1592997946000 1558455967000 Standard Record object-110005528 1747159852012 1681744229000 1747159409017 adlib fitz-online adlib-object-110005528 https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110005528 25239701-4fcd-38ed-a004-5f4ab8880284 5 person reference agent-192551 adlib-agent-192551 b494e74a-20ec-3ce9-be5f-3267eaba4253 Seward, Anna person reference agent-199382 adlib-agent-199382 25e26187-0b53-32b9-a747-81c8dd6129f9 Elliot, Mr person reference agent-116992 adlib-agent-116992 ef3205d8-6794-3a6e-aae6-922ee555a7fb Romney, George person reference agent-198502 adlib-agent-198502 b67bd5fa-4f2a-302b-afaa-81f4c4f45ec8 Hayley, Eliza person reference agent-198972 adlib-agent-198972 920da6ce-e8e0-3b0e-94df-aef3bd9411e9 Seward, Thomas person reference agent-198991 adlib-agent-198991 6704da4c-9ab6-3716-8ebd-8a5d62c1c5ab Saville, John person reference agent-60281 adlib-agent-60281 eb950ea2-c7cf-31ca-86c5-6e18f0e39f92 Hayley, Thomas Alphonso content description Hayley writes responding to a "kind accusation" in Seward's previous letter "I ought indeed to have requested you long ago to present my best acknowledgements to yr ingenious Friend Mr Elliot, for his elegant & flattering Compliment ... but if I attempt to enumerate all my Sins of Omission, I shall fill my paper with a bare Catalogue of my Offences, let me therefore intreat you to give mefull absolution for all my manifold Failings..." Hayley then writes how 5 carpenters have been working from "5 in the morning till 8 at night" for a month to construct his library. They have now finished, and he is expecting Seward's portrait to arrive from Romney imminently. He has ordered two busts: one of Pope and one of Prior to sit either side of the portrait, but has been sent a bust of Isaac Newton in error. He relates this to Seward in 8 stanzas of verse, in the course of which Newton claims that this is not a mistake, but down to "the Laws of Attraction": "E'en on Canvass fair Seward has Virtue to draw a Philosopher's Sould from the regions of Bliss: To contemplate her Genius may charm Him, who saw all the secret Sublime of the starry Abyss Then on me I beseech you this charge to confer! of Seward's attendants I justly am one: The fond Student of Light, may well wait upon Her, Whose Fancy has all the rich Hues of the Sun - What say you? - does the Philosopher deserve the Honor of attending you or not by the gallantry of his Petition?" Hayley is concerned by Seward's reports of her "Lameness - I am willing however to hope , that Time will assist you, where Medecine fails - perhaps you ought to have some Infirmity of this kind to being you nearer to a Level with the rest of the World..." Hayley/XII/42 1 accession number Hayley/XII/42 110005528 priref 110005528 uri https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110005528 https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110005528 reference agent-149638 adlib-agent-149638 7376d833-d0a7-3be0-916e-9c892b7a24d8 The Fitzwilliam Museum 1784 1784 1784-08-29 reference agent-198487 adlib-agent-198487 4dbae6db-a725-3bfd-b34e-5d215b1a85e6 Hayley, William 1 sheet, folded. William Hayley to Anna Seward: letter object OBJECT