Part 9

SWIFT. I do; and I want to vent my Spleen, in abusing my Countrymen, for the inconsiderable Progress which has been made in so excellent a Design. Certainly, though we have made some Advances that Way, if we had carried them on with the least Share of that Nobleman's Spirit, we shou'd have brought it to much greater Perfection than we have done. Even with what little Care and Encouragement we have bestowed on it, if we continue to cultivate it, we may expect in some Years to improve it so far, as to be able to export large Quantities, and see it swell and increase, in proportion to the great Material for it, our Linen. But, as if we were afraid too many Arts wou'd enrich us too fast, or take up more Hands than we cou'd spare; we have given this useful Undertaking so little Assistance, that it has by no means made the Advances we cou'd have expected from it; and we have just left it, like a lovely exotic Flower, to live or die at the Mercy of an unfavourable Season, and a wintry Climate. This puts our Giddiness, in overlooking every offered Advantage, and our Supineness as to all Attempts to improve our Circumstances, in a very indifferent Light; we wear better Linen, and more of it, than most of our neighbouring Kingdoms, (our Numbers and Poverty fairly considered) nay, and we wear them to Rags too, and yet we will not save those Rags for the Paper-mill; nor will we, when they are turned into Paper, buy it, while we can purchase better and dearer from _France_ and _Holland_. In short, we are a People, _Tom_, miserable amidst a Crowd of Opportunities to be happy, for Want of a little Activity and Management, a little Sobriety and Care; and one of the most alleviating Circumstances of my Death was, my being delivered from the Torment, of endeavouring to serve _Ireland_ to no Purpose.

PRIOR. Indeed, Mr. _Dean_, I cannot but allow there is too much Truth in many of your Attacks and Abuses of our unfortunate Countrymen; and yet I am tempted to return to my old Reveries, and to think, notwithstanding all their Disadvantages, if I had lived ten Years longer in _Ireland_, I shou'd have been able to have made vast Alterations among them for the better.

SWIFT. No, _Tom_, not if you had lived longer than _Methuselah_. Consider, Man, tho' there are Remedies for the Sick, and Helps for the Dying, there are none for the Dead; and in that Light, I have been used to consider _Ireland_ of a long Time. But prithee, _Tom_, let me know the whole of your Scheme; What wou'd you have done?

PRIOR. Why, if you will hear me calmly, Mr. _Dean_, I will give you a fair Account of what I wou'd have attempted at least, and to open all my Heart to you, that was one of the main Subjects I called at your Tomb to talk to you on, to see if we could get any of these Crawlers on the Earth to attempt it, by oar artfully suggesting it to him. In short, my Project was, by procuring greater and more numerous Subscriptions, and by extending and enlarging the Plan of the _Dublin_ Society, to have promoted more than ever the general Good of the Kingdom.

SWIFT. You might as well Talk to most People, of the general Good of _Japan_. I have told you already they have no Notions of such Things: Their Thoughts, their Taste, their Passions have another Turn. Did you expect to get more from those, who think too much is given already? Why, Man, do you forget the Pains, the Application, the Time, and the Expence, it cost an old Gentleman of our Acquaintance, to procure the first Subscriptions? Recollect also, that after such plain, visible, good Effects were seen by the whole Kingdom, what Numbers of those, who seemed to subscribe with Zeal, withdrew their Subscriptions; and then consider what Success you could have of obtaining larger and more numerous Contributions.

