9 6 On RICHES, 
proper subjects of the mail of fortune, in the country, are 
his tenants : is he ambitious of being truly great, let him feek 
their happinefs ? The greatness derived from hence, would 
even enlarge the fields of ambition, and yet there would be 
fewer competitors for power, in the courts of princes, and con- 
fequently fewer corroding pafiions to imbitter their lives, and 
mix theirs, and the peoples joys, with forrow. I am yours, 
&>c. 
LETTER XXXIII. 
To the fame. 
M A D A M, 
A S I was rambling in the fields, before the family was ftir- 
ring, 1 met a farmer, who mifiaking me for Mr. H***#, 
faluted me with the appellation of good sir ! This is a com- 
mon phrafe, but the halt he made, and the air with which he 
uttered the words, gave me great pleafure ; I thought it was a 
proof of the fincerity of his heart, and of the high fentiments 
which he entertained of his landlord. 
Whilfi: I was ruminating on this fubjecf, I could not help 
enquiring of my own heart why a man of fenfe may not be 
happy with a fmall fortune as well as a large one? 
‘ c Reafon s whole pleafure all the joys of fenfe , 
“ Lie in three words, health, peace, and competence ; 
tc And health confifts with temperance alone , 
“ And peace , 0 Virtue l peace is all thy own . 
But here the poet does not tell us what competence is, about 
which mankind are fo much divided, concluding that as peace 
is 
