divine.' Early in life (about 1699) he published a string of sarcastic verses entitled the Grumbling Hive, or Knaves Turned Honest, which he reprinted in 1714 with the addition of long explanatory notes, and an Inquiry into the Origin of Moral Virtue, giving to the whole the title afterwards so well known, the Fable of the Bees, or Private Vices Public Benefits. Previous to the latter work he had published Esop Dressed, Typhon in Verse, and the Planter's Charity, all in 1704. He enlarged his principal work, the Fable of the Bees; and in 1729 it was rendered more conspicuous by being presented to the grand jury of Middlesex on account of its immoral and pernicious tendency. Bishop Berkeley answered the arguments of the Fable, and Mandeville replied in Letters to Dion. He also published Free Thoughts on Religion, and An Inquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War (1732), both of which, like his Fable, were of questionable tendency. of thought and ingenuity, what toil and labour, and what length of time must it have cost, before man could learn from a seed to raise and prepare so useful a product as linen! the world before a fine scarlet or crimson cloth can we reflect on the toil and hazard that are to be under The satire of Mandeville is general, not individual; yet his examples are strong and lively pictures. He describes the faults and corruptions of different professions and forms of society, and then attempts to shew that they are subservient to the grandeur and worldly happiness of the whole. If mankind, he says, could be cured of the failings they are naturally guilty of, they would cease to be capable of forming vast, potent, and polite societies. The fallacy of his theory, as Johnson says, is that he defines neither vices nor benefits.' He confounds innocent pleasures and luxuries, which benefit society, with their vicious excesses, which are destructive of order and government. His object was chiefly to divert the reader, being conscious that mankind are not easily reasoned out of their follies. Another of the paradoxes of Mandeville is, that charity schools, and all sorts of education, are injurious to the lower classes. The If you ask me where to look for those beautiful view which he takes of human nature is low and shining qualities of prime-ministers, and the great degrading enough to have been worthy the adop-favourites of princes, that are so finely painted in tion of Swift; and many of his descriptions are not inferior to those of the dean. Some of his opinions on economic questions are admirably expressed. 'Let the value of gold and silver,' he says, either rise or fall, the enjoyment of all societies will ever depend upon the fruits of the earth and the labour of the people; both which joined together are a more certain, a more inexhaustible, and a more real treasure than the gold of Brazil or the silver of Potosi.' Division of Labour. If we trace the most flourishing nations in their origin, we shall find that, in the remote beginnings of every society, the richest and most considerable men among them were a great while destitute of a great many comforts of life that are now enjoyed by the meanest and most humble wretches; so that many things which were once looked upon as the inventions of luxury are now allowed even to those that are so miserably poor as to become the objects of public charity, nay, counted so necessary that we think no human creature ought to want them. A man would be laughed at that should discover luxury in the plain dress of a poor creature that walks along in a thick parish gown, and a coarse shirt underneath it; and yet what a number of people, how many different trades, and what a variety of skill and tools, must be employed to have the most ordinary Yorkshire cloth! What depth Flattery of the Great. dedications, addresses, epitaphs, funeral-sermons, and inscriptions, I answer, There, and nowhere else. Where would you look for the excellency of a statue but in that part which you see of it? 'Tis the polished outside only that has the skill and labour of the sculptor to boast of; what is out of sight is untouched. look for the brains or the heart, you would only shew Would you break the head or cut open the breast to has often made me compare the virtues of great men to your ignorance, and destroy the workmanship. This your large china jars : they make a fine show, and are ornamental even to a chimney. One would, by the bulk they appear in, and the value that is set upon them, think they might be very useful; but look into a thousand of them, and you will find nothing in them but dust and cobwebs. Pomp and Superfluity. If the great ones of the clergy, as well as the laity, of any country whatever, had no value for earthly pleasures, and did not endeavour to gratify their appetites, why are envy and revenge so raging among them, and all the other passions, improved and refined upon in courts of princes more than anywhere else; and why are their repasts, their recreations, and whole manner of living, always such as are approved of, coveted, and imitated by the most sensual people of the same country? If, despising all visible decorations, they were only in love with the embellishments of the mind, why should they borrow so many of the implements, and make use of the most darling toys, of the luxurious? Why should a his honour, name, and praise shall live; but