gaged (and if he is by any creature, it is by you), I hope she will join us. I am, with great truth, Madam, Your most faithful friend, and obliged fervant, A. POPE. LET LETTER IV. I MADAM, COULD not play the impertinent fo far as to write to you, till I was encouraged to it by a piece of news Mrs H tells me, which ought to be the most agreeable in the world to any author, That you are determined to write no more-It is now the time then, not for me only, but but for every body, to write without fear, or wit and I fhall give you the firft example here. But for this affurance, it would be every way too dangerous to correfpond with a lady, whose very first fight and very first writings had such an effect, upon a man used to what they call fine fights, and what they call fine writings. Yet he has been dull enough to fleep quietly, after all he has feen, and all he has read; till broke in upon yours his ftupidity and indolence, and totally deftroyed it. But, God be thanked, you will write no more; fo I am in 5 no no danger of increafing my admiration of you one way; and as to the other, you will never (I have too much reason to fear) open these eyes again with one glimpse of you. I AM told, you named lately in a letter a place called Twitenham, with particular distinction. That you may not be mif-conftrued and have your meaning mistaken for the future, I must acquaint you, Madam, that the name of the place where Mrs. H▬▬ is, is not Twitenham, but Richmond; which your ignorance in the geography D geography of these parts has made you confound together. You will unthinkingly do honour to a paltry hermitage (while you fpeak of Twitenham) where lives a creature alto gether unworthy your memory or notice, because he really wishes he had never beheld you, nor yours. You have spoiled him for a folitaire, and a book, all the days of his life; and put him into fuch a condition, that he thinks of nothing, and enquires of nothing but after a person who has nothing to fay to him, and has left him for ever without hope of ever |