profitable in future, but at present, upon the whole, infinitely more delightful. My own travels at present are none of the pleasantest: I am going through a fit of the gout; with much proper pain and what proper patience I may. Avis au lecteur, my sweet boy: remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth. Let no excesses lay the foundations of gout and the rest of Pandora's box; nor any immoralities, or vicious courses sow the seeds of a too late and painful repentance. Here ends my sermon, which, I trust, you are not fine gentleman enough, or in plain English, silly fellow enough, to laugh

at.

Lady Hester is much yours.

Let me hear some account of your

intercourse with the muses,

And believe me ever,

Your truly most affectionate.

LETTER XI.

Pay Office, April 15, 1755.

A THOUSAND thanks to my dear boy for a very pretty letter. I like extremely the account you give of your literary life; the reflexions you make upon some West Saxon actors in the times you are reading, are natural, manly, and sensible, and flow from a heart that will make you far superior to any of them. I am con

tent you should be interrupted (provided the interruption be not long) in the course of your reading by declaiming in defence of the Thesis you have so wisely chosen to maintain. It is true indeed that the affirmative maxim, Omne solum forti Patria est, has supported some great and good men under the persecutions of faction and party injustice, and taught them to prefer an hospitable retreat in a foreign land to an unnatural mother-country. Some few such may be found in ancient times: in our own country also some; such was Algernon Sidney, Ludlow, and others. But how dangerous is it to trust frail, corrupt man, with

F

such an aphorism! What fatal casuistry is it big with! How many a villain might, and has, masked himself in the sayings of ancient illustrious exiles, while he was, in fact, dissolving all the nearest and dearest ties that hold societies together, and spurning at all laws divine and human! How easy the transition from this political to some impious ecclesiastical aphorisms! If all soils are alike to the brave and virtuous, so may all churches and modes of worship; that is, all will be equally neglected and violated. Instead of every soil being his country; he will have no one for his country; he will be the folorn outcast of mankind.

Such