they lord treasurer, or a bishop, or even the Grand Signior, | have had a much more durable existence. or the Pope of Rome, to be good and virtuous, and endeavour the conquest of his passions, have occasion for greater revenues, richer furniture, or a more numerous attendance as to personal service, than a private man? What virtue is it the exercise of which requires so much pomp and superfluity as are to be seen by all men in power? A man has as much opportunity to practise temperance that has but one dish at a meal, as he that is constantly served with three courses and a dozen dishes in each. One may exercise as much patience and be as full of self-denial on a few flocks, without curtains or tester, as in a velvet bed that is sixteen foot high. The virtuous possessions of the mind are neither charge nor burden: a man may bear misfortunes with fortitude in a garret, forgive injuries afoot, and be chaste, though he has not a shirt to his back; and therefore I shall never believe but that an indifferent sculler, if he was intrusted with it, might carry all the learning and religion that one man can contain, as well as a barge with six oars, especially if it was but to cross from Lambeth to Westminster; or that humility is so ponderous a virtue, that it requires six horses to draw it. MRS MANLEY. ANDREW FLETCHER OF SALTOUN. ANDREW FLETCHER, born in 1653, the son of a Scottish_knight, succeeded early to the family estate of Saltoun, and represented the shire of Lothian in the Scottish parliament in the reign of Charles II. He opposed the arbitrary designs of the Duke of York, afterwards James II. and retired to Holland. His estate was confiscated; but he returned to England with the Duke of Monmouth in 1685. Happening, in a personal scuffle, to kill the mayor of Lynn, Fletcher again went abroad, and travelled in Spain. He returned at the period of the Revolution, and took an active part in Scottish affairs. His opinions were republican, and he was of a haughty unbending temper; brave as the sword he wore,' according to a contemporary, and bold as a lion: a sure friend,. and an irreconcilable enemy: would lose his life readily to serve his country, and would not do a base thing to save it.' Fletcher opposed the union DE LA RIVIERE MANLEY, a female novelist, of Scotland with England in 1707, believing, with dramatist, and political writer, enjoyed some many zealous but narrow-sighted patriots of that celebrity among the wits of the Queen Anne day, that it would eclipse the glory of ancient Caledonia. He died in 1716. Fletcher wrote period. Neither her life nor writings will bear a close scrutiny, but she appears to have been several political discourses. One of these, entitled unfortunate in her youth. She was the daughter An Account of a Conversation concerning a Right of a brave and accomplished officer, Sir Roger Regulation of Governments for the common Good Manley, governor of Guernsey, and one of the of Mankind, in a Letter to the Marquis of Montrose, authors of the Turkish Spy. Sir Roger died the Earls of Rothes, Roxburghe, and Haddington, while his daughter was young, and she fell to the from London, the First of December 1703, is forcibly charge of a Mr Manley, her cousin, who drew her written, and contains some strong appeals in into a mock-marriage-he had a wife living-and favour of Scottish independence, as well as some in about three years basely deserted her. Her just and manly sentiments. In this letter occurs life henceforward was that of an author by profesa saying often quoted, and which has been-by sion, and a woman of intrigue. She wrote three Lord Brougham and others-erroneously ascribed plays, the Royal Mistress, the Lost Lover, and to the Earl of Chatham: 'I knew a very wise man Lucius-the last being honoured by a prologue that believed that if a man were permitted to make from the pen of Steele, and an epilogue by Prior. all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a nation.' The newspaper may now Her most famous work was the Atalantis, a political romance or satire, full of court and party the war with France, the naval songs of Dibdin be said to have supplanted the ballad; yet, during scandal, directed against the Whig statesmen and public characters connected with the Revolution fanned the flame of national courage and patriotof 1688. This work was honoured with a state ism. An excessive admiration of the Grecian and prosecution. The printer and publisher were Roman republics led Fletcher to eulogise even the seized, and Mrs Manley, having generously come slavery that prevailed in those states. He repreforward to relieve them from the responsibility, sents their condition as happy and useful; and, as was committed to custody. She was soon liber-class in Scotland in colours, that, if true, shew how a contrast to it, he paints the state of the lowest ated and discharged, and a Tory ministry succeeding, she was in high favour. Swift, in his frightfully disorganised the country was at that Journal to Stella (January 28, 1711-12), draws this period. In his Second Discourse on the Affairs portrait of Mrs Manley: She has very generous of Scotland, 1698, there occurs the following principles for one of her sort, and a great deal of good sense and invention: she is about forty, very homely, and very fat.' She found favour, however, with Swift's friend, Alderman Barber, in whose house she lived for