Olney, April 8, 1781. My dear Friend,-Since I commenced author, my letters are even less worth your acceptance that they were before. I shall soon however, lay down the character, and cease to trouble you with directions to a printer, at least till the summer is over. If I live to see the return of winter, I may, perhaps, assume it again; but my appetite for fame is not keen enough to combat with my love of fine weather, my love of indolence, and my love of gardening employments.

ers.

TO THE REV. JOHN NEWTON.*

Olney, Monday, April 23, 1781. My dear Friend,-Having not the least doubt of your ability to execute just such a preface as I should wish to see prefixed to my publication, and being convinced that you have no good foundation for those which you yourself entertain upon the subject, I neither withdraw my requisition nor abate one jot of the earnestness with which I made it. I admit the delicacy of the occasion, but am far from apprehending that you will therefore find it difficult to succeed. You can draw a hair-stroke where another man would make a blot as broad as a sixpence.

I am much obliged to you for the interest you take in the appearance of my poems, and do it. Your favorable opinion of them afmuch pleased by the alacrity with which you fords me a comfortable presage with respect lowances for your partiality to me and mine, to that of the public; for though I make albecause mine, yet I am sure you would not suffer me unadmonished to add myself to the multitude of insipid rhymers, with whose productions the world is already too much pestered.

I

It is worth while to send you a riddle, you I send you, by Mr. Old, my works commake such a variety of guesses, and turn and plete, bound in brown paper, and numbered according to the series in which I would have tumble it about with such an industrious cuthem published. With respect to the poem-let me see; it requires some consideration riosity. The solution of that in question is called "Truth," it is so true, that it can hardly to explain it, even though I made it. fail of giving offence to unenlightened readI think, therefore, that, in order to ob- raised the seed that produced the plant that viate in some measure those prejudices that produced the fruit that produced the seed will naturally erect their bristles against it, latter seed I gave to the gardener of Tyringthat produced the fruit I sent you. This an explanatory preface, such as you (and noham, who brought me the cucumber you body so well as you) can furnish me with, mention. Thus you see I raised it-that is will have every grace of propriety to recomto say, mend it. Or, if you are not averse to the its progenitor; and yet I did not raise it, I raised it virtually by having raised task, and your avocations will allow you to undertake it, and if you think it would be because the identical seed from which it grew

more proper, I should be glad to be indested to you for a preface to the whole. I wish you, however, to consult your own judgment upon the occasion, and to engage in either of these works, or neither, just as your discretion guides you.

I have written a great deal to-day, which must be my excuse for an abrupt conclusion. Our love attends you both. We are in pretty good health; Mrs. Unwin, indeed, better than

usual: and as to me, I ail nothing but the

incurable ailment.

Yours, my dear friend, W. C. Thanks for the cocoa-nut.

was raised at a distance. You observe I did not speak rashly when I spoke of it as dark to call your own sagacity in question for fallenough to pose an Edipus, and have no need ing short of the discovery.

A report has prevailed at Olney that you are coming in a fortnight; but, taking it for granted that you know best when you shall come, and that you will make us happy in the same knowledge as soon as you are possessed of it yourself, I did not venture to build any

sanguine expectations upon it.

I have at last read the second volume of Mr.'s work, and had some hope that I should prevail with myself to read the first

I send you a cucumber, not of my own likewise. I began his book at the latter end, raising, and yet raised by me.

Solve this enigma, dark enough

To puzzle any brains

That are not downright puzzle-proof,
And eat it for your pains.

* Private correspondence.

because the first part of it was engaged when I received the second; but I had not so good an appetite as the soldier of the Guards, who, I was informed when I lived in London, would for a small matter, eat up a cat alive, * Private correspondence.

beginning at her tail and finishing with her argument, you must. You have still however whiskers.

Yours, ut semper, W. C.

one comfort left, that what I must write, you may or may not read, just as it shall please you; unless Lady Anne at your elbow should say you must read it, and then, like a true knight, you will obey without looking for a remedy.

