nothing of the merits of the navigation in question, and it would have given me great pain to have opposed, as it might have happened, a side espoused by one for whom I had conceived such an esteem as I have for you, Sir.  I did not tell you my scruples, because you might have thought them affected, and because, to say the truth, I choose to disguise them.  I have seen too much of the parade of conscience to expect that an ostentation of it in me should be treated with uncommon lenity.  I cannot help having scruples; I can help displaying them; and now, sir, that I have made you my confessor, I trust you will keep my secret for my sake, and give me absolution for what I have committed against you.

I certainly do propose to digest the materials that Vertue had collected(1031) relating to English arts; but doubting of the merit of the subject, as you do, Sir, and not proposing to give myself much trouble about it, I think, at present, that I shall still call the work his.  However, at your leisure, I shall be much obliged to you for any hints.  For nobler or any other game, I don’t think of it; I am sick of the character of author; I am sick of the consequences of it; I am weary Of Seeing my name in the newspapers; I am tired with reading foolish criticisms on me, and as foolish defences of me; and I trust my friends will be so good as to let the last abuse of me pass unanswered.  It is called “Remarks” on my Catalogue, asperses the Revolution more than it does my book, and, in one word, is written by a non-juring preacher, who was a dog-doctor.  Of me he knows so little, that he thinks to punish me by abusing King William!  Had that Prince been an author, perhaps I might have been a little ungentle to him too.  I am not dupe enough to think that any body wins a crown for the sake of the people.  Indeed, I am Whig enough to be glad to be abused; that is, that any body may write what they please; and though the Jacobites are the only men who abuse outrageously that liberty of the press which all their labours tend to demolish, I would not have the nation lose such a blessing for their impertinences.  That their spirit and projects revive is certain.  All the histories of England, Hume’s, as you observe, and Smollett’s more avowedly, are calculated to whiten the house of Stuart.  All the magazines are elected to depress writers of the other side, and as it has been learnt within these few days, France is preparing an army of commentators1032) to illustrate the works of those professors.  But to come to what ought to be a particular part of this letter.  I am very sensible, Sir, to the confidence you place in me, and shall assuredly do nothing to forfeit it; at the same time, I must take the liberty you allow me, of making some objections to your plan.  As your friend, I must object to the subject.  It is heroic to sacrifice one’s own interest to do good, but I would be sure of doing some before I offered myself up.  You will make enemies; are you sure you shall make