many years, and there she died in 1724. When Swift relinquished the Examiner, Mrs Manley conducted it for some time, the dean supplying hints, and she appears to have been a ready and effective political writer. All her works, however, have sunk into oblivion. Her novels are worthless, extravagant productions, and the Atalantis is only remembered from a line in Pope. The Baron, in the Rape of the Lock, says: As long as Atalantis shall be read, sketch: State of Scotland in 1698. There are at this day in Scotland-besides a great many poor families very meanly provided for by the church-boxes, with others who, by living on bad food, fall into various diseases-two hundred thousand people begging tageous, but a very grievous burden to so poor a country. from door to door. These are not only noway advanAnd though the number of them be perhaps double to what it was formerly, by reason of this present great distress, yet in all times there have been about one hundred thousand of those vagabonds, who have lived without any regard or subjection either to the laws of the land, or even those of God and nature. No magistrate could ever be informed, or discover, which way one in a hundred of these wretches died, or that ever they were baptised. Many murders have been discovered among them; and they are not only a most unspeakable oppression to poor tenants-who, if they give not bread, or some kind of provision, to perhaps forty such villains in one day, are sure to be insulted by them-but they rob many poor people who live in houses distant from any neighbourhood. In years of plenty, many thousands of them meet together in the mountains, where they feast and riot for many days; and at country-weddings, markets, burials, and the like public occasions, they are to be seen, both men and women, perpetually drunk, cursing, blaspheming, and fighting together. These are such outrageous disorders, that it were better for the nation they were sold to the galleys or West Indies, than that they should continue any longer to be a burden and curse upon us. M. MARTIN. The first account of the Hebrides was published in 1703. It is entitled A Description of the Western Islands of Scotland, by M. MARTIN, Gent. The author was a native of Skye. Dr Johnson had read Martin's book when he was very young, and was particularly struck with the St Kilda man's notion that the High Church of Glasgow had been hollowed out of a rock. This 'notion' had probably struck Addison also, as in the Spectator (No. 50) he makes, as Mr Croker has remarked, the Indian king suppose that St Paul's was carved out of a rock. Martin's work is poorly written, but the novelty of the information it contains, and even the credulity of the writer, give it a certain interest and value. He gives a long account of the second-sight, or taish, as it is called in Gaelic, in which he was a firm believer, though he admitted that it had greatly declined. The Second-sight. required in sorting the colours, so as to be agreeable to the nicest fancy. For this reason the women are at great pains, first, to give an exact pattern of the plaid upon a piece of wood, having the number of every thread of the stripe on it. The length of it is commonly seven double ells; the one end hangs by the middle over the left arm, the other going round the body, hangs by the end over the left arm also. The right hand above it is to be at liberty to do anything upon occasion. Every isle differs from each other in their fancy of making plaids as to the stripes in breadth and colours. This humour is as different through the mainland of the Highlands, in so far that they who have seen those places is able at the first view of a man's plaid to guess the place of his residence. When they travel on foot, the plaid is tied on the breast with a bodkin of bone or wood-just as the spina wore by the Germans, according to the description of C. Tacitus. The plaid is tied round the middle with a leather belt. It is pleated from the belt to the knee very nicely. This dress for foot-men is found much easier and lighter than breeches or trews. The plaid (for women) being pleated all round, was tied with a belt below the breast; the belt was of leather, and several pieces of silver intermixed with the leather like a chain. The lower end of the belt has a piece of plate about eight inches long and three in breadth, curiously engraven; the end of which was adorned with fine stones or pieces of red coral. They wore sleeves of scarlet cloth, closed at the end as men's vests, with gold lace round 'em, having plate buttons set with fine stones. The head-dress was a fine kerchief of linen strait about lock of hair hangs down their cheeks above the breast, the head, hanging down the back taper-wise. A large the lower end tied with a knot of ribands. JONATHAN SWIFT. The most powerful and original prose writer of this period was the celebrated Dean of St Patrick's. We have already noticed his poetry, which formed only a sort of interlude in the strangely mingled The second-sight is a singular faculty of seeing an drama of his life. None of his works were written otherwise invisible object, without any previous means for mere fame or solitary gratification. His restused by the person that sees it for that end. The vision less and insatiate ambition prompted him to wield makes such a lively impression upon the seer, that they neither see nor