Jonathan Swift

“ The House of Commons p. 406goes on in mauling the late Ministry and their proceedings. Nite deelest MD. [406a]
19. I dined with Lord Treasurer to-day, and sat with him till ten, in spite of my teeth, though my printer waited for me to correct a sheet. I told him of four lines I writ extempore with my pencil, on a bit of paper in his house, while he lay wounded. Some of the servants, I suppose, made waste-paper of them, and he never had heard of them. Shall I tell them you? They were inscribed to Mr. Harley’s physician. Thus
On Britain Europe’s safety lies ”

“ It is very possible for a man who hath the appearance of religion, and is a great pretender to conscience, to be wicked and a hypocrite; but, it is impossible for a man who openly declares against religion, to give any reasonable security that he will not be false and cruel, and corrupt, whenever a temptation offers, which he values more than he does the power wherewith he was trusted. And, if such a man doth not betray his cause and his master, it is only because the temptation was not properly offered, or the profit was too small, or the danger was too great. ”

“ I am assured that it hath for some time been practised as a method of making men's court, when they are asked about the rate of lands, the abilities of tenants, the state of trade and manufacture in this Kingdom, and how their rents are paid, to answer, That in their neighbourhood all things are in a flourishing condition, the rent and purchase of land every day increasing. And if a gentleman happens to be a little more sincere in his representations, besides being looked on as not well affected, he is sure to have a dozen contradictors at his elbow. ”

“ The bulk of the clergy, and one-third of the bishops, are stupid sons of whores, who think of nothing but getting money as soon as they can: If they may but produce enough to supply them in gluttony, drunkenness, and whoring, they are ready to turn traitors to God and their country, and make their fellow-subjects slaves. ”

“ Surely His Majesty, when he consented to the passing of this patent, conceived he was doing an act of grace to his most loyal subjects of Ireland, without any regard to Mr. Wood, farther than as an instrument. But the people of Ireland think this patent (intended no doubt for their good) to be a most intolerable grievance, and therefore Mr. Wood can never succeed, without an open avowal that his profit is preferred not only before the interests, but the very safety and being of a great kingdom; and a kingdom distinguished for its loyalty, perhaps above all others upon earth. ”

“ Harley will be lord treasurer in a short time, and other great removes and promotions made. This is my thought, &c.
15. I was this morning with Mr. secretary, and he is grown pretty well. I dined with him to day, and drank some of that wine which the great duke of Tuscany used to send to sir William Temple: he always sends some to the chief ministers. I liked it mightily, but he does not; and he ordered his butler to send me a chest of it to morrow. Would to God MD had it. The queen is well again, and was at chapel to day, &c. ”

“ Whoever beareth witness against his neighbour, out of a principle of malice and revenge, from any old grudge, or hatred to his person; such a man is a false witness in the sight of God, although what he says be true; because the motive or cause is evil, not to serve his prince or country, but to gratify his own resentments. And therefore, although a man thus accused may be very justly punished by the law, yet this doth by no means acquit the accuser, who, instead of regarding the public service, intended only to glut his private rage and spite. ”

“ It is objected, that freethinkers themselves are the most infamous, wicked, and senseless of all mankind.
I answer, first, we say the same of priests, and other believers. But the truth is, men of all sects are equally good and bad; for no religion whatsoever contributes in the least to mend men's lives.
I answer, secondly, that freethinkers use their understanding, but those who have religion do not; therefore the first have more understanding than the others; witness Toland, Tindal, Gildon [23] , Clendon, Coward, and myself. For, use legs and have legs. ”

“ The reader may be disposed to wonder how I could prevail on myself to give so free a representation of my own species, among a race of mortals who were already too apt to conceive the vilest opinion of human kind, from that entire congruity betwixt me and their yahoos. But I must freely confess, that the many virtues of these excellent quadrupeds placed in opposite view to human corruptions, had so far opened my eyes and enlarged my understanding, that I began to view the actions and passions of man in a very different light, and to think the honor of my own kind not worth managing ”

“ I think it manifest, that whatever circumstances could possibly contribute to make a country poor and despicable, are all united with respect to Ireland. The nation controlled by laws to which they do not consent, disowned by their brethren and countrymen, refused the liberty not only of trading with their own manufactures, but even their native commodities, forced to seek for justice many hundred miles by sea and land, rendered in a manner incapable of serving their king and country in any employment of honour, trust, or profit ”

“ When your master and lady are talking together in their bedchamber, and you have some suspicion that you or your fellow servants are concerned in what they say, listen at the door for the publick good of all the servants, and join all to take proper measures for preventing any innovations that may hurt the community.
Be not proud in prosperity: you have heard that fortune turns on a wheel; if you have a good place, you are at the top of the wheel. ”

“ Suppose a person, born in this kingdom, shall happen by his services for the English interest to have an employment conferred on him worth four hundred pounds a year; and that he hath likewise an estate in land worth four hundred pounds a year more; suppose him to sit in Parliament; then, suppose a land-tax to be brought in of five shillings a pound for ten years; I tell you how this gentleman will compute. He hath four hundred pounds a year in land: the tax he must pay yearly is one hundred pounds; by which, in ten years, he will pay only a thousand pounds. ”

“ The clergy having been stripped of the greatest part of their revenues, the glebes being generally lost, the tithes in the hands of laymen, the churches demolished, and the country depopulated; in order to preserve a face of Christianity, it was necessary to unite small vicarages, sufficient to make a tolerable maintenance for a minister. ”

