ensively, and when old age came on, which not only
abates thirst, but oftentimes gives a disrelish to these and almost all
other things, which do not help to make our passage into eternity more
easy, he then destroyed them (I dare believe) in order to prevent the
malicious reflections of an ill-natured world.

I have always been a passionate lover of History and Antiquity,
Biography, and Northern Literature: and as I have ever hated idleness,
so I have in my time filled many hundred sheets with my useless
scribble, the greater part of which I will commit to the flames shortly,
to prevent their giving me any uneasiness in my last moments.[107]

[May 22, 1753.]

FOOTNOTES:

[106] Ballard's _Memoirs of Learned Ladies of Great Britain who have
been celebrated for their writings or skill in the Learned Languages
Arts & Sciences_, appeared at Oxford in 4to (1752) and 8vo (1775). It
contains some sixty lives, the most noteworthy names being those of
Queens Elizabeth and Mary of Scotland, Lady Jane Grey, Margaret Countess
of Richmond (_the_ "Lady Margaret"), the Duchess of Newcastle, Lady
Winchelsea, the two Countesses of Pembroke ("Sidney's sister" and Anne
Clifford), Dame Juliana Barnes or Berners, Dryden's Anne Killigrew,
Dorothy Pakington (the alleged author of _The Whole Duty of Man_), and
"the matchless Orinda."

[107] Perhaps a note should be added on "Mrs. Hopton" and "F.
Turbe(r)ville." The former, born Susanna Harvey (1627-1709), was the
wife of a Welsh judge, and wrote devotional works. The latter, Henry T.
(d. 1678: the "F" of text is of course "Father"), was a writer of
doctrinal and controversial manuals on the Roman side.

THOMAS GRAY (1716-1771)

The chief thing to add to what has been said of Gray in the
Introduction is something that may draw attention to a
curious feature of his letters, not there distinctly
noticed. Letters, it must be sufficiently seen even from
this little book, have a curious _variety_ of relation to
the characters, personal and literary, of their writers.
Sometimes they show us phases entirely or almost entirely
concealed in the published works; sometimes again, without
definitely revealing new aspects, they complete and enforce
the old; while, in yet a third, though perhaps the smallest,
class of instances, they are as it were results of the same
governing formula as that of the published works themselves,