PRIOR. I am but too sensible, there would be some Difficulty in it, Mr. _Dean_; but, cold and dead as most Men are, to all great and generous Attempts to serve us, I know by Experience, that there are yet left in _Ireland_ a few chosen Spirits, who wou'd have concurr'd in such a Design, and who had Hearts and Fortunes suited to the Task, and almost equal to the Burthen. But happen what would, I am sure, I should have got some reasonable additional Subsidies; and though possibly they would have been too small to answer my Purpose; yet, still, I should at least, have pav'd the Way for some happier Man who would have come after me; and I should have the Comfort to think, that my too eager Zeal to serve others, and disserve myself, could not give great Offence; especially, as Men are not likely to meet Impertinences of this Kind, every Day. This I am confident of, that the Use and Advantage which that Society, (blessed be God) has been of to _Ireland_, will secure a large adventitious Fund to her hereafter; and tho' by the Arts of evil Men, it may be damped, or dropped for some Years, there never will be wanting, worthy Spirits in the rising Generation, who will remember how happily, that Society was set up and supported, by a few active Gentlemen; and, that it may be restored again, and an adequate Fund provided for it, by the same Resolution and Zeal. But, after all, Mr. _Dean_, I make little Question (if I had lived, to apply for larger Subscriptions) I should not have been disappointed; and, if I had succeeded, _Ireland_ should have had Cause to remember my good Fortune.

SWIFT. Alas! _Tom_, your Hopes were over-heated, I fear; though there are many Squanderers, there are few Givers in _Ireland_ and even among those few, the greater Part instead of giving their Benefactions while they live, and can see them well applied; are laid in their Graves, before their Donations are of use to the Living; for People only bestow their Substance to others, as they do their old Cloathes to their Servants, when they can use them no longer. This, makes me fear, _Tom_, you would have got in few Contributions, among our own Countrymen. Alas! _Tom_, we seem to keep our Repentance for the Time past, and our Charity for the Future; but the poor present Time, is sacrificed to the meanest Avarice, the falsest Pleasures, or, the lowest Ambition; without any Care of the general Welfare of our Country, or one social Wish for the Happiness of our People.

PRIOR. I allow all this would hold true, if the great and admirable Effects of the Society's Præmiums, did not make it highly probable, that I should have prevailed with several of our worthiest Countrymen, to have assisted so great and so successful an Undertaking. When Men see they have it in their Power, if they will join together, to deliver their Country from all its calamitous Distresses; and to be themselves the Sources of infinite Blessings to Millions yet unborn, their Hands rebell against their Hearts, and even Misers learn to be bounteous. I am not ignorant, how much Men are under the Influence of their lowest and poorest Passions, yet still I am of Opinion, as Stingy as they generally are, if they evidently saw, where they could do much Good by their Benefactions, we should have more of them in the World than we have.

SWIFT. I doubt, _Tom_, you mistake that Matter egregiously, for nine Tenths of our Donations, I fear, proceed more from our Vanity than our Virtue. Numbers give, as our great Master tells us, to be seen of Men; and for that Reason, probably, it is, that there are so few secret Corbans offered up to Heaven, and not to the World; and if this be so, 'tis plain, that People give more for the Ostentation of having given, than the good they hope to get done by it, and therefore you must have met with few generous Subscribers.

PRIOR. I cannot approve of your Thoughts on this Point, nay, on the contrary, I am confident most People give for the heavenly Joy of giving, and the seeing much Good likely to be the Consequence of their Bounty; and from the same Way of Thinking, where there is little Hope of such Consequences, Men give more coldly and illiberally. I will also add, that the perceiving, how unskilfully (and therefore unsuccessfully) many bestow their Alms, is the Death of Charity, and the great Obstacle to generous Donations in others. It grieves me to say, that I have often observed, that too few give with Judgment.

