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LETTER XIV.

WALLER to ST. EVREMOND.

HE Charm that bound Proteus, and com

THE

pelled him to prophefy, could not be more powerful than that you have found out to make me philosophize. For as Proteus, though, posfibly, fomething more of a God, was not, by your Account, more volatile than myself, nothing less than the Magic in the Name of Mazarin could have fixed me to the fober Point ́of Philofophy.

You may remember I told you, that you had an extensive Procefs to go through, before you could arrive at that State of Mind which is immediately reconciled to every Event. I meant not that you should facrifice your Paffions, or dismiss your Defires. I did not propose to reduce you to a State of Indifference to every Object, for that would have been to cut off the Sources of Pleasure; and I am of Opinion that our Friend Horace was never more out in his Philofophy, than in the following Couplet :

Nit

* Níl admirari prope res eft una, Numici, Solaque qua poteft facere, et fervare beatum.

For though to admire nothing may be a Means of preventing Regret, it can be no Means of Happiness, at least of that Kind of Happiness which obtains in my Creed; for that is Pleasure. If Ease be Happiness, If an Exemption from Evil alone may be termed fo, the Dead have the best Claim to it, and the Inhabitants of Vaults and Charnels are more to be envied than the Living.

But this was never the Purpose of Nature. The Portion the gives her Children is the Enjoyment of their Existence, and those are the most undutiful who most neglect or depreciate this her first and greatest Law.

Nothing that is not dear to us can be enjoyed: For this Reason Nature has given us Attachments, Affections, and Defires.

C 4

* Thus tranflated by Creech:

"Naught to admire is all the Art we know "To make Men happy, and to keep them fo."

The

Pope has borrowed this Translation, because he could not find a better; and then very ungratefully laughs at poor Creech for lending him it.

"So take it in the very Words of Creech."

The End of these Gifts was to promote our Happiness; when they are retained longer than that Purpose can be answered; when they are extended to Objects out of our Power, it is not Nature that errs; we alone are to blame, who mifapply her Gifts.

While we are attached to particular Objects, that Attachment conftitutes our Happiness, fo long as they are in our Power. When that

ceases to be the Cafe; when this Law of Nature is obliged to give Place to the Contingencies of Fortune, or is fuperfeded by fome other Law of her own, then are we not to imitate Nature herself in this Cafe, and make the Lefs fubmit to the Greater? No —we will not yield to this. We are determined to retain our Attachments when their Objects are vanished; we cherish what is altogether fuperfluous; and what was given us for our Pleasure we pervert to a Tor

ment.

It is not neceffary to fpecify the several Objects I allude to: I mean whatever is the End of our Pursuits, Affections, Paffions, and Defires. Whether Love or Friendship, Fame, Place, or Power, or whatever else may be the Subject, the Rule is ftill the fame. While either Hope, or Defire can be reasonably exercifed, we follow

our

our Happiness in the Paths that Nature has pointed out to us; but when Hope is cut off, our Pursuits are Madness; and when Defire can no longer be gratified, the Indulgence of it is Folly.

Thefe Speculations, you will fay, are easy, and the Charge may be just; but is it so easy to overcome an Attachment which is grown into Habit, and has been confirmed by Time? Certainly, I answer, there can be no Difficulty in doing what Nature intended we should do.

Were it unnatural it might be difficult. Our Love of Life lafts as long as Life itself, because it was fo long neceffary for the Preservation of our Being; yet this Love of Life cannot poffibly furvive its Object, and that is the General Law which Nature has given to all our Attachments. She never meant that they should last longer than the tranfient Subjects that occafioned them; and if she never meant it, it cannot be difficult for us to act in Conformity to her original Pur poses.

It is generally a Disposition to act contrary to Nature which occafions our Mifery in this, as well as in almost every other Respect. It is from her Bounty we derive the Objects of Enjoyment; but with this we are not fatisfied; we

want to prescribe the Terms and the Duration of that Enjoyment ourselves. When she has lent us the Play-things of Pleasure for our Amusement, like Children, we cannot part with them without Petulance and Tears. No;-it must be the laft Bauble, or nothing. In vain the offers us fomething else She has taken the Bells from us; and the Whistle she holds out to us we snatch, and dash it to the Ground.

Thus we act like Children, and it is like Children we fuffer. Could we but perfuade ourfelves quietly to give up one Toy, and take another, how much Mifery, occafioned by Obftinacy and Abfurdity, might we avoid!

It would, moreover, be no very ineffectual Means of inducing us to part unreluctantly with what we have enjoyed, if we should then begin to view the Object in the most unfavourable Light. Nothing more probable than that we fhould find it a Toy! We often admire without Attention, or the Exercise of Reason; and it is neceffary we should; for were we to examine minutely every Object that should engage our Affections, or exercife our Defires, we should find so much Weakness, fuch infignificant Properties, or fuch contemptible Qualities, that Defire and Affection would for ever be suspended, and

we