I answer it.  Method is good in all things.  Order governs the world.  The Devil is the author of confusion.  A general of an army, a minister of state; to descend lower, a gardener, a weaver, etc.  That may make a fine observation, if you think it worth finishing; but I have not time.  Is not this a terrible long piece for one evening?  I dined to-day with Patty Rolt at my cousin Leach’s,[22] with a pox, in the City:  he is a printer, and prints the Postman, oh hoo, and is my cousin, God knows how, and he married Mrs. Baby Aires of Leicester; and my cousin Thomson was with us:  and my cousin Leach offers to bring me acquainted with the author of the Postman;[23] and says he does not doubt but the gentleman will be glad of my acquaintance; and that he is a very ingenious man, and a great scholar, and has been beyond sea.  But I was modest and said, may be the gentleman was shy, and not fond of new acquaintance; and so put it off:  and I wish you could hear me repeating all I have said of this in its proper tone, just as I am writing it.  It is all with the same cadence with “Oh hoo,” or as when little girls say, “I have got an apple, miss, and I won’t give you some.”  It is plaguy twelvepenny weather this last week, and has cost me ten shillings in coach and chair hire.  If the fellow that has your money will pay it, let me beg you to buy Bank Stock with it, which is fallen near thirty per cent. and pays eight pounds per cent. and you have the principal when you please:  it will certainly soon rise.  I would to God Lady Giffard would put in the four hundred pounds she owes you,[24] and take the five per cent. common interest, and give you the remainder.  I will speak to your mother about it when I see her.  I am resolved to buy three hundred pounds of it for myself, and take up what I have in Ireland; and I have a contrivance for it, that I hope will do, by making a friend of mine buy it as for himself, and I will pay him when I can get in my money.  I hope Stratford will do me that kindness.  I’ll ask him tomorrow or next day.

27.  Mr. Rowe[25] the poet desired me to dine with him to-day.  I went to his office (he is under-secretary in Mr. Addison’s place that he had in England), and there was Mr. Prior; and they both fell commending my “Shower” beyond anything that has been written of the kind:  there never was such a “Shower” since Danae’s, etc.  You must tell me how it is liked among you.  I dined with Rowe; Prior could not come:  and after dinner we went to a blind tavern,[26] where Congreve, Sir Richard Temple,[27] Estcourt,[28] and Charles Main,[29] were over a bowl of bad punch.  The knight sent for six flasks of his own wine for me, and we stayed till twelve.  But now my head continues pretty well; I have left off my drinking, and only take a spoonful mixed with water, for fear of the gout, or some ugly distemper; and now, because it is late, I will, etc.