Journeys Through Bookland Volume V Part 1

Journeys Through Bookland.

Vol. 5.

by Charles Sylvester.

JONATHAN SWIFT

The father of Jonathan Swift was a Dublin lawyer who died just as he was beginning what might have been a profitable career, and before his only son was born. The widow was left with so little money that when her son was born in November, 1667, she was not able to take care of him. Her brother-in-law undertook to provide for mother and child.

He procured a nurse who became so attached to her little charge that when she received a small sum of money from a relative in England and was compelled to go to that country, she stole the baby and took him with her across the channel. It was more than three years before Jonathan was brought back to Dublin, but he had been tenderly cared for, and though but five years of age had been taught to spell and to read in the Bible.

A year later he was sent to a good school, where he made rapid progress.

However, he could not have been always studious, for visitors to the school are still shown a desk in which his name is deeply cut.

He was fourteen years old when he entered the University of Dublin, where his record was not a very satisfactory one. When it came time for him to graduate, his standing was too poor for him to take his degree, but after some delay it was given him "by special favor," a term then used in Dublin to show that a candidate did not pa.s.s in his examinations.

After this, Swift remained three years at the University under the pretense of studying, but he was chiefly notorious for his connection with a gang of wild and disobedient students who were often under censure of the faculty for their irregularities. For one offense Swift was severely censured and compelled upon his knees to beg pardon of the dean. This punishment he did not forgive, and long afterward he wrote bitter things about Dr. Allen, the dean.

Yet while indulging in these follies, Swift learned to write well and became noted for a peculiar satirical style that afterward made him much feared by the government.

When the uncle who had first supported Swift had died, a second uncle and his son took up the burden. At one time this cousin sent Swift quite a large sum of money, a fact which seemed to change the nature of the wild young spendthrift, who thereafter remained economical; in fact, he became n.i.g.g.ardly in his saving.

Swift's second degree from the University was earned creditably, and he was much pleased with the praise and respect with which he was received.

This was owing to two years of diligent study which he spent at the home of Sir William Temple, a leading statesman of the time and a distant relative by marriage of Swift's mother.

Discouraged by his fruitless attempt to enter public life, he began to study for the ministry, and, ultimately, he received a church appointment, of which he wearied after a short experience.

Until 1710, he led a varied life, sometimes dependent upon his relatives, and at others making his way in various political positions.

From the date above he was embroiled in heated political controversies in which his bitter writings made him feared even by his friends and fiercely hated by his enemies. But he steadily rose in power and influence, and when his party triumphed he was rewarded for his political services by being appointed dean of Saint Patrick's Cathedral in Ireland.

His appointment was exceedingly unpopular, even in Ireland, for few believed him at all suited for a position in the church, much less for one so high and important. On the day he was installed, some bitter verses, of which the following are three, were found posted on the door of the cathedral:

To-day this temple gets a dean, Of parts and fame uncommon; Used both to pray and to profane, To serve both G.o.d and Mammon.

This place he got by wit and rhyme, And many ways most odd; And might a bishop be in time, Did he believe in G.o.d.

And now when'er his deanship dies, Upon his tomb be graven-- A man of G.o.d here buried lies, Who never thought of heaven.

Unfortunately there was too much truth in the charges against Swift's character, and his career, in spite of his genius, is a pitiful one. He was admired for his wit and brilliancy, and courted by the n.o.ble and powerful, but he was never able to gratify his ambitions, though he did secure many devoted friends. From his disappointments he became moody, bitter and discontented. This state of mind, together with other causes, finally broke his health, destroyed his mind and left him but the sad wreck of a brilliant manhood, and an old age of helpless imbecility.

Such a life has little that is attractive for anyone, but it does show us that even a brilliant intellect cannot save a man who persistently neglects to guard his character, and that fame does not always bring happiness.

But Swift was by no means all bad, and his great services to Ireland are still deservedly recognized by that devoted people. He really laid the foundation for their prosperity and may be said to have created const.i.tutional liberty for them.

It is, however, as a wit and a writer that Swift is now chiefly famous.

Many are the stories told of his readiness in repartee, his bright sallies in conversation, and of his skill in quick and caustic rhyming.