The period was now arrived, in which Cowper was at length to make his appearance in the avowed character of an author. It is an epoch in British literature worthy of In the press, and speedily will be published, being recorded, because poetry in his hands in one volume octavo, price three shillings, became the handmaid of morality and religion. Poems, by William Cowper, of the Inner Too often has the Muse been prostituted to Temple, Esq. You may suppose, by the size more ignoble ends. But it is to the praise of the publication, that the greatest part of of Cowper, that he never wrote a line at them have been long kept secret, because you which modesty might blush. His verse is yourself have never seen them; but the truth identified with whatever is pure in conception, is, that they were most of them, except what chaste in imagery, and moral in its aim. His you have in your possession, the produce of object was to strengthen, not to enervate; to the last winter. Two-thirds of the compilaimpart health, not to administer to disease; tion will be occupied by four pieces, the first and to inspire a love for virtue, by exhibiting of which sprung up in the month of December, the deformity of vice. So long as nature and the last of them in the month of March. shall possess the power to charm, and the They contain, I suppose, in all, about two interests of solid truth and wisdom, arrayed thousand and five hundred lines; are known, in the garb of taste, and enforced by nervous or to be known in due time, by the names of language, shall deserve to predominate over Table Talk-The Progress of Error-Truth seductive imagery, the page of Cowper will-Expostulation. Mr. Newton writes a predemand our admiration, and be read with delight and profit.

The following letters afford a very pleasing circumstantial account of the manner in which he was induced to venture into the world as a poet.

face, and Johnson is the publisher. The principal, I may say the only, reason why I never mentioned to you, till now, an affair which I am just going to make known to all the world (if that Mr. All-the-world should think it worth his knowing) has been this; that till within these few days, I had not the honor to know it myself. This may seem strange, but it is true, for, not knowing where to find underwriters who would choose to insure them, and not finding it convenient to a purse like mine to run any hazard, even upon the credit of my own ingenuity, I was very much in doubt for some weeks whether any bookseller would be willing to subject himself to an ambiguity, that might prove very expensive in case of a bad market. But Johnson has heroically set all peradventures at defiance, and takes the whole charge upon His himself. So out I come. I shall be glad of my Translations from Vincent Bourne in your next frank. My Muse will lay herself at your feet immediately on her first public appearance.

We will only add to the information they contain what we learn from the authority of his guardian friend, Mrs. Unwin, that she strongly solicited him, on his recovery from a very long fit of mental dejection, to devote his thoughts to poetry of considerable extent. She suggested to him, at the same time, the first subject of his verse, "The Progress of Error," which the reader will recollect as the second poem in his first volume. The time when that volume was completed, and the motives of its author for giving it to the world, are clearly displayed in an admirable letter to his poetical consin, Mrs. Cowper. feelings, on the approach of publication, are described with his usual nobleness of sentiment and simplicity of expression, in reply to a question upon the subject from the anxious young friend to whom he gave the first notice of his intention in the next letter.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.
Olney, May 1, 1781.

Your mother says I must write, and must admits of no apology; I might otherwise plead, that I have nothing to say, that I am weary, that I am dull, that it would be more convenient therefore for you, as well as for myself, that I should let it alone. But all these pleas, and whatever pleas besides, either disinclination, indolence, or necessity might suggest are overruled, as they ought to be, the moment a lady adduces her irrefragable

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, May 23, 1781. My dear Friend,-If a writer's friends have need of patience, how much more the writer! Your desire to see my Muse in public, and mine to gratify you, must both suffer the mortification of delay. I expected that my trumpeter would have informed the world, by this time, of all that is needful for them to know upon such an occasion; and that an advertising blast, blown through every newspaper, would have said "The Poet is coming."-But man, especially man that writes verse, is born to disappointments, as surely as printers and booksellers are born to be the most dilatory and tedious of all crea tures. The plain English of this magnificent preamble is, that the season of publication is just elapsed, that the town is going into the country every day, and that my book cannot appear till they return, that is to say, not till next winter. This misfortune, however, comes not without its attendant advantage; I shall now have, what I should not

LIFE OF COWPER.

