Imatges de pàgina
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We call you brethren; the next thing
Is to inquire what goods you bring,
To enrich or please us, else go forth;
We love you just as much as you are worth.
This your commissioners have taught us,
Who sold you to us, when they sought us.
So, just as they do in your name
Our promises, I do your's claim;
Which you may break, as we, at will,

Or, if it please, you may fulfil.

Since thus united we possess you,

When you make us sneeze, we cry, God bless you.
The snuff which you encouraged me

To hope for, will be charity;

Which to your slave when you convey,

Your poor petitioner shall pray.

B. C.

A Letter of Advice to the Reverend Dr D-la-y, humbly proposed to the Consideration of a certain great Lord.

[This curious libel upon Dr Delany takes the same tone with the rebuke administered to him by Swift, for boasting of his intimacy with Delany. See Vol, XIV. p. 400 and 424, and also p. 357 of this volume, where it is observed that there occurred some coldness between the Dean and Delany. I have a copy of verses upon Lord Carteret, supposed to be written by Dr De lany himself, in which his Lordship's taste for society is charac terized by the last line :

"He chooses Delany and Tickell for friends."

This affectation of holding himself forth as the chosen favourite of the lord-lieutenant's easier hours, called down the censure of Tisdal, Smedley, and others, to one of whom we owe the following lines. They are here inserted as throwing some light on Swift's literary history.]

WHAT Doctor, if great Carteret condescends
To chat with Swift and you as private friends,
Must you so silly be to tell the town,

And boast of freedoms he may blush to own;
Is this the modest dutiful behaviour

You shew your patron, for so great a favour?
Think you these honours to your merit due?
What equal honours can reflect from you?
You may perhaps propose immortal fame,
Under the shelter of your patron's name,
If you presume too far, you miss that end,
For the like course lost Swift his Gallstown friend,
And may in time disturb your patron too,
To see the simple choice he's made of you.
But is my lord still short of his intent?
Or is your merit of that vast extent,

That nothing less than thousands can content?
There was a time when Paddy, out of hope,
Thought a West Indian jaunt his utmost scope.
The world's well mended since with Patrick, now
Nothing but vistos and canals will do.

But pray, great sir, what friend of common sense,
Would labour to promote such vain expence ?
And must your breth'ren all in hamlets dwell,
T' adorn your busts, and young St Patrick's cell?
Why may not some of 'em, for ought you know,
Have a desire to build and to bestow?

Retrench then, and be modest if you can, Sir,
Or raise objections stronger than your answer.
Think, Doctor, after double vicar, double rector,
A dignity in Christ-Church lecture:

And something else, which you have still forgot,
A college place. Won't all this boil the pot.
Then judge how very aukwardly it looks,
"You have not yet enough to buy your books."
Good Patrick take advice, and first read o'er
The books you have, before you call for more;
Resign some of those cures you labour hard in,
If you must spend whole summers in your garden,
Attend some one at least, and quit Glass-Nevin,
Which will destroy your credit, if you live in,

Let Barber, tho' polite, at counter wait,
Nor longer be caress'd in pomp and state,
Quickly do this, or you may some provoke
To say, you mean to fleece, not feed the flock.

APPENDIX. No. XI.

DR SWIFT'S WILL, WITH THE CODICIL

ANNEXED.

[These documents are preserved in the Prerogative Office, Henrietta Street, Dublin. The will is written upon vellum, by the Dean's own hand. The codicil, which is now published for the first time, is upon paper. It is not in the Dean's hand-writing, excepting the date and signature. The following letter to Mrs Whiteway, never before published, forms an Introduction to the Will.]

A Letter of the Dean to Mrs Whiteway, endorsed by him, "March 26, 1737. Directions to Mrs Whiteway."

