for I disapprove extremely of
your proposed long and troublesome journey to Switzerland. Wherever you
may be, I recommend to you to get as much Italian as you can, before you
go either to Rome or Naples: a little will be of great use to you upon
the road; and the knowledge of the grammatical part, which you can easily
acquire in two or three months, will not only facilitate your progress,
but accelerate your perfection in that language, when you go to those
places where it is generally spoken; as Naples, Rome, Florence, etc.

Should the state of your health not yet admit of your usual application
to books, you may, in a great degree, and I hope you will, repair that
loss by useful and instructive conversations with Mr. Harte: you may, for
example, desire him to give you in conversation the outlines, at least,
of Mr. Locke's logic; a general notion of ethics, and a verbal epitome of
rhetoric; of all which Mr. Harte will give you clearer ideas in half an
hour, by word of mouth, than the books of most of the dull fellows who
have written upon those subjects would do in a week.

I have waited so long for the post, which I hoped would come, that the
post, which is just going out, obliges me to cut this letter short. God
bless you, my dear child! and restore you soon to perfect health!

My compliments to Mr. Harte; to whose care your life is the least thing
that you owe.

LETTER LXXIII

LONDON, June 22, O. S. 1749.

DEAR BOY: The outside of your letter of the 7th N. S., directed by your
own hand, gave me more pleasure than the inside of any other letter ever
did. I received it yesterday at the same time with one from Mr. Harts of
the 6th. They arrived at a very proper time, for they found a
consultation of physicians in my room, upon account of a fever which I
had for four or five days, but which has now entirely left me. As Mr.
Harte Says THAT YOUR LUNGS NOW AND THEN GIVE YOU A LITTLE PAIN, and that
YOUR SWELLINGS COME AND GO VARIABLY, but as he mentions nothing of your
coughing, spitting, or sweating, the doctors take it for granted that you
are entirely free from those three bad symptoms: and from thence
conclude, that, the pain which you sometimes feel upon your lungs is only
symptomatical of your rheumatic disorder, from the pressure of the
muscles which hinders the free play of the lungs. But, however, as the
lungs are a point of the utmost importance and delicacy, they insist upon
your drinking, in all eve