ease. and unrelenting refusal to clear her honour to the world, even at her dying hour. There the authority of Mr. Sheridan, the other on are two editions of this dying scene-one on that of Mr. Theophilus Swift, who is said to have received it from Mrs. Whiteway. Mr. Scott, who is unable to discredit the former, and is inclined at the same time to prefer the least disreputable for his author, is reduced to the necessity of supposing, that both may be true, and that Mr. Sheridan's story may have related to an earlier period than that reported by Mrs. Whiteway. We shall lay both before our readers. Mr. Sheridan says, with earnestness to see me, since I wrote last to From this heart-breaking scene we turn to another, if possible, still more deplorable. Vanessa was now dead. The grave had heaped its tranquillising mould on her agitated heart, and given her tormentor assurance, that he should no more suffer from her reproaches on earth; and yet, though with her the last pretext was extinguished for refusing to acknowledge the wife he had so infamously abused, we find him, with this dreadful example before his eyes, persisting to withhold from his remaining victim, that late and imperfect justice to which her claim was so apparent, and from the denial of which she was sinking before his eyes in sickness and Sorrow to the grave. It is utterly impossible to suggest any excuse or palliation for such cold-blooded barbarity. Even though we were to believe with Mr. Scott, that he had ceased to be a man, this would afford no apology for his acting like a beast! He might still have acknowledged his wife in public; and restored to her the comfort and the honour, of which he had robbed her without the excuse of violent passion, or thoughtless precipitation. He was rich, far beyond what either of them could have expected when their union was first contemplated; and had attained a name and a station in society which made him independent of riches. Yet, for the sake of avoiding some small awkwardness or inconvenience to himself-to be secured from the idle talking of those who might wonder why, since they were to marry, they did not marry before-or perhaps merely to retain the object of his regard in more complete subjection and dependence, he could bear to see her pining, year after year, in solitude and degradation, and sinking at last into an untimely grave, prepared by his hard "A short time before her death, a scene passed between the Dean and her, an account of which I had from my father, and which I shall relate with reluctance, as it seems to bear more hard on Swift's humanity than any other part of his conduct in life. As she found her final dissolution approach, a few days before it happened, in the presence of Dr. Sheridan, she addressed Swift in the most earnest and pathetic terms to grant her dying request; That, as the ceremony of marriage had passed between them, though for sundry considerations they had not cohabited in that state, in order to put it out of the power of slander to be busy with her fame after death, she adjured him by their friendship to let her have the satisfaction of dying at least, though she had not lived, his acknowledged 46 "Swift made no reply, but, turning on his heel, walked silently out of the room, nor ever saw her behaviour threw Mrs. Johnson into unspeakable afterward, during the few days she lived. This agonies, and for a time she sunk under the weight of so cruel a disappointment. But soon after, roused by indignation, she inveighed against his cruelty in the bitterest terms; and, sending for a lawyer, made her will, bequeathing her fortune by her own name to charitable uses. This was done in the presence of Dr. Sheridan, whom she appointed one of her executors.'"-Vol. i. p. 357. If this be true, Swift must have had the heart of a monster; and it is of little consequence, whether, when her death was nearer, he pretended to consent to what his unhappy be too late;' and to what, at all events, cervictim herself then pathetically declared to tainly never was done. Mrs. Whiteway's statement is as follows: "When Stella was in her last weak state, and one day had come in a chair to the Deanery, she was with difficulty brought into the parlour. The Dean had prepared some mulled wine, and kept it by the fire for her refreshment. After tasting it, she became very faint, but having recovered a little by degrees, when her breath (for she was asthmatic), was allowed her, she desired to lie down. She sitting by her, held her hand, and addressed her in was carried up stairs, and laid on a bed; the Dean the most affectionate manner. She drooped, however, very much. Mrs. Whiteway was the only third person present. After a short time, her politeness induced her to withdraw to the adjoining room, but it was necessary, on account of air, that the door should not be closed,-it was half shut: the rooms were close adjoining. Mrs. Whiteway had too much honour to listen, but could not avoid observing, that the Dean and Mrs. Johnson conversed together in a low tone; the latter, indeed, was too weak to raise her voice. Mrs. Whiteway paid no attention, having no idle curiosity, but at length she heard the Dean say, in an audible voice, Well, my dear, if you wish it, it shall be owned,' to which Stella answered with a sigh, "It is too late."-Vol. i. pp. 355, 356. 