I believe, Sir, that I may have been over-candid to Hogarth, and that his spirit and youth and talent may have hurried him into more real caricatures than I specified; yet he certainly restrained his bent that way pretty early.  Charteris,[1] I have seen; but though some years older than you, Sir, I cannot say I have at all a perfect idea of him; nor did I ever hear the curious anecdote you tell me of the banker and my father.  I was much better acquainted with Archbishop Blackburne.  He lived within two doors of my father in Downing Street, and took much notice of me when I was near man....  He was a little hurt at not being raised to Canterbury on Wake’s death [1737], and said to my father, “You did not think on me; but it is true, I am too old, I am too old.”  Perhaps, Sir, these are gossiping stories, but at least they hurt nobody now.

[Footnote 1:  Colonel Charteris, satirised by Hogarth’s introduction of his portrait in the “Harlot’s Progress,” was at his death still more bitterly branded by Swift’s friend, Dr. Arbuthnot, in the epitaph he proposed for him:  “Here continueth to rot the body of Francis Charteris, who, in the course of his long life, displayed every vice except prodigality and hypocrisy.  His insatiable avarice saved him from the first:  his matchless impudence from the second.”  And he concludes it with the explanation that his life was not useless, since “it was intended to show by his example of how small estimation inordinate wealth is in the sight of Almighty God, since He bestowed it on the most unworthy of mortals.”]

I can say little, Sir, for my stupidity or forgetfulness about Hogarth’s poetry, which I still am not sure I ever heard, though I knew him so well; but it is an additional argument for my distrusting myself, if my memory fails, which is very possible.  A whole volume of Richardson’s[1] poetry has been published since my volume was printed, not much to the honour of his muse, but exceedingly so to that of his piety and amiable heart.  You will be pleased, too, Sir, with a story Lord Chesterfield told me (too late too) of Jervas,[2] who piqued himself on the reverse, on total infidelity.  One day that he had talked very indecently in that strain, Dr. Arbuthnot,[3] who was as devout as Richardson, said to him, “Come, Jervas, this is all an air and affectation; nobody is a sounder believer than you.”—­“I!” said Jervas, “I believe nothing.”—­“Yes, but you do,” replied the Doctor; “nay, you not only believe, but practise:  you are so scrupulous an observer of the commandments, that you never make the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or on the earth beneath, or,” &c.

[Footnote 1:  Richardson was a London bookseller, the author of the three longest novels in the English language—­“Pamela,” “Clarissa Harbour,” and “Sir Charles Grandison.”  They were extravagantly praised in their day.  But it was to ridicule “Pamela” that Fielding wrote “Joseph Andrews.”]