otherwise have had, an opportunity to correet the press myself: no small advantage upon any occasion, but especially important where poetry is concerned! A single erratum may knock out the brains of a whole passage, and that, perhaps, which of all others the unfortunate poet is the most proud of. Add to this that, now and then, there is to be found in a printing-house a presumptuous intermeddler, who will fancy himself a poet too, and, what is still worse, a better than he that employs him. The consequence is that, with cobbling and tinkering, and patching on here and there a shred of his own, he makes such a difference between the original and the copy, that an author cannot know his own work again. Now, as I choose to be responsible for nobody's dulness but my own, I am a little comforted when I reflect that it will be in my power to prevent all such impertinence, and yet not without your assistance. It will be quite necessary that the correspondence between me and Johnson should be carried on without the expense of postage, because proof-sheets would make double or treble letters, which expense, as in every instance it must occur twice, first when the packet is sent and again when it is returned, would be rather inconvenient to me, who, as you perceive, am forced to live by my wits, and to him who hopes to get a little Half matter, no doubt, by the same means.

a dozen franks, therefore, to me, and totidem to him will be singularly acceptible, if you can, without feeling it in any respect a trouble, procure them for me.*

I am much obliged to you for your offer to support me in a translation of Bourne. It is but seldom, however, and never except for my amusement, that I translate; because I find it disagreeable to work by another man's pattern; I should, at least, be sure to find it so in a business of any length. Again, that is epigrammatic and witty in Latin which would be perfectly insipid in English, and a translator of Bourne would frequently find himself obliged to supply what is called the torn, which is in fact the most difficult and the most expensive part of the whole composition, and could not, perhaps, in many instances, be done with any tolerable success. If a Latin poem is neat, elegant, and musical, it is enough-but English readers are not so easily satisfied. To quote myself, you will find, in comparing the jackdaw with the original, that I was obliged to sharpen a point which, though smart enough in the Latin. would in English have appeared as plain and as blunt as the tag of a lace. I

The privilege of franking letters was formerly exercised in a very different manner from what is now in

The name of the M.P. was inserted, as is usual, on We cover of the letter, but the address was left to be subled when and where the writer of the letter found it most expedient.

love the memory of Vinny Bourne. I think
him a better Latin poet than Tibullus, Pro-
pertius, Ausonius,* or any of the writers in
his way, except Ovid, and not at all inferior
to him. I love him too, with a love of par-
tiality, because he was usher of the fifth
form at Westminster, when I passed through
it. He was so good-natured, and so indo-
lent, that I lost more than I got by him; for
he made me as idle as himself. He was such
a sloven, as if he had trusted to his genius
as a cloak for everything that could disgust
you in his person; and indeed in his writings
he has almost made amends for all. His
humor is entirely original-he can speak of
a magpie or a cat in terms so exquisitely ap-
propriate to the character he draws, that one
would suppose him animated by the spirit of
the creature he describes. And with all his
drollery there is a mixture of rational and even
religious reflection at times, and always an
air of pleasantry, good-nature, and humanity,
that makes him, in my mind, one of the most
amiable writers in the world. It is not com-
mon to meet with an author, who can make
you smile and yet at nobody's expense; who
is always entertaining and yet always harm-
less; and who, though always elegant, and
classical to a degree not always found in the
classics themselves, charms more by the sim-
plicity and playfulness of his ideas than by
the neatness and purity of his verse; yet
such was poor Vinny. I remember seeing
the Duke of Richmond set fire to his greasy
I seem
locks, and box his ears to put it out again.
Since I began to write long poems
to turn up my nose at the idea of a short one.
I have lately entered upon one, which, if ever
But this must
finished, cannot easily be comprised in much
less than a thousand lines!
make part of a second publication, and be
accompanied, in due time, by others not yet
thought of; for it seems (what I did not
know till the bookseller had occasion to tell
me so) that single pieces stand no chance, and
go down.
that nothing less than a volume will
You yourself afford me a proof of the cer-
tainty of this intelligence, by sending me
franks which nothing less than a volume can
fill. I have accordingly sent you one, but
am obliged to add that, had the wind been in
any other point of the compass, or, blowing
as it does from the east, had it been less bois-
terous, you must have been contented with
a much shorter letter, but the abridgment of
every other occupation is very favorable to
that of writing.