44 H and want of patriotism, could ever come with so ill a grace from any quarter, as from him who had openly deserted and libelled his original party, without the pretext of any other cause than the insufficiency of the rewards they bestowed upon him,—and joined himself with men, who were treacherous not only to their first professions, but to their country and to each other, to all of whom he adhered, after their mutual hatred and vil lanies were detected. In private life, again, with what face could he erect himself into a rigid censor of morals, or pretend to complain of men in general, as unworthy of his notice, after breaking the hearts of two, if not three, amiable women, whose affections he had engaged by the most constant assiduities,—after savagely libelling almost all his early friends and benefactors, and exhibiting, in his daily life and conversation, a picture of domineering insolence and dogmatism, to which no parallel could be found, we believe, in the history of any other individual, and which rendered his society intolerable to all who were not subdued by their awe of him, or inured to it by long use? He had some right, perhaps, to look with disdain upon men of ordinary understandings; but for all that is the proper object of reproach, he should have looked only within: and whatever may be his merits as a writer, we do not hesitate to say, that he was despicable as a politician, and hateful as a man. With the consciousness of having thus barbarously destroyed all the women for whom he had ever professed affection, it is not wonderful that his latter days should have been overshadowed with gloom and dejection: but it was not the depression of late regret, or unavailing self-condemnation, that darkened his closing scene. It was but the rancour of disappointed ambition, and the bitterness of proud misanthropy: and we verily believe, that if his party had got again into power, and given him the preferment he expected, the pride and joy of his vindictive triumph would have been but little alloyed by the remembrance of the innocent and accomplished women of whom we have no hesitation to pronounce him the murderer. In the whole of his later writings, indeed, we shall look in vain for any traces of that penitential regret, which was due to the misery he had occasioned, even if it had arisen without his guilt, or even of that humble and solemn self-reproach, which is apt to beset thoughtful men in the decline of life and animation, even when their conduct has been generally blameless, and the judgment of the candid finds nothing in them to condemn: on the contrary, there is nowhere to be met with, a tone of more insolent reproach, and intolerant contempt to the rest of the world, or so direct a claim to the possession of sense and virtue, which that world was no longer worthy to employ. Of women, too, it is very remarkable, that he speaks with With these impressions of his personal charunvaried rudeness and contempt, and rails acter, perhaps it is not easy for us to judge indeed at the whole human race, as wretches quite fairly of his works. Yet we are far with whom he thinks it an indignity to share from being insensible to their great and very a common nature. All this, we confess, ap- peculiar merits. Their chief peculiarity is, pears to us intolerable; for, whether we look that they were almost all what may be called to the fortune, or the conduct of this extraor- occasional productions-not written for fame dinary person, we really recollect no individual or for posterity-from the fulness of the mind, who was less entitled to be either discontented or the desire of instructing mankind—but on or misanthropical-to complain of men or of the spur of the occasion-for promoting some accidents. Born almost a beggar, and neither temporary and immediate object, and provery industrious nor very engaging in his early ducing a practical effect, in the attainment habits, he attained, almost with his first efforts, of which their whole importance centered. the very height of distinction, and was re- With the exception of The Tale of a Tub, Gulwarded by appointments, which placed him liver, the Polite Conversation, and about half in a state of independence and respectability a volume of poetry, this description will apfor life. He was honoured with the acquaint- ply to almost all that is now before us;-and ance of all that was distinguished for rank, it is no small proof of the vigour and vivacity literature, or reputation;-and, if not very of his genius, that posterity should have been generally beloved, was, what he probably so anxious to preserve these careless and valued far more, admired and feared by most hasty productions, upon which their author of those with whom he was acquainted. appears to have set no other value than as When his party was overthrown, neither his means for the attainment of an end. The person nor his fortune suffered :—but he was truth is, accordingly, that they are very extraindulged, through the whole of his life, in a ordinary performances: And, considered with licence of scurrility and abuse, which has a view to the purposes for which they were never been permitted to any other writer, intended, have probably never been equalled and possessed the exclusive and devoted af- in any period of the world. They are writfection of the only two women to whom he ten with great plainness, force, and intrepidity wished to appear interesting. In this history, advance at once to the matter in dispute we confess, we see but little apology for dis- give battle to the strength of the enemy, and content and lamentation ;—and, in his conduct, never seek any kind of advantage from darkthere is assuredly still less for misanthropy. ness or obscurity. Their distinguishing feaIn public life, we do not know where we ture, however, is the force and the vehecould have found any body half so profligate mence of the invective in which they