Another severe illness broke into the ease, the prosperity, and the
muse of Dr. Burney, and drove him, perforce, to sojourn for some weeks
at Chesington, with his friend, Mr. Crisp; whose character, in the
biographical and chronological series of events, is thus forcibly,
though briefly, sketched.
“To Crisp I repair’d—that best guide of my youth,
Whose decisions all flow from the fountain of truth;
Whose oracular counsels seem always excited
By genius, experience, and wisdom united.
Then his taste in the arts—happy he who can follow!
’Tis the breath of the muses when led by Apollo.
His knowledge instructs, and his converse beguiles.”
To this inestimable Mentor, and to Chesington, that sanctuary of
literature and of friendship, Dr. Burney, even in his highest health,
would uncompelled have resorted, had Fortune, as kind to him in her
free gifts as Nature, left his residence to his choice.
But choice has little to do with deciding the abode of the man who
has no patrimony, yet who wishes to save his progeny from the same
hereditary dearth: the Doctor, therefore, though it was to the spot
of his preference that he was chased, could not, now, make it that of
his enjoyment: he could only, and hardly, work at the recovery of his
strength; and, that regained, tear himself away from this invaluable
friend, and loved retreat, to the stationary post of his toils, the
metropolis.