Fairest Valentine, the unfeigned wishe of your humble votary, JO. DRYDEN. LETTER II. TO [JOHN WILMOT,] EARL OF ROCHESTER. MY LORD, Tuesday. [July, 1673.][58] I have accused my selfe this month together, for not writing to you. I have called my selfe by the names I deserved, of unmannerly and ungratefull. I have been uneasy, and taken up the resolutions of a man, who is betwixt sin and repentance, convinc’d of what he ought to do, and yet unable to do better. At the last, I deferred it so long, that I almost grew hardened in the neglect; and thought I had suffered so much in your good opinion, that it was in vain to hope I could redeem it. So dangerous a thing it is to be inclin’d to sloath, that I must confess, once for all, I was ready to quit all manner of obligations, and to receive, as if it were my due, the most handsome compliment, couch’d in the best language I have read, and this too from my Lord of Rochester, without shewing myself sensible of the favour. If your Lordship could condescend so far to say all those things to me, which I ought to have say’d to you, it might reasonably be concluded, that you had enchanted me to believe those praises, and that I owned them in my silence. ’Twas this consideration that moved me at last to put off my idleness. And now the shame of seeing my selfe overpay’d so much for an ill Dedication, has made me almost repent of my address. I find, it is not for me to contend any way with your Lordship, who can write better on the meanest subject, then I can on the best. I have only engaged my selfe in a new debt, when I had hoped to cancell a part of the old one; and should either have chosen some other patron, whom it was in my power to have obliged by speaking better of him then he deserv’d, or have made your Lordship only a hearty Dedication of the respect and honour I had for you, without giving you the occasion to conquer me, as you have done, at my own weapon. My only relief is, that what I have written is publique, and I am so much my own friend as to conceal your Lordship’s letter; for that which would have given vanity to any other poet, has only given me confusion. You see, my Lord, how far you have push’d me; I dare not own the honour you have done me, for fear of shewing it to my own disadvantage. You are that _rerum natura_ of your own Lucretius; _Ipsa suis pollens opibus, nihil indiga nostri._[59]