abound; and unprincipled as himself, and the friends-the copiousness, the steadiness, the perseto whom he finally attached himself;-nor verance, and the dexterity with which abuse can we conceive that complaints of venality, and ridicule are showered upon the adver sary. This, we think, was, beyond all doubt, Of the few works which he wrote in the Swift's great talent, and the weapon by which capacity of an author, and not of a party zealot he made himself formidable. He was, with- or personal enemy, The Tale of a Tub was out exception, the greatest and most efficient by far the earliest in point of time, and has, libeller that ever exercised the trade; and by many, been considered as the first in point possessed, in an eminent degree, all the quali- of merit. We confess we are not of that opinfications which it requires:-a clear head-a ion. It is by far too long and elaborate for a cold heart-a vindictive temper-no admira- piece of pleasantry;-the humour sinks, in tion of noble qualities-no sympathy with suf- many places, into mere buffoonery and nonfering-not much conscience-not much con- sense; and there is a real and extreme tesistency-a ready wit-a sarcastic humour- diousness arising from the too successful mima thorough knowledge of the baser parts of icry of tediousness and pedantry. All these human nature-and a complete familiarity defects are apparent enough even in the main with every thing that is low, homely, and fa- story, in which the incidents are without the miliar in language. These were his gifts;- shadow of verisimilitude or interest, and by and he soon felt for what ends they were far too thinly scattered; but they become ingiven. Almost all his works are libels; gene- sufferable in the interludes or digressions, rally upon individuals, sometimes upon sects the greater part of which are to us utterly and parties, sometimes upon human nature. illegible, and seem to consist almost entirely Whatever be his end, however, personal of cold and forced conceits, and exaggerated abuse, direct, vehement, unsparing invective, representations of long exploded whims and is his means. It is his sword and his shield, absurdities. The style of this work, which his panoply and his chariot of war. In all his appears to us greatly inferior to the History of writings, accordingly, there is nothing to raise John Bull or even of Martinus Scriblerus, is or exalt our notions of human nature, but evidently more elaborate than that of Swift's every thing to vilify and degrade. We may other writings, but has all its substantial learn from them, perhaps, to dread the con- characteristics. Its great merit seems to consequences of base actions, but never to love sist in the author's perfect familiarity with the feelings that lead to generous ones. There all sorts of common and idiomatical expresis no spirit, indeed, of love or of honour in any sions, his unlimited command of established part of them; but an unvaried and harassing phrases, both solemn and familiar, and the display of insolence and animosity in the unrivalled profusion and propriety with which writer, and villany and folly in those of whom he heaps them up and applies them to the he is writing. Though a great polemic, he exposition of the most fantastic conceptions. makes no use of general principles, nor ever To deliver absurd notions or incredible tales enlarges his views to a wide or comprehen- in the most authentic, honest, and direct sive conclusion. Every thing is particular terms, that have been used for the commuwith him, and, for the most part, strictly per-nication of truth and reason, and to luxuriate sonal. To make amends, however, we do in all the variations of that grave, plain, and think him quite without a competitor in perspicuous phraseology, which dull men use personalities. With a quick and sagacious spirit, and a bold and popular manner, he joins an exact knowledge of all the strong and the weak parts of every cause he has to manage; and, without the least restraint from delicacy, either of taste or of feeling, he The voyages of Captain Lemuel Gulliver seems always to think the most effectual is indisputably his greatest work. The idea blows the most advisable, and no advantage of making fictitious travels the vehicle of unlawful that is likely to be successful for satire as well as of amusement, is at least as the moment. Disregarding all the laws of old as Lucian; but has never been carried polished hostility, he uses, at one and the into execution with such success, spirit, and same moment, his sword and his poisoned originality, as in this celebrated performance. dagger-his hands and his teeth, and his en- The brevity, the minuteness, the homeliness, venomed breath,—and does not even scruple, the unbroken seriousness of the narrative, all upon occasion, to imitate his own yahoos, by give a character of truth and simplicity to the discharging on his unhappy victims a shower work, which at once palliates the extravaof filth, from which neither courage nor dex-gance of the fiction, and enhances the effect terity can afford any protection.Against of those weighty reflections and cutting sesuch an antagonist, it was, of course, at no verities in which it abounds. Yet though it time very easy to make head; and accord- is probable enough, that without those touchingly his invective seems, for the most part, es of satire and observation the work would to have been as much dreaded, and as tre- have appeared childish and preposterous, we mendous as the personal ridicule of Voltaire. are persuaded that it pleases chiefly by the Both were inexhaustible, well-directed, and novelty and vivacity