihi magnus Apollo," in both his capacities as a god of poets and god of physicians. Wish me joy of leaving my college, and leave yours as fast as you can. I shall be settled at the temple very soon. Dartmouth-street, Feb. 21, 1737-8. |