ness, I should wish they were of a nature that could be removed; and that they admitted of some other remedy than the one you sometimes mention, on which I cannot think without terror. I feel the reflection this instant, as the stroke of a poniard at my heart; and the tear at present starts in my eye when it recurs to me. Is it necessary that my sympathy too should furnish you with arms against me?

But I perceive, dear madam, or shall I say my amiable pupil, that while I am answering the second part of your letter, I have entirely forgot the first; which yet surely is not of a nature wholly indifferent to me.

It gives me a sensible uneasiness that my friend's performance has not gained your approbation. I am more sorry on his account, than because you condemn my judgment, which I am sensible may easily be warped by friendship and partiality. I acknowledge too, that most of your objections, and indeed all of them, are well founded. I could add some others, which a more frequent perusal of the piece has suggested to me. I always disliked the character of Glenalvon, as being that of such a finished and black villain as either is not in nature, or requires very little genius in the poet to have imagined. Such a personage seems only to be a gross artifice in the writer, when the plot requires an incident, which he knows not how to introduce naturally. Glenalvon is a kind of Diabolus ex machina; more, blamable than the Deus ex machina, which the ancient critics condemned as an unartificial manner of unravelling a plot. But though I allow

all these objections, and more which would occur to you on a second perusal, I cannot still but flatter myself that the tragedy of Douglas is a work of merit, from the sensible pathetic which runs through the whole. The value of a theatrical piece can less be determined by an analysis of its conduct, than by the ascendant which it gains over the heart, and by the strokes of nature which are interspersed through it. But I am afraid that it has not affected you to the degree I could wish, even in this particular, and that you have not found in it any such beauties as can compensate for its defects.

If such be your judgment on a second perusal (for you must allow me to appeal from your first judgment to your second, and I shall surely never think of any other appeal), if such, I say, be the case, I can do nothing but acquiesce. Your nation, your sex, and, above all, the peculiar delicacy of your taste, give you a title to pronounce on these subjects.

I can even kiss the hand, with pleasure and passion, which signs the verdict against me: I could only have kissed it with more pleasure, had it acquitted my friend.

Allow me, dear madam, before I bid you adieu (since it is necessary to come to that at last), to ask you, whether you do not come to Paris about the middle of August, and stay there for some time? My question proceeds not merely from curiosity, I could wish to enjoy your company before the return of winter recalls us to our former dissipations.

DAVID HUME TO THE COUNTESS DE

BOUFFLERS.

I COULD never yet accuse myself, dear madam, of hypocrisy or dissimulation; and I was surely guilty of these vices in the highest degree, if I wrote you a letter which carried with it any marks of indifference. What I said in particular, I cannot entirely recollect, but I well remember in general what I felt, which was a great regard and attachment to you, not increased indeed (for that was scarce possible), but rendered more agreeable to myself, from the marks you had given me of your friendship and confidence: I adhere to these; I will never, but with my life, be persuaded to part with the hold which you have been pleased to afford me: you may cut me to pieces, limb by limb; but like those pertinacious animals of my country, I shall expire still attached to you, and you will in vain attempt to get free. For this reason, madam, I set at defiance all those menaces, which you obliquely throw out against me. Do you seriously think that it is at present in your power to determine whether I shall be your friend or not? In every thing else your authority over me is without control. But with your ingenuity, you will scarce contrive to use me so ill, that I shall not still better bear it and after all, you will find yourself obliged, from pity, or generosity, or friendship, to take me back into your service. At least this will probably be the case, till you find one who loves you more sincerely and values you

more highly; which, with all your merit, I fancy it will not be easy for you to do. I know that I am here furnishing you with arms against myself: you may be tempted to tyrannize over me, in order to try how far I will practise my doctrine of passive obedience: but I hope also that you will hold this soliloquy to yourself: This poor fellow, I see, is resolved never to leave me let me take compassion on him; and endeavour to render our intercourse as agreeable to him and as little burdensome to myself as possible. If you fall, madam, into this way of thinking, as you must at last, I ask no farther; and all your menaces will vanish into smoke.

Good God! how much am I fallen from the airs which I at first gave myself! You may remember that a little after our personal acquaintance, I told you that you were obliged à soutenir la gageure, and could not in decency find fault with me, however I should think proper to behave myself. Now, I throw myself at your feet, and give you nothing but marks of patience and long suffering and submission. But I own that matters are at present upon a more proper and more natural footing; and long may they remain so.

I went to Villars-Cotterets, as I told you, on Sunday last, and I stayed till Tuesday. Madam de Vierville arrived on Monday evening, whom I questioned about the manner of life at Staure. Nothing could be more ravishing, more delightful than her description of it, and of the person who inspired gaiety and amenity into all around her. And can you treat me with contempt be

cause I am willing to be that person's slave? For, let me tell you, there is an expression in your letter against slavery, which I take a little to myself, as said against me; but I still maintain

Nunquam libertas gratior extat
Quam sub rege pio.

Pray go to your Latin Dictionary to interpret this passage; you will find that regina, if it would agree with the measure, would suit much better with the sense.

What can I say, dear madam, to the arrangement which you are pleased to communicate to me? Can I think of it without satisfaction, and without vexation? I shall be in Paris on the eleventh or twelfth of the month, perhaps a day sooner or a day later. I shall watch the opportunity; and endeavour that you shall not pass without my paying my respects to you. The party you propose after that does me great honour, and still greater pleasure. But, in the present state of our affairs, I cannot promise that it will be possible for me to be above a day absent. And, to add to my embarrassments, there is just now arrived in France a very ancient and very intimate friend of mine, Mr. Elliot, who is wholly a stranger there, and whom I cannot entirely neglect. He is justly regarded as one of the ablest and most considerable men among us; he was my friend long before I knew any thing of the names of Boufflers, except that of the famous and virtuous marshal of the last reign. Is it not strange, that I should think my