of the extraordinary picunsparing; but even when Voltaire drew blood, tures it presents, and the entertainment we he did not mangle the victim, and was only receive from following the fortunes of the mischievous when Swift was brutal. Any one traveller in his several extraordinary advenwho will compare the epigrams on M. Franc tures. The greater part of the wisdom and de Pompignan with those on Tighe or Bettes- satire at least appears to us to be extremely worth, will easily understand the distinction. vulgar and common-place; and we have no to express their homely opinions, seems to be the great art of this extraordinary humorist, and that which gives their character and their edge to his sly strokes of satire, his keen sarcasms and bitter personalities. idea that they could possibly appear either impressive or entertaining, if presented without these accompaniments. A considerable part of the pleasure we derive from the voyages of Gulliver, in short, is of the same description with that which we receive from those of Sinbad the sailor; and is chiefly heightened, we believe, by the greater brevity and minuteness of the story, and the superior art that is employed to give it an appearance of truth and probability, in the very midst of its wonders. Among those arts, as Mr. Scott has judiciously observed, one of the most important is the exact adaptation of the narrative to the condition of its supposed author. "The character of the imaginary traveller is exactly that of Dampier, or any other sturdy nautical wanderer of the period, endowed with courage and common sense, who sailed through distant seas, without losing a single English prejudice which he had brought from Portsmouth or Plymouth, and on his return gave a grave and simple narrative of what he had seen or heard in foreign countries. The character is perhaps strictly English, and can be hardly relished by a foreigner. The reflections and observations of Gulliver are never more refined or deeper than might be expected from a plain master of a merchantman, or surgeon in the Old Jew. ry; and there was such a reality given to his whole person, that one seaman is said to have sworn he knew Captain Gulliver very well, but he lived at Wapping, not at Rotherhithe. It is the contrast between the natural ease and simplicity of such a style, and the marvels which the volume contains, that forms one great charm of this memorable satire on the imperfections, follies, and vices of mankind. The exact calculations preserved in the first and second part, have also the effect of qualifying the extravagance of the fable. It is said that in natural objects where proportion is exactly preserved, the marvellous, whether the object be gigantic or diminutive, is lessened in the eyes of the spectator; and it is certain, in general, that proportion forms an essential attribute of truth, and consequently of verisimilitude, or that which renders a narration probable. If the reader is disposed to grant the traveller his postulates as to the existence of the strange people whom he visits, it would be difficult to detect any inconsistency in his narrative. On the contrary, it would seem that he and they con duct themselves towards each other, precisely as must necessarily have happened in the respective circumstances which the author has supposed. In this point of view, perhaps the highest praise that could have been bestowed on Gulliver's Travels was the censure of a learned Irish prelate, who said the book contained some things which he could not prevail upon himself to believe."-Vol. i. pp. 340, 341. That the interest does not arise from the satire but from the plausible description of physical wonders, seems to be farther proved by the fact, that the parts which please the least are those in which there is most satire and least of those wonders. In the voyage to Laputa, after the first description of the flying island, the attention is almost exclusively directed to intellectual absurdities; and every one is aware of the dulness that is the result. Even as a satire, indeed, this part is extremely poor and defective; nor can any thing show more clearly the author's incapacity for large and comprehensive views than his signal failure in all those parts which invite him to such contemplations. In the multitude of his vulgar and farcical representations of particular errors in philosophy, he nowhere appears to have any sense of its true value or principles; but satisfies himself with collecting or imagining a number of fantastical quackeries, which tend to illustrate nothing but his contempt for human understanding. Even where his subject seems to invite him to something of a higher flight, he uniformly shrinks back from it, and takes shelter in common-place derision. What, for instance, can be poorer than the use he makes of the evocation of the illustrious dead-in which Hannibal is conjured up, just to say that he had not a drop of vinegar in his camp; and Aristotle, to ask two of his commentators, "whether the rest of the tribe were as great dunces as themselves?" The voyage to the Houyhnhmns is commonly supposed to displease by its vile and degrading representations of human nature; but, if we do not strangely mistake our own feelings on the subject, the impression it produces is not so much that of disgust as of dulness. The picture is not only extravagant, but bald and tame in the highest degree; while the story is not enlivened by any of those numerous and uncommon incidents which are detailed in the two first parts, with such an inimitable air of probability as almost to persuade us of their reality. For the rest, we