# The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift/Volume 14/Letter: Pope to Swift - 27

MR. POPE TO DR. SWIFT.
MARCH 25, 1736.
IF ever I write more epistles in verse, one of them shall be addressed to you. I have long concerted it, and begun it, but I would make what bears your name as finished as my last work ought to be, that is to say, more finished than any of the rest. The subject is large, and will divide into four epistles, which naturally follow the Essay on Man, viz. 1. Of the Extent and Limits of Human Reason and Science. 2. A View of the useful and therefore attainable, and of the unuseful and therefore unattainable, Arts: 3. Of the Nature, Ends, Application, and Use of different Capacities: 4. Of the Use of Learning, of the science of the World, and of Wit. It will conclude with a Satire against the misapplication of all these, exemplified by pictures, characters, and examples.
But alas! the task is great, and non sum qualis eram! My understanding indeed, such as it is, is extended rather than diminished: I see things more ​in the whole, more consistent, and more clearly deduced from, and related to each other. But what I gain on the side of philosophy, I lose on the side of poetry: the flowers are gone, when the fruits begin to ripen, and the fruits perhaps will never ripen perfectly. The climate (under our Heaven of a court) is but cold and uncertain; the winds rase, and the winter comes on. I find myself but little disposed to build a new house; I have nothing left but to gather up the relicks of a wreck, and look about me to see how few friends I have left. Pray whose esteem or admiration should I desire now to procure by my writing? whose friendship or conversation to obtain by them? I am a man of desperate fortunes, that is, a man whose friends are dead: for I never aimed at any other fortune than in friends. As soon as I had sent my last letter, I received a most kind one from you, expressing great pain for my late illness at Mr. Cheselden's. I conclude you was eased of that friendly apprehension in a few days after you had despatched yours, for mine must have reached you then. I wondered a little at your quere, who Cheselden was? it shows that the truest merit does not travel so far any way as on the wings of poetry; he is the most noted, and most deserving man, in the whole profession of chirurgery; and has saved the lives of thousands by his manner of cutting for the stone. — I am now well, or what I must call so.
I have lately seen some writings of lord Bolingbroke's, since he went to France. Nothing can depress his genius: whatever befals him, he will still ​be the greatest man in the world, either in his own time, or with posterity.
Every man you know or care for here, inquires of you, and pays you the only devoir he can, that of drinking your health. I wish you had any motive to see this kingdom. I could keep you, for I am rich; that is, I have more than I want. I can afford room for yourself and two servants; I have indeed room enough, nothing but myself at home: the kind and hearty housewife is dead! the agreeable and instructive neighbour is gone! yet my house is enlarged, and the gardens extend and flourish, as knowing nothing of the guest they have lost. I have more fruit trees and kitchen garden than you have any thought of; nay I have good melons and pineapples of my own growth. I am as much a better gardener, as I am a worse poet, than when you saw me: but gardening is near akin to philosophy, for Tully says, agricultura proxima sapientiæ. For God's sake, why should not you, (that are a step higher than a philosopher, a divine, yet have more grace and wit than to be a bishop) even give all you have to the poor of Ireland (for whom you have already done every thing else) so quit the place, and live and die with me? And let tales amimæ concordes be our motto and our epitaph.