_Perdere multi sciunt, donare pauci._

And Numbers, through an ill concerted generosity, do not half the Good they might do, if they appropriated their Gifts with proper Skill, and knew the happy Art of giving. But giving largely to the _Dublin_ Society, has not one Objection against it, and answers every End the human Soul can ask for, when it scatters the Dung of the Earth, to enrich the World. You well know, _Dean_, to give even to an useful Purpose, which ends with the Occasion that calls for it, falls short of those Charities, which extends their Views to future Ages; and therefore, to assist Societies, that are contriving for the Welfare of Nations, is a nobler Donation, than relieving private Wants that die away with the Person relieved. I will go yet further, Mr. _Dean_, since I have touch'd on this Topick, and assert, that to give, where Virtue and Industry are the Consequence of the Benefaction, you must allow is of higher Use, than relieving Distresses, which have been occasioned by Vice or Extravagance, and may probably end in them. Nay, to give under such Conditions, as must inevitably draw in others, to join in your Charity, and enlarge your Hopes of serving Mankind, is of the greatest Use; as it brings in Crowds to co-operate with you, and vastly out-do your Benefactions; and to give to a Plan of Charity, which is as likely to encrease as a River, the farther it goes, is of yet greater Service, than to give where their Subscription Ends like a Shower of Rain, in watering the Earth for a Moment, and vanishes with the next Sun. Lastly, to give to a few, and yet to make Numbers industrious and laborious, in Hopes of receiving your Bounty, though they never obtain it, is of yet more Weight and Importance; and this is plainly the Case of all Præmiums, where they are faithfully distributed. Now, all these Considerations accompany every Subscription to my enlarged Plan, and thence I was apt to flatter myself I should be successful, if I had liv'd to apply for them.

SWIFT. Well, I shall drop any Dispute on that Point: But, pray, _Tom_, be a little more minute in explaining your Views, and let me know if you had many large additional Subscriptions, how would you have applied them?

PRIOR. Why, I cannot enter into a long Detail of every Particular, but I would in General, have doubled the Præmiums of most of the Articles, which the Society has yet promoted, and in some of the most important Improvements and Manufactures, I would have trebled them. By this Means, it is hardly credible, what a Progress we should make, in all those Subjects of Husbandry and manual Arts in a few Years; and how we should work up the Industry and Skill of our People, by every Incentive that Profit or Glory could give them. I formerly reckoned up many Articles which I may probably seem tedious in repeating now, but you will make Allowances for my Fondness and Folly, as you know Mr. _Dean_; a Lover would as soon be tired with dwelling on the Praises of his Mistress, as I can be with naming the Things, or the Methods by which I flattered myself I could have served poor _Ireland_. The reflecting on them made my Life pleasant to me when upon Earth, and the Remembrance of them, sweetens my Grave to me; and therefore, though you may think them but Dreams, allow me the Pleasure of repeating them. I say, then, with the highest Joy of Heart, that the enlarging and improving our neglected Tillage, the encouraging and heightening our old decaying Manufactures, and the setting up new ones should have been the great Care of my Life, and the extending the Force and Use of the Society, when thus advanced to its Manhood, beyond what the Weakness and Inexperience of its infantine State could perform. I would have nursed up Crowds of Orphan Arts, and as they grew up, and could shift for themselves, I would have wean'd them, and brought a new Succession of others in their Place, as far as the Narrowness of the Fund would allow me. I would have brought over foreign Workmen of all Trades and Professions; I would have set up Glass Manufactures of all Kinds near our Collieries; I would have established our Earthen-Ware in the most effectual Manner, and if possible (by bringing over Hands from _Birmingham_) I would have improved our Hard-ware to such a Degree of Perfection as to stop that terrible Drain of our Cash. I had also designed to allow large Encouragements to bring over Foreigners for improving our Silk and Thread Bone-lace for enlarging our Paper and Sugar Business, which would be a Saving of many thousand Pounds every Year to _Ireland_.

SWIFT. Here is a fine Bundle of Hopes for a Man in Despair to live comfortably on! But pray now _Tom_, have you done reckoning up all your mighty Projects to make _Ireland_ another _Utopia_? I am almost at the End of my Patience, for to say Truth, _Tom_, the List of the Ships in _Homer_'s Iliad is not more tedious.

