of that is the pleasurable.

"------Alas! how changed from him,
That life of pleasure and that soul of whim:
Gallant and gay, in Cliveden's proud alcove,
The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love!"

Among his happiest and most inimitable effusions are the Epistles to
Arbuthnot, and to Jervas the painter; amiable patterns of the delightful
unconcerned life, blending ease with dignity, which poets and painters
then led. Thus he says to Arbuthnot--

"Why did I write? What sin to me unknown
Dipp'd me in ink, my parents' or my own?
As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame,
I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.
I left no calling for this idle trade,
No duty broke, no father disobey'd:
The muse but serv'd to ease some friend, not wife;
To help me through this long disease, my life?
To second, Arbuthnot! thy art and care,
And teach the being you preserv'd to bear.

But why then publish? Granville the polite,
And knowing Walsh, would tell me I could write;
Well-natur'd Garth inflam'd with early praise,
And Congreve lov'd, and Swift endur'd my lays;
The courtly Talbot, Somers, Sheffield read;
E'en mitred Rochester would nod the head;
And St. John's self (great Dryden's friend before)