have observed already, that the scope of the whole work, and indeed of all his writings, is to degrade and vilify human nature; and though some of the images which occur in this part may be rather coarser than the others, we do not think the difference so considerable as to account for its admitted inferiority in the power of pleasing. His only other considerable works in prose, are the "Polite Conversation," which we think admirable in its sort, and excessively entertaining; and the "Directions to Servants," which, though of a lower pitch, contains as much perhaps of his peculiar, vigorous and racy humour, as any one of his productions. The Journal to Stella, which was certainly never intended for publication, is not to be judged of as a literary work at all but to us it is the most interesting of all his productions-exhibiting not only a minute and masterly view of a very extraordinary political crisis, but a truer, and, upon the whole, a more favourable picture of his own mind, than can be gathered from all the rest of his writings-together with innumerable anecdotes characteristic not only of various eminent individuals, but of the private manners and public taste and morality of the times, more nakedly and surely authentic than any thing that can be derived from contemporary publications. Of his Poetry, we do not think there is much to be said;-for we cannot persuade ourselves that Swift was in any respect a poet. It would be proof enough, we think, just to observe, that, though a popular and most miscellaneous writer, he does not mention the name of Shakespeare above two or three times in any part of his works, and has But nowhere said a word in his praise. His partial editor admits that he has produced nothing which can be called either sublime or pathetic; and we are of the same opinion as to the beautiful. The merit of correct rhymes and easy diction, we shall not deny him; but the diction is almost invariably that of the most ordinary prose, and the matter of -his pieces no otherwise poetical, than that the Muses and some other persons of the Heathen mythology are occasionally mentioned. He has written lampoons and epigrams, and satirical ballads and abusive songs in great abundance, and with infinite success. these things are not poetry;—and are better in verse than in prose, for no other reason than that the sting is more easily remembered, and the ridicule occasionally enhanced, by the hint of a ludicrous parody, or the drollery of an extraordinary rhyme. His witty verses, when they are not made up of mere filth and venom, seem mostly framed on the model of Hudibras; and are chiefly remarkable, like those of his original, for the easy and apt application of homely and familiar phrases, to illustrate ingenious sophistry or unexpected allusions. One or two of his imitations of Horace, are executed with spirit and elegance, and are the best, we think, of his familiar pieces; unless we except the verses on his own death, in which, however, the great charm arises, as we have just stated, from the singular ease and exactness with which he has imitated the style of ordinary society, and the neatness with which he has brought together and reduced to metre such a number of natural, characteristic, and common-place expressions. The Cadenus and Vanessa is, of itself, complete proof that he had in him none of the elements of poetry. It was written when his faculties were in their perfection, and his heart animated with all the tenderness of which it was ever capable-and yet it is as cold and as flat as the ice of Thulé. Though describing a real passion, and a real perplexity, there is not a spark of fire nor a throb of emotion in it from one end to the Which keeps the peace among the gods, The Rhapsody of Poetry, and the Legion Club, are the only two pieces in which there is the least glow of poetical animation; though, in the latter, it takes the shape of ferocious and almost frantic invective, and, in the former, shines out but by fits in the midst of the usual small wares of cant phrases and snappish misanthropy. In the Rhapsody, the following lines, for instance, near the beginning, are vigorous and energetic. "Not empire to the rising sun By valour, conduct, fortune won; Not beggar's brat on bulk begot; Not boy brought up to cleaning shoes, To rise in church, or law, or state, Vol. xiv. pp. 310, 311. immediately after this nervous and poetical line, he drops at once into the lowness of vulgar flippancy. "What hope of custom in the fair, While not a soul demands your ware?" &c. There are undoubtedly many strong lines, and much cutting satire in this poem; but the staple is a mimicry of Hudibras, without the richness or compression of Butler; as, for example, other. All the return he makes to the warm-Yet, hearted creature who had put her destiny into his hands, consists in a frigid mythological fiction, in which he sets forth, that Venus and the Graces lavished their gifts on her in her infancy, and moreover got Minerva, by a trick, to inspire her with wit and wisdom. The style is mere prose or rather a string of familiar and vulgar phrases tacked together in rhyme, like the general tissue of his poetry. However, it has been called not only easy but elegant, by some indulgent critics—and therefore, as we take it for granted nobody reads it now-a-days, we shall extract a few lines at random, to abide the censure of the judicious. To us they seem to be about as much poetry as so many lines out of Coke upon Littleton." "But in the poets we may find A wholesome law, time out of mind, "And here a simile comes pat in: Though chickens take a month to fatten, |