PRIOR. Why, Mr. _Dean_, to teize you as little as I can, I will drop a Number of others, and only touch cursorily on the Advancement of our Silk Manufactures of every Kind, as well as our Tapestry. I would have encouraged our Salt-works, and our Ship-building, and I would have set on Foot a Society, to have set up and directed our Fisheries both in the North and South Coasts of this Island. If I durst take in smaller Matters, I would have set up an experimental Farm and Garden, and in Time allowed a Salary for a Professor in Agriculture, which _Columella_ you know so much laments the Want of, and I would have given an yearly Præmium of 100 _l._ for the best annual Invention in Arts and Husbandry, as much for the best Book yearly in any of the Sciences, and the same for the best _English_ Poem; as Nations are apt to judge of each other's Genius and Talents (I will not say how justly) by the Performances they produce this Way. Nay, Mr. _Dean_, I would have advis'd a Præmium of at least 100 _l._ annually, to be given by the Society for the best Picture, and also, as much for the best Piece of Sculpture, or Statue; as these two Arts have ever been consider'd as the chief Marks and Characteristics of a polite and sensible Nation, and have always flourish'd where ever Arts or Learning have been encouraged. I had Thoughts of stopping the vast drain of our People to _America_, by hiring Ships which trade thither, to bring back every _Irishman gratis_, who disliked the Country, and would rail at it when he got Home. Nay, I had even Thoughts of printing a Collection in Folio, of all the best _Irish_ Pamphlets, or at least, of all the best Hints in them, relating to the Service of our Country. I would have done my utmost to have gotten the best and noblest Members of the Society (as great and good Men communicate Virtue to their Friends as the Loadstone invigorates the Needle it touches) to have petitioned the Parliament for sumptuary Laws, for Hospitals in every County Town, for establishing a national Bank, for illuminating our Coasts, with Light-houses as carefully as our Streets with Lamps; for applying to his Majesty for a Mint for our Copper and Silver Coinage, and also for hardening it to prevent its wearing; as well as for forming Canals for assisting our inland Navigation, and for working up our Collieries, and opening those hidden Treasures our Mines. I would have promoted by judicious Præmiums.----

SWIFT. Hold! Stop! Where is the Man going? Are you sailing in Quest of the North-West Passage to make a short Cut to Wealth and Trade of your own imagining? You boddered me enough with many of these Articles already, and do you expect I can be as little tired with them as you are? Whenever you enter upon this Subject, you run on, Head foremost, like a mad Hound on the Road, without minding what's before you; weak Men, I find, tho' they cannot Think without Talking, can Talk without Thinking. Was there ever such a Hodge-Podge of Reveries, mustered up by a living Author, to say nothing of a dead one, that should have a little more Sense? Why there is not in all _Bedlam_, a Man so absurdly distracted by an Over-load of Projects. You are a sweet Politician indeed, _Tom_, and just as fit to conquer Nations as to mend them. What enthusiastical Delusions stuff thy Noddle? Will you never remember _mundus vult vadere quo vult_ and be satisfied to leave the World to him that made it, and Kingdoms to those he has appointed to govern them? These high flown Whims of yours, are just as practicable, as _Archimedes_ his moving the Earth out of its Place, and it provokes me to hear such impossible Projects declaim'd on by such a Visionary, such a Stockjobber in Politicks!

PRIOR. You try my Temper too far, I neither can nor will bear your insolent contemptuous Way of conversing, or your opprobrious provoking Language. If you attack my favourite Foible with such Acrimony, you must expect I will not spare some of yours: As for your sneering at my Politicks, I own I never was a Politician, nor did I ever set up for one. I had too rational an Head, I thank Heaven, and too honest an Heart, to allow me to make any great Progress that Way. And now, Mr. _Dean_, I must tell you very frankly, I never saw or heard any eminent Proofs of your extraordinary Skill as a Politician, except a vast Crowd of Pamphlets; And what are they but the mere Cobwebs of Politicks, that owe their Birth to the House being neglected, and are all swept away when it is clean'd? You was a pretty good Patriot, but you had so much of the Politician, the next to taking Care of others, you loved to take Care of yourself, and all possible Care too. You kept a good Byass on your Bowl to get near the Jack at long run and secure a Mitre; and tho' when you were disappointed, you furiously attack'd the Ministry and pleaded your Country's Cause with due Resentment; yet even then, your Revenge when over-tired, slept like an Hare with its Eyes open, that while you watch'd for the publick Good, you should not overlook your own. Besides, let me tell you _Dean_, if you will be taunting, that if the political Secrets of the latter End of the Queen's Reign were detected, you would be found as rank a Jacobite as many Authors in those Days represented you to the World.