“ Yet merry folks, who want by chance A pair to make a country dance, Call the old housekeeper, and get her To fill a place for want of better: While Sheridan is off the hooks, And friend Delany at his books, That Stella may avoid disgrace, Once more the Dean supplies their place. Beauty and wit, too sad a truth! Have always been confined to youth; The god of wit and beauty's queen, He twenty-one and she fifteen, No poet ever sweetly sung, Unless he were, like Phoebus, young; Nor ever nymph inspired to rhyme, Unless, like Venus, in her prime. ”

“ I am not, like other men, to envy or undervalue the talents I cannot reach, for which reason I must needs bear a true honour to this large eminent sect of our British writers. And I hope this little panegyric will not be offensive to their ears, since it has the advantage of being only designed for themselves. Indeed, Nature herself has taken order that fame and honour should be purchased at a better pennyworth by satire than by any other productions of the brain, the world being soonest provoked to praise by lashes, as men are to love. ”

“ Whereas all the rebellions of Puritans, Presbyterians, Independents, and other sectaries, constantly began before any provocations were given, except that they were not suffered to change the government in Church and State, and seize both into their own hands; which, however, at last they did, with the murder of their King and of many thousands of his best subjects.
The Catholics were always defenders of monarchy, as constituted in these kingdoms. Whereas our brethren the Dissenters were always republicans, both in principle and practice. ”

“ I went on one side about two hundred yards, and beckoning to her not to look or to follow me, I hid myself between two leaves of sorrel, and there discharged the necessities of nature.
I hope the gentle reader will excuse me for dwelling on these and the like particulars, which, however insignificant they may appear to groveling vulgar minds, yet will certainly help a philosopher to enlarge his thoughts and imagination, and apply them to the benefit of public as well as private life, which was my sole design in presenting this and other accounts of my travels to the world ”

“ For these said reasons her said majesty the queen of Great Britain, although in the vigour of her age, and enjoying perfect health (in which may God preserve her many years) out of an effect of her usual prudence and piety, has thought fit to enter with the lords the States-general of the United Provinces into a particular alliance and confederacy; the principal end and only aim of which shall be the publick quiet and tranquillity; and to prevent, by measures taken in time, all the events which might one day excite new wars. ”

“ The rule of the tradesman must be replaced by the rule of those whose lives are bound up with the land of their country. The art of government was not "the importation of nutmegs, and the curing of herrings;" but the political embodiment of the will of "a Parliament freely chosen, without threatening or corruption," and "composed of landed men" whose interests being in the soil would be at one with the interests of those who lived on the soil. Whigs and Tories may dispute as they will among themselves as to the best side from which to defend the country ”

“ I am far from presuming to affirm or think that the Church is in danger at present, or as things now stand; but we know not how soon it may be so when the Christian religion is repealed. As plausible as this project seems, there may a dangerous design lurk under it: [19] Nothing can be more notorious, than that the Atheists, Deists, Socinians, Anti-trinitarians, and other subdivisions of freethinkers, are persons of little zeal for the present ecclesiastical establishment: Their declared opinion is for repealing the Sacramental Test; they are very indifferent with regard to ceremonies ”

“ Tis an odd way of uniting parties, to deprive a majority of part of their ancient right, by conferring it on a faction who had never any right at all, and therefore cannot be said to suffer any loss or injury if it be refused them. Neither is it very clear, how far some people may stretch the term of common enemy. How many are there of those that call themselves Protestants, who look upon our worship to be idolatrous as well as that of the Papists, and with great charity put Prelacy and Popery together, as terms convertible? ”

“ That the proceedings of the House of Commons, particularly about the Barrier Treaty, must chiefly be ascribed to the manner in which the Queen and the nation had been treated by Mons. Bothmar, Count Gallas, Buys, and other foreign ministers. That if the States would yet enter into a strict union with the Queen, give her satisfaction in the said treaty, and join in concert with her plenipotentiaries at Utrecht, a safe and advantageous peace might be obtained for the whole alliance; otherwise Her Majesty must save her own country, and join with such of her allies as would join with her. ”

“ Suppose upon information taken before your Lordship of a rape committed, a bill of indictment were sent to a grand jury, and the grand jury return ignoramus on it, application is made to the Court to recommend it to them to reconsider it, and they return as before ignoramus—Suppose a judge with more than decent passion should ask them their reasons (which is their counsel) for so doing, nay should be so particular as to demand of them whether they thought the woman a whore. Must not all the world conclude somebody had forgot the oath of a grand juryman? ”

“ Gualtier went to France, with letters to the marquis de Torcy, to propose her majesty's expedient for preventing the union of that kingdom with Spain; which, as it was the most important article to be settled, in order to secure peace for Europe, so it was a point that required to be speedily adjusted, under the present circumstances and situation of the Bourbon family; there being only left a child of two years old, to stand between the duke of Anjou, and his succeeding to the crown of France. ”

“ Swift always distinguished between the Irish "barbarians" and the Irish who were in reality English settlers in Ireland. Swift, for once, is in accord with the desires of the English Government, who wished to eradicate the Irish language. His friend the Archbishop of Dublin and his own college, that of Trinity, were in favour of keeping the language alive. (See Lecky's "Ireland," vol. i., pp. 331-332.) [T. S.]
[100] See Swift's "Proposal for the Universal Use of Irish Manufactures." [T. S.]
[101] See Swift's "Proposal for the Universal Use of Irish Manufactures." ”