"fons that diffuade me: but I crave 66 your favour that I may forbear to express them, and thankfully decline "offer." your This was his prefent refolution: but the heart of man is not in his own keeping; and he was deftined to this facred fervice by an higher hand; a hand fo powerful, as at laft forced him to a compliance of which I fhall give the reader an account before I fhall give a rest to my pen. Mr. Donne and his wife continued with Sir Francis Wolly till his death: a little before which time, Sir Francis was fo happy as to make a perfect reconciliation betwixt Sir George and his forsaken fon and daughter; Sir George conditioning by bond to pay to Mr. Donne 8ool. at a certain day, as a portion with his wife, or 201. quarterly for their maintenance, as the intereft for it, till the faid portion was paid. Moft of thofe years that he lived with Sir Francis, he ftudied the Civil and Canon Laws; in which he acquired fuch a per a perfection, as was judged to hold proportion with many who had made that study the employment of their whole life. Sir Francis being dead, and that happy family diffolved, Mr. Donne took for himfelf a house in Micham, (near to Croydon in Surry) a place noted for good air and choice company: there his wife and children remained; and for himself he took lodgings in London, near to White-Hall, whither his friends and occafions drew him very often, and where he was as of ten vifited by many of the nobility and others of this nation, who used him in their counfels of greatest confideration, and with fome rewards for his better fubfiftence. Nor did our own nobility only value and favour him, but his acquaintance and friendship was fought for by most ambasfadors of foreign nations, and by many other ftrangers, whofe learning or bufinefs occafioned their stay in this nation. He was much importuned by many friends to make his constant refidence in London; London; but he ftill denied it, having fettled his dear wife and children at Micham, and near fome friends that were bountiful to them and him; for they, God knows, needed it: and that you may the better now judge of the then prefent condition of his mind and fortune, I fhall present you with an extract collected out of fome few of his many letters. "And the reafon why I did not "send an answer to your last week's let"ter was, because it then found me "under too great a sadness; and at pre"fent it is thus with me. There is not "one perfon, but myself, well of my fa"mily: I have already lost half a child, "and with that mifchance of hers, my "wife is fallen into fuch a difcompofure, "as would afflict her too extremely, but "that the fickness of all her other chil"dren ftupifies her: of one of which, in good faith, I have not much hope: "and these meet with a fortune fo ill "provided for phyfic, and fuch relief, " that if God fhould eafe ús with burials, "I know "I know not how to perform even that: "but I flatter myself with this hope, "that I am dying too; for I cannot waste "fafter than by fuch griefs. As for, "From my hofpital at Micham, Aug. 10. "JOHN DONNE." Thus he did bemoan himself: and thus in other letters. "For we hardly discover a fin, "when it is but an omiffion of fome "good, and no accufing act: with this, "or the former, I have often fufpected 66 myself to be overtaken; which is, with 66 an over-earneft defire of the next life. "And though I know it is not mere"ly a wearinefs of this, because I had "the fame defire when I went with the ❝tide, and enjoyed fairer hopes than I "now do; yet I doubt worldly troubles "have increased it. It is now spring, and "all the pleasures of it difplease me; "every other tree bloffoms, and I wi"ther: I grow older, and not better; my ftrength diminisheth, and my load grows heavier; and yet I would fain 66 66 "be "be or do something; but that I cannot "tell what, is no wonder in this time of "my fadnefs; for to choofe is to do; but "to be no part of any body is as to be no"thing and fo I am, and shall so judge "myself, unless I could be fo incorpo"rated into a part of the world, as by "bufinefs to contribute fome fuftentation "to the whole. This I made account; "I began early, when I understood the "ftudy of our laws; but was diverted by "leaving that, and embracing the worst "voluptuoufnefs, an hydroptique immo"derate defire of human learning and lan66 guages: beautiful ornaments indeed to men of great fortunes; but mine was 66 grown fo low as to need an occupation; "which I thought I entered well into, "when I subjected myself to fuch a fer"vice as I thought might exercise my "poor abilities: and there I ftumbled, and "fell too; and now I am become fo little, "or fuch a nothing, that I am not a fub"ject good enough for one of my own "letters.-Sir, I fear my prefent difcon"tent does not proceed from a good root, "that |