Thomas Gray to William Mason (20 June 1758) Alexander Huber Editor Thomas Gray Archive
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Oxford

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 USA New York, NY New York Public Library Humanities and Social Sciences Library Henry W. And Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature

The original letter is extant and usually available for academic research purposes

 Correspondence of Thomas Gray, 3 vols. Ed. by the late Paget Toynbee and Leonard Whibley, with corrections and additions by H. W. Starr. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971 [1st ed. 1935], letter no. 272, vol. ii, 573-575 http://www.e-enlightenment.com/search/letters/print/?printref_sourceedition=graythOU0084&printref_docnumber=272 The Correspondence of Thomas Gray and William Mason, with Letters to the Rev. James Brown, D.D. Ed. by the Rev. John Mitford. London: Richard Bentley, 1853, letter XXXV, 147-150 https://www.thomasgray.org/texts/diglib/primary/MiJ_1853/1/147 The Letters of Thomas Gray, including the correspondence of Gray and Mason, 3 vols. Ed. by Duncan C. Tovey. London: George Bell and Sons, 1900-12, letter no. CLXVIII, vol. ii, 33-35 https://www.thomasgray.org/texts/diglib/primary/ToD_1900ii/1/33 Gray, Thomas, 1716-1771 Cambridge, United Kingdom Mason, William, 1724-1797 Aston, United Kingdom

Gregorian

 English Delap, John Thorney Abbey Peterborough Ely Crowland Abbey Cambridge

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This letter is part of the correspondence calendar of the complete correspondence of Thomas Gray. The calendar contains detailed bibliographic records for all known original, copied, or published letters written by or to the poet as well as the full-text, where available. Each record is accompanied by digitised images of the manuscript, where available, or digitised images of the first printed edition.

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To The Revd Mr Mason, Rector of Aston near Sheffield Yorkshire
CAMBRIDGE

Dear Mason

I sympathize with your eyes, having been confined at Florence with the same complaint for three weeks, but (I hope) in a much worse degree, for besides not seeing, I could not sleep in the night for pain. have a care of old Women (who are all great Oculists) & do not let them trifle with so tender a part.

I have been exercising my eyes at Peterborough, Crowland, Thorney, Ely, &c: and am grown a great Fen-Antiquary; this was the reason I did not answer you directly, as your Letter came in my absence. I own, I have been all this while expecting Caractacus, or at least three Choruses, & now you do not so much as tell me, it is finish'd. sure your spiritual functions, & even your attentions to the Dutchess of Norfolk & Sir Coniers, might have allow'd you some little intervals for Poetry. if not, (now Queen Hecuba is gone) I utterly despair: for (say what you will) it was not retirement, it was not leisure, or the summer, or the country, that used to make you so voluminous: it was emulation, it was rivalry, it was the collision of tragedy against tragedy, that kindled your fires, & set old Mona in a blaze. you do not say, who succeeds her Trojan Majesty; it ought to be well consider'd: let me have none of your prosaic Curates. I shall have you write Sermons, & private Forms, & Heavens open to all Men.

That old fizzling Duke is coming here again (but I hope to be gone first) to hear speeches in his new Library with the Bp of Bristol to air his close-stool. they have fitted it up (not the close-stool, nor the Bp) but the Library with classes, that will hold any thing, but books: yet books they must hold, & all the bulky old Commentators, the Synopses, & Tractatus Tractatuums, are wash'd with white of eggs, gilt & letter'd, and drawn up in review before his Grace. your Uncle Balguy takes his Doctor's degree, & preaches ye Commencement-Sermon, at Dr Green's request.

Mr B:n sends his love, & bids me tell you that Dr W:n has sent you his new-Legation with its dedication to Ld Mansfield. would you have it sent you? Ld Strathmore goes tomorrow into the North to come of age. I keep an Owl in the Garden as like me, as it can stare; only I don't eat raw meat, nor bite people by the fingers. this is all the news of ye place. Adieu, dear M:n, & write to me directly, if it won't hurt you, or I shall think you worse, than you are.

I am ever Yours TG: June 20, 1758.