Of this kind will appear to gross and vulgar
apprehensions, the miseries which I endured in a morning
visit to Prospero, a man lately raised to wealth by a
lucky project, and too much intoxicated by sudden
elevation, or too little polished by thought and
conversation, to enjoy his present fortune with elegance
and decency.
We set out in the world together; and for a long
time mutually assisted each other in our exigencies,
as either happened to have money or influence
beyond his immediate necessities. You know that
nothing generally endears men so much as participation
of dangers and misfortunes; I therefore always
considered Prospero as united with me in the
strongest league of kindness, and imagined that our
friendship was only to be broken by the hand of
death. I felt at his sudden shoot of success an honest
and disinterested joy; but as I want no part of his
superfluities, am not willing to descend from that
equality in which we hitherto have lived.
Our intimacy was regarded by me as a dispensation
from ceremonial visits; and it was so long before
I saw him at his new house, that he gently
complained of my neglect, and obliged me to come on
a day appointed.
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