think of anything else except the vision, his pen as a means of advancing his interests, or as long as it continues; and then they appear pensive or expressing his personal feelings, caprices, or rejovial, according to the object which was represented to sentment. In a letter to Bolingbroke, Swift says: them. At the sight of a vision the eyelids of the person'All my endeavours, from a boy, to distinguish are erected, and the eyes continue staring until the object vanish. If an object is seen early in a morning (which is not frequent), it will be accomplished in a few hours afterwards; if at noon, it will commonly be accomplished that very day; if in the evening, perhaps that night; if after candles be lighted, it will be accomplished that night; the latter always in accomplishment by weeks, months, and sometimes years, according to the time of night the vision is seen. When a shroud is perceived about one, it is a sure prognostic of death; the time is judged according to the height of it about the person. If a woman is seen standing at a man's left hand, it is a presage that she will be his wife, whether they be married to others, or unmarried at the time of the apparition. If two or three women are seen at once standing near a man's left hand, she that is next him will undoubtedly be his wife first, and so on. To see a seat empty at the time of one's sitting in it, is a presage of that person's death quickly after. Dress in the Western Islands. The plaid wore by the men is made of fine wool; the thread as fine as can be made of that kind; it consists of divers colours, and there is a great deal of ingenuity | myself, were only for want of a great title and fortune, that I might be used like a lord by those who have an opinion of my parts-whether right or wrong, it is no great matter; and so the reputation of wit or great learning does the office of a blue ribbon, or of a coach and six horses.'. This was but a poor and sordid ambition, and it is surprising that it bore such fruit. The first work of any importance by Swift was a political tract, written in 1701, to vindicate the Whig patriots, Somers, Halifax, and Portland, who had been impeached by the House of Commons. The author was then of the ripe age of thirty-four; for Swift, unlike his friend Pope, came but slowly to the maturity of his powers. The treatise was entitled A Discourse of the Contests and Dissensions between the Nobles and Commons of Athens and Rome. It is plainly written, without irony or eloquence. One sentence-the last in the fourth chapter-closes with a fine simile. Although,' he says, 'most revolutions of government in Greece and Rome began with the tyranny of the people, yet they generally concluded in that of a single person: so that an usurping populace is its own dupe; a mere underworker, and a purchaser in by Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq. This last brochure trust for some single tyrant, whose state and power had immense popularity. It was a satire on an they advance to their own ruin, with as blind an almanac-maker and astrologer named Partridge. instinct as those worms that die with weaving Swift's first prediction related to Partridge. 'I magnificent habits for beings of a superior nature have consulted,' he said, 'the star of his nativity, to their own.' Swift's next work was his Battle of and find he will infallibly die upon the 29th of the Books, written to support his patron, Sir William March next, of a raging fever.' In a subsequent Temple, in his dispute as to the relative merits of paper, Swift proposed to give an account of the ancient and modern learning. The Battle of the accomplishment of the prediction. Partridge was Books exhibits all the characteristics of Swift's style, naturally very indignant. He advertised his exits personal satire, and strong racy humour. These istence: Blessed be God, he, John Partridge, qualities were further displayed in his Tale of a Tub, was still living and in health, and all were knaves written about the same time, and first published in who reported otherwise.' Swift and his friends 1704. The object of his powerful satire was here were ready with replies and rejoinders, and the of a higher cast; it was to ridicule the Roman affair amused the town for a season. Some political Catholics and Presbyterians, with a view of exalt- tracts followed, the most conspicuous of which are ing the High Church of England party, and to the Conduct of the Allies, published in 1712 (and expose what he considered to be the corruptions which had immense influence on public opinion), of the Church of Rome and the fanaticism of the and the Public Spirit of the Whigs, in 1714 The Dissenters. He begins in the old story-telling latter incensed the Duke of Argyle and other peers way: 'Once upon a time there was a man who so much, that a proclamation offering a reward of had three sons.' Those sons he names Peter (the £300 was issued for the discovery of the author. Church of Rome), Martin (the Church of England), In 1713, Swift was rewarded with the deanery of and Jack (the Presbyterians or Protestant Dis- St Patrick's in Dublin; and the destruction of all senters generally), who was sometimes called hopes of further preferment followed soon after, Knocking Jack (or John Knox). Their father on the accession of the House of Hanover to the died while they were young, and upon his death- throne, and the return of the Whigs to power. bed, calling the lads, he spoke to them thus: Sons, Swift withdrew to Ireland, a disappointed man, because I have purchased no estate nor was born full of bitterness. His feelings partly found vent to any, I have long considered of some good in several works which he published on national legacies to leave you, and at last, with much care, subjects, and which rendered him exceedingly I have provided each of you with a good coat.' popular in Ireland-A Proposal for the Universal Under this homely figure is signified the Christian Use of Irish Manufactures (1720), and Letters by religion. 