Hill.
I have now attempted, as far as I am able, to throw off a Weight,
which my Mind has been uneasy under. I cannot say, in the City
Phrase, that I have balanc'd the Account, but you must admit of
Composition, where full Payment is impossible. I shall be so far
from regretting you the old Benefit of Lex talionis, that I
forgive you heartily, beforehand, for any thing you may hereafter
think fit to say, or do, to my Disadvantage; nay, the Pleasure I
enjoy by reflecting on your good Nature, will degenerate to a
Pain, if one Accident or other, in the Course of your Life, does
not favour me with some Occasion of advancing your Interest.
Having said thus much to you, in your Quality of a Good Man, I
will proceed to address you, in your other Quality, of a Great
Poet; in which Light I look up to you with extraordinary Comfort,
as to a new Constellation breaking out upon our World, with equal
Heat, and Brightness, and cross-spangling, as it were, the whole
Heaven of Wit with your milky way of Genius.
You cou'd never have been born at a Time, which more wanted the
Influence of your Example: All the Fire you bring with you, and
the Judgment you are acquiring, in the Course of your Journey,
will be put to their full stress, to support and rebuild the
sinking Honours of Poetry.
It was a Custom, which prevail'd generally among the Ancients, to
impute Celestial Descent to their Heroes; The Vanity, methinks,
might have been pardonable, and rational, if apply'd to an Art;
since Arts, when they are at once delightful and profitable, as
you will certainly leave Poetry, have one real Mark of Divinity,
they become, in some measure, immortal.
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