I am glad I did not expect to hear from

*The classic beauty and felicity of expression in the Latin compositions of Bourne have been justly admired;" but a doubt will exist in the mind of the classical reader, whether the praise which exalts his merits above those of a Tibullus, to whom both Ovid and Horace have borne so distinguished testimony, does not exceed the bounds of legitimate eulogy.

Olney, May 28, 1781. My dear Friend,-I am much obliged to you for the pains you have taken with my "Table Talk," and wish that my viva voce table-talk could repay you for the trouble you have had with the written one.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.
Olney, May 28, 1781.
My dear Friend,-I believe I never gave
you trouble without feeling more than I give.
So much by way of preface and apology!

Thus stands the case-Johnson has begun to print, and Mr. Newton has already corrected the first sheet. This unexpected despatch makes it necessary for me to furnish myself with the means of communication, viz., the franks, as soon as may be. There are reasons (I believe I mentioned in my last) why I choose to revise the proof myself: nevertheless, if your delicacy must suffer the puncture of a pin's point in procuring the franks for me, I release you entirely from the task: you are as free as if I had never mentioned them. But you will oblige me by a speedy answer upon this subject, because it is expedient that the printer should know to whom he is to send his copy; and when the press is once set, those humble servants of the poets are rather impatient of any delay, because the types are wanted for other authors, who are equally impatient to be born.

The season is wonderfully improved within this day or two; and if these cloudless skies are continued to us, or rather if the cold winds do not set in again, promises you a pleasant excursion, as far, at least, as the weather can conduce to make it such. You seldom complain of too much sunshine, and if you are prepared for a heat somewhat like that of Africa, the south walk in our long garden will exactly suit you. Reflected from the gravel and from the walls, and beating upon your head at the same time, it may possibly make you wish you could enjoy for an hour or two that immensity of shade afforded This fine weather, I suppose, sets you on by the gigantic trees still growing in the land horseback, and allures the ladies into the of your captivity. If you could spend a garden. If I was at Stock, I should be of day now and then in those forests, and return their party, and, while they sat knotting or with a wish to England, it would be no small netting in the shade, should comfort myself addition to the number of your best pleas- with the thought that I had not a beast under ures. But penna non homini date. The time me whose walk would seem tedious, whose will come, perhaps, (but death will come trot would jumble me, and whose gallop first,) when you will be able to visit them might throw me into a ditch. What nature without either danger, trouble, or expense; expressly designed me for I have never been and when the contemplation of those well- able to conjecture, I seem to myself so uniremembered scenes will awaken in you emo-versally disqualified for the common and tions of gratitude and praise, surpassing all you could possibly sustain at present. In this sense, I suppose there is a heaven upon earth at all times, and that the disembodied spirit may find a peculiar joy, arising from the contemplation of those places it was formerly conversant with, and so far, at least, be reconciled to a world it was once so weary of, as to use it in the delightful way of thankful recollection.

Miss Catlett must not think of any other lodging than we can, without any inconvenience as we shall with all possible pleasure, furnish her with. We can each of us saythat is, I can say it in Latin, and Mrs. Unwin in English-Nihil tui a me alienum puto.

Having two more letters to write, I find myself obliged to shorten this; so once more wishing you a good journey, and ourselves the happiness of receiving you in good health and spirits,

I remain affectionately yours, W. C.

* Private corespondence.

† Mr. Newton's voyage to Africa, and his state of mind at that period, are feelingly described by himself in his own writings, as well as the great moral change which he subsequently experienced.

customary occupations and amusements of mankind. When I was a boy, I excelled at cricket and football, but the fame I acquired by achievements that way is long since forgotten, and I do not know that I have made a figure in anything since. I am sure, however, that she did not design me for a horseman, and that, if all men were of my mind, there would be an end of all jockeyship for ever. I am rather straitened for time, and not very rich in materials; therefore, with our joint love to you all, conclude myself, Yours ever, W. C.

TO THE REV. WILLIAM UNWIN.

Olney, Jun. 5, 1781. My dear Friend,-If the old adage be true, that "he gives twice who gives speedily," it is equally true that he who not only uses expedition in giving, but gives more than was asked, gives thrice at least. Such is the style in which Mr. confers a favor. He has not only sent me franks to Johnson, but, under another cover, has added six to you.