SWIFT. I think you have borrowed some of their sort of Spite, for you seem to be in a great Fury with little Reason for it. But I must tell you, Sir, though those Authors were ever mistaken when they called me a _Jacobite_, I never was in the wrong when I called them Fools. As for your political Secrets, let me be allowed to set you right, for I assure you there are no such Things in _England_. Men are such sievish leaky Mortals there, that they can't conceal even their own Rogueries; for political Secrets told to _Britons_, tho' under Vows of Secrecy, are like Bonds for great Sums seal'd in private, but Judgment is soon enter'd up in the public Offices; and all the World knows in a trice what has pass'd. As for the kind Hints those Writers Honoured me with, I assure you, Sir, I despised them as sincerely as your Anger now. Their Talents were incapable of hurting any but themselves, and therefore I forgave them, as the Law pardons Children and Ideots. It is true, where their Spite appeared very invenom'd, I took other Measures; for then, as the Statute speaks of Boys, _Malitia suplet ætatem_ (Malice supplies their Want of Age) and I pepper'd them off notwithstanding their Folly, to frighten silly Scribblers from playing with such edg'd Tools again. But after all, what were their Works against me, but a mere hot Hash of cold Meat, of fifty half read political Authors, and unknown common-place Party-Writers, mix'd up with common Reports, and a few insipid lifeless Scraps of their own tasteless Trash and factious Venom.

PRIOR. We that are dead and love Truth, know that most Books, and especially Party Books are made like their Paper of old Scraps and Rags pickt up here and there; but however, their Works in those Days pleased the World, had an infinite number of Applauders, and made you sufficiently jealous of the Talents of their Authors.

SWIFT. I jealous! I detest, I renounce the Thought! I was never jealous of any Man but my self, lest I should fall short of that Glory, which I knew I had gained, and feared I might lose again. I ever judg'd when a Man has wrote a good Book, he should Stop as _Jupiter_ did when he begot _Hercules_, left his next Production, should be found vastly beneath the former; and therefore I was as suspicious of my scribling Temper, as Physicians say an over-fed Glutton should be of his Finger's Ends. But I scorn'd my Antagonists too much, to be jealous of them, or even to be Angry with them; for tho' they abused me very Generally and very Grosly, my chief Delight was, that they never reviled me so much as when I was in my greatest Glory, as Dogs never are so apt to Bark at the Moon, as when she is at the Full. Besides, let me tell you, testy Sir, with the old Poet _Nomina mille, mille nocendi Artes_. 'Tis so easy to be malicious, and at the same time so mean, that true Worth never Triumphs so eminently over its Enemies, as when they expose their Weakness and Envy by reviling it. It is true, many Scriblers busied themselves with Criticising and Decrying my Works; but they were so far from disturbing me, I made the best Use of them, by improving my Productions; for Criticks to good Writers, are like their own Dust to Diamonds, good for nothing but just to polish them, and them only. I Jealous! No really, Sir, there was no Occasion for it; the very Wit of my Writings kept all the laughing Part of Mankind on my Side, and I never lived in any Times where reasoning was much regarded by the common Herd of Readers or Talkers.

PRIOR. A pretty Confession for an Author, Truly! and yet since you have stirred my Gall, I must tell you, that we may say of the brightest of your Writings, what I said in one of my Exercises at School of Mr. _Cowlry_.

_With all the Graces, all the Faults of Wit, You both adorn'd and blemisht all you writ._

I am sure you had often such a quick running hand way of thinking, that you frequently left your meaning behind you. But I am not angry enough to make any severe Remarks of my own, on the numerous Tracts you gave the World; but there was one Objection every one agreed in, and that was your banishing Divinity out of all your Compositions, and indeed out of your Conversation; so that it should seem Mr. _Dean_, if I am such a wretched Politician as you say, I may as fairly and more truly tell you, that you have not shewn your self a very able Divine.