As soon as you are assured of my death, whether it shall happen to be in town or the country, I desire you will go immediately to the Deanery, and if I die in the country, I desire you will send down a strong coffin, to have my body brought to town, and deposited in any dry part of St Patrick's Cathedral. Then you are to take my keys, and find my will, and send for as many of my executors as are in town, and in presence of three of them have my will read; and what you see therein that relates to yourself, and is to take place after my death, you are to do in their presence, first delivering my keys to my executors, and then demanding those keys to search where my ready money lies, and take it for your own use, as my will empowers you. But upon their notes you are to lend the money to them, for the charges of

my funeral, as directed in my will. Then you are to see that one or more of my said executors shall order my plate and household goods, and other things of value, and what are lockt up in my scrutoires, cabinets, &c. to be entered in a list, and secured in their several places, for my executors to dispose of them as my will provides.

You are likewise to deliver the keys of all the rooms, cellars, &c. to my said executors, and often to entreat them to come to the Deanery and pursue the directions in my will, &c.

Deanery-house, March 25, 1737.

JONATH. SWIFT.

You are to deliver my executors all my bonds, mortgages, and papers relating to money, &c. when they shall have agreed where to deposit them with security, taking their receipts.

Deanery-house, March 25, 1737.

JONATH. SWIFT.

In the name of GOD, Amen. I JONATHAN SWIFT, doctor in divinity, and Dean of the cathedral church of St Patrick, Dublin, being at this present of sound mind, although weak in body, do here make my last will and testament, hereby revoking all my former wills.

Imprimis, I bequeath my soul to God, (in humble hopes of his mercy through Jesus Christ) and my body to the earth. And I desire that my body may be buried in the great aisle of the said cathedral, on the south side, under the pillar next to the monument of primate Narcissus Marsh, three days after my decease, as privately as possible, and at twelve o'clock at night, and that a black marble of

feet square, and seven feet from the ground, fixed to the wall, may be erected, with the following inscription in large letters, deeply cut, and strongly gilded.

Item, I give and bequeath to my executors, all my worldly substance, of what nature or kind soever (except such part thereof as is herein after particularly devised) for the following uses and purposes, that is to say, to the intent that they, or the survivors or survivor of them, his executors, or administrators, as soon as conveniently may be after my

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death, shall turn it all into ready money, and lay out the same in purchasing lands of inheritance in fee simple, situate in any province in Ireland, except Connaught, but as near to the city of Dublin as conveniently can be found, and not incumbered with, or subject to any leases for lives renewable, or any terms, for years longer than thirty-one; and I desire that a yearly annuity of twenty pounds sterling, out of the annual profits of such lands, when purchased, and out of the yearly income of my said fortune, devised to my executors, as aforesaid, until such purchase shall be made, shall be paid to Rebecca Dingley, of the city of Dublin, spinster, during her life, by two equal half-yearly payments, on the feast of All Saints, and St Philip, and St Jacob, the first payment to be made on such of the said feasts as shall happen next after my death. And that the residue of the yearly profits of the said lands, when purchased, and until such purchase be made, the residue of the yearly income and interest of my said fortune devised as aforesaid, to my executors, shall be laid out in purchasing a piece of land situate near Dr Steevens's hospital, or if it cannot be there had, somewhere in or near the city of Dublin, large enough for the purposes herein aftermentioned, and in building thereon an hospital large enough for the reception of as many idiots and lunatics as the annual income of the said lands and worldly substance shall be sufficient to maintain; and I desire that the said hospital may be called St Patrick's Hospital, and may be built in such a manner, that another building may be added unto it, in case the endowment thereof shall be enlarged; so that the additional building may make the whole edifice regular and complete. And my farther will and desire is, that when the said hospital shall be built, the whole yearly income of the said lands and estate shall, for ever after, be laid out in providing victuals, clothing, medicines, attendance, and all other necessaries for such idiots and lunatics as shall be received into the same; and in repairing and enlarging the building from time to time, as there may be occasion. And, if a sufficient number of idiots and lunatics cannot readily be found, I desire that incurables may be taken into the said hospital to supply such deficiency; but, that no person shall be admitted into it, that labours under any infectious disease; and that

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