It is said that one day, when traveling in the south of Ireland, he stopped to give his horse water at a brook which crossed the road; a gentleman of the neighborhood halted for the same purpose, and saluted him, a courtesy which was politely returned. They parted, but the gentleman, struck by the dean's figure, sent his servant to inquire who the man was. The messenger rode up to the dean and said, "Please, sir, master would be obliged if you would tell him who you are."

"Willingly," replied the dean. "Tell your master I am the person that bowed to him when we were giving our horses water at the brook yonder."

[Ill.u.s.tration: JONATHAN SWIFT 1667-1745]

Swift's interests lay rather with the common people than with the Irish aristocracy, who, he thought, were arrant "grafters." Of one in particular he said,

"So great was his bounty-- He erected a bridge--at the expense of the county."

The last thing Swift wrote was an epigram. It was in almost the final lucid interval between periods of insanity that he was riding in the park with his physician. As they drove along, Swift saw, for the first time, a building that had recently been put up.

"What is that?" he inquired.

"That," said the physician, "is the new magazine in which are stored arms and powder for the defence of the city."

"Oh!" said the dean, pulling out his notebook. "Let me take an item of that; this is worth remarking: 'My tablets!' as Hamlet says, 'my tablets! Memory put down that.'" Then he scribbled the following lines, the last he ever penned:

"Behold a proof of Irish sense!

Here Irish wit is seen!

When nothing's left that's worth defence, We build a magazine."

With the exception of _Gulliver's Travels_, very little that Dean Swift wrote is now read by anyone but students.

GULLIVER'S TRAVELS

INTRODUCTION

Gulliver's Travels was published in 1726 and without any allusion to the real author, though many knew that the work must have come from the pen of Dean Swift. Though the dean was habitually secretive in what he did, he had some reason for not wishing to say in public that he had written so bitter a satire on the government and on mankind.

The work was immediately popular, not only in the British Isles but on the Continent as well. No such form of political satire had ever appeared, and everyone was excited over its possibilities. Not all parts of the work were considered equally good; some parts were thought to be failures, and the Fourth Voyage was as a whole deservedly unpopular. The Voyages to Lilliput and to Brobdingnag were considered the best, and to them is to be attributed the greater part of the author's fame. Their popularity continues with the years.

Lemuel Gulliver is represented as a British sailor who had been educated as a doctor but whose wandering instincts led him back to the sea. On his return from his voyages he writes the account of his adventures; and the manner in which this account is written is so masterly that we almost believe the things he tells.

In describing the manners, customs, and governments of the several countries, he shows in his inimitable way the weakness of his king, prince, n.o.bles, government and mankind in general.

While the scholar and the man of affairs may still be interested in the political significance of what is said and in a study of the keen knowledge of human nature shown by the writer, yet it is princ.i.p.ally as a story that the work is now popular. Everybody enjoys reading about the wonderful people who existed only in the imagination of the great dean of Saint Patrick's.

In this volume are printed some of the most enjoyable parts of the first and second voyages. About the only changes from the original text are in the omission of those pa.s.sages which contribute nothing to the narrative or which for other reasons it seems inadvisable to reprint. These omissions put the real fict.i.tious narrative into so small a compa.s.s that children will be entertained from beginning to end.

The _Voyage to Lilliput_ was directed against the policy of the English Court during the reign of George I. The real differences between the parties were trifling; not more, to Swift's idea, than that between _High-heels_ and _Low-heels_ in the court of Lilliput; and the controversies between the churches were not greater than those between the _Big-endians_ and the _Little-endians._ As the Prince of Wales was thought to favor a union of parties, he was typified in the heir-apparent of Lilliput who wore one shoe with a high heel and one with a low heel. This explanation will give an idea of the nature of Swift's milder satire.

The _Voyage to Brobdingnag_ advocates the principles then held by the Tory party in England and attacks those of the Whigs.

The _Voyage to Laputa_, from which we give no selections, was not generally understood and hence was not popular. Its chief purpose was to ridicule the proceedings of the Royal Society, but Swift was not well enough acquainted with music and some of the other sciences fostered by the Society to attack them to advantage.