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LETTER

To Mr. J. M.

DEAR SIR,

CANNOT, with fatisfaction to

myself, enjoy the noble pre

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fent of books you have been fo kind to fend me, without acknowledging it in a manner fomewhat more durable than by word of mouth. But as I know that repeated thanks would not be agreeable to your generous mind, I fhall reftrain my pen from doing justice to my heart, and rather tell you, what I am fure will hear with pleafure, -That nothing could have been more agreeable

you

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agreeable and acceptable, and I really think more beneficial to me, than this mark of your affection.

As I have no extravagant inclinations to gratify, and live within my income, an addi tion of fortune, at my time of life especially, would have been no great benefit, nor have afforded me much pleasure, except that of bestowing, which is indeed a pleasure. I have food and raiment for the body, and am therewith content: but you have given me food for the mind, which, if my digeftion. and concoction were but good enough, would afford excellent nourishment.

MANY of the viands you have furnished my table with, are not only of the best kind, but fo neatly dished up, as to please the eye, and excite the appetite, at the fame time that they afford the most delicious repaft. Do not you think that Horace, whofe characteristic was elegance, would have been delighted with fuch an elegant tranfcript of his works, as Pine has given to the public, and you to me? I doubt not but it would have produced an ode in praise of the ingenious artist. And might not Cæfar himself, could he be fenfible of it, receive pleasure in seeing fuch an accurate and beautiful edition of his Commentaries, as the late learned Dr. Clarke published and favoured the world with? Had

this magnificent performance appeared in Cafar's time, he would certainly have made the editor a princely prefent; (for Cæfar was generous) and I think he would not have forgot honeft Jacob Tonfon, the printer, who has admirably well acquitted himself of his part. I affure you, if I had as rich a cabinet as Alexander the Great was poffeffed of, and which he thought could not be fo well furnished as with Homer's works, I would place this book in it; yet not fo much for its own fake, tho' very valuable, as for that of the donor.

BUT to be a little more particular refpecting the benefit accruing to me by your kind gift.

HAVING been, as you know, for between thirty and forty years engaged in variety of affairs, which, by reafon of my ill ftate of health for the laft ten or twelve years, became very burdenfome to me; but being in a good degree freed from the trouble of business and the mifery of pain, I have for some time suspected, that I was not without danger of falling into too much indolence; perhaps of feeding the body, and starving the mind. But the mental entertainment you have fo kindly provided for me, has given a new turn to my difpofition, and I hope will be a means of putting the inB 2 tellectual

tellectual faculties into a quicker motion. To gain this point, give me leave to tell you how I employ myself, or rather how you have employed me. I am at prefent principally engaged in reading hiftory, and particularly renewing my acquaintance with Cafar and Livy. Will you indulge me in communicating to you my thoughts on thefe authors? What is the chief, or indeed almoft the only fubject of their hiftories? Do but read the titles of Cafar's particularly: De bello Gallico, De bello Hifpanienfi, De bello Africano, &c. and what is worst of all, De bello civili. Methinks, fuch tranfactions, varied and extended to other nations, are a kind of epitome of the principal contents of moft hiftories, facred, as they are called, and prophane. And pray, what are all these recitals of wars? Are they in reality any other than fo many accounts of horrid and barbarous murders, committed by men on their own fpecies? And for what? This is a question that very few of the multitudes employed in this cruel butcherly work can answer. A king or an emperor, who it is very likely has much uncultivated ground in his dominions, and will certainly caufe a great deal more to become fo by the deftruction of his people in war, wants a larger territory;

and

and he who perhaps totally neglects the government of his own fubjects, or governs them very ill, and treats them as flaves, fpares neither blood or treasure to bring more people under his dominion, that he may add to the number of the afflicted and the miferable. It is apparent, that lust of power, and the fenfelefs quarrels of princes, are generally the causes of wars, and of the devaftations and cruel slaughter of their fubjects attending them. About an hundred years ago, the king of Pegu made war againft the king of Siam, with an army of above a million of foot, two hundred thousand horse, five thousand elephants, three thousand camels, &c. The cause of this war was to take two white elephants from the king of Siam; and to do the like from the king of Pegu, the kings of Arrican and Tangu waged war

with him".

HORACE, in his fecond epiftle to Lollius, fays, very juftly,

Quicquid delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi.

And your favourite Virgil, at the latter end of his first book of Georgics, very emphatically deplores the miseries of war in the following lines:

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• Atlas Geographus, vol. III. Afia, p. 662.

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