'With good wearing,' he continues, M. B. Drapier against Wood's patent for supply'the coats will last you as long as you live, and ing Ireland with a copper coinage (1724). There will grow in the same proportion as your bodies, was a scarcity of copper coin in Ireland, and lengthening and widening of themselves, so as to Wood, an English owner of mines, obtained a be always fit.' They were not to add to or dimin- patent right to coin farthings and halfpence to the ish from their coats one thread. After a time, amount of £108,000. The grant was made to however, they got tired of their plainness, and Wood without consulting the Irish government; wished to become gay and fashionable. The the disposal of the patent had, in the first instance, father's will (the Bible) was misinterpreted and been given by Lord Sunderland to the Duchess of twisted word by word, and letter by letter, to suit Kendal, the king's mistress, and the duchess, it their purpose; shoulder-knots, lace, and embroidery was said, had sold it to Wood for £12,000. All were added to their coats, and the will was at this wounded deeply the pride and patriotism of the length locked up and utterly disregarded. Peter Irish nation, and Swift attacked the scheme with then lorded it over his brothers, claiming the all his might. He contended that Wood's metal supremacy, insisting upon being called Father Peter was base: 'If a hatter sells a dozen of hats for and Lord Peter; a violent rupture ensued, and a 5s. apiece, which amounts to £3, and receives series of scenes and adventures are related in which the payment in Wood's coin, he receives only the Swift allegorises, as we may say, the most sacred value of five shillings!' In reality, the coinage doctrines and the various sects of the Christian was excellent, better than the English, and nobody religion. It is obvious that this was treading on in Ireland would have been obliged to take more very dangerous ground. The ludicrous ideas and than fivepence-halfpenny in copper; but the feelassociations called up by such grotesque fancies, ing against England was strong, and wrought up striking analogy, and broad satire in connection to a pitch of fury by Swift, who, after heaping with religion, inevitably tended to lower the respect every epithet of contempt and execration upon due to revelation, and many persons considered Wood, touched upon the higher question of the the work to be a covert attack upon Christianity. royal prerogative. It was unjust to bind the This opinion was instilled into the mind of Queen people of Ireland by the laws of a parliament in Anne. The work established Swift's fame for all which they were unrepresented. The remedy,' time coming, but condemned him to an Irish he added, is wholly in your own hands-by the deanery for life. Whenever a mitre came in sight laws of God, of nature, of nations, and of your and seemed within his reach, the witty buffoon- country, you are and ought to be as free a people as eries of Lord Peter and his brothers were pro- your brethren in England.' The government had jected before the queen, and the golden prize was to bow to the storm. The patent was withdrawn, withdrawn. In 1708 appeared Swift's Sentiments and Swift was as much the idol of the Irish as of a Church of England Man in Respect to Reli-Mirabeau was afterwards the idol of the French. gion and Government, his Letters on the Sacra- In 1726 appeared Gulliver's Travels, the most mental Test, Argument against the Abolition of original and extraordinary of all Swift's producChristianity, and Predictions for the Year 1708, tions. A few of his friends-Pope, Bolingbroke, the Modest Proposal for preventing the Poor in Gay, and Arbuthnot-were in the secret as to the authorship of this satirical romance; but it puzzled the world in no ordinary degree, and this uncertainty tended to increase the interest and attraction of the work.* While courtiers and politicians recognised in the adventures of Gulliver many satirical allusions to the court and politics of England to Walpole, Bolingbroke, the Prince of Wales, the two contending parties in the state, and various matters of secret history-the great mass of ordinary readers saw and felt only the wonder and fascination of the narrative. The appearance, occupations, wars, and pursuits of the tiny Lilliputians-the gigantic Brobdingnagians-the fearful, misanthropic picture of the Yahoos with the philosophic researches at Laputa-all possessed novelty and attraction for the mere unlearned reader, who was alternately agitated with emotions of surprise, delight, aston-minous as a three-volume novel. It is a strange ishment, pity, and reprobation. All parties seem now agreed in the opinion that the interest of the work diminishes as it proceeds; that Lilliput is