Walker opens by noting that he has passed on Caldwell’s enquiry concerning Voltaire to Mr Hayley. He then goes on to discuss a passage from the ‘Life of Milton’ that puzzled him, before thanking Caldwell for his letter of introduction to Mr Malone which has since been forwarded to Mr Irwin. Walker next discusses several artists, before turning to an accident involving Lord Meath and his hopes that the ‘ball’ can be safely removed.

Voltaire discusses his views on metaphysics in response to Louis-Martin Kahle (1712-1775), professor and dean of the Faculty of Philosophy in Göttingen and makes a brief mention his encounter with Sir Isaac Newton in England. Voltaire had published Métaphysique de Newton in 1740, a text which would later form the first part of his Elements de la philosophie de Newton. Voltaire writes that he had been much criticised by some German doctors and his ‘Courte réponse’ is a reply to this criticism. The text ends with a passage in English which quotes John Milton’s Paradise Lost: ‘and reason’d high / of providence, fore knowledge, will, and fate: / fix’t fate, free will, fore knowledge absolute: / And foud non end, &c’ (l.558-61).

Contains Landor’s thoughts and opionions on various aspects of life and literature. There are comments on old age, on Napoleon, and on a host of writers and poets including Shakespeare, Milton, Tennyson, Pope, Byron, Wordsworth, Gibbon, Sterne, Coleridge, Otway, and Voltaire. There are also passages on Elizabethan poets, and on the progress of poetry in general, with a tribute to Sir Walter Scott.

The letter critiques the recipient’s poetry before going on to mention a series of poets: Voltaire; Jacques Pradon; Jean Racine; William Shakespeare; John Milton; Samuel Johnson; Edmund Waller; and John Dryden.