Let Epicurus give indolency as an
attribute to his gods, and place in it the happiness of the blest:
the Divinity which we worship has given us not only a precept
against it, but His own example to the contrary. The world, my
lord, would be content to allow you a seventh day for rest; or, if
you thought that hard upon you, we would not refuse you half your
time: if you came out, like some great monarch, to take a town but
once a year, as it were for your diversion, though you had no need
to extend your territories. In short, if you were a bad, or, which
is worse, an indifferent poet, we would thank you for our own quiet,
and not expose you to the want of yours. But when you are so great,
and so successful, and when we have that necessity of your writing
that we cannot subsist entirely without it, any more (I may almost
say) than the world without the daily course of ordinary Providence,
methinks this argument might prevail with you, my lord, to forego a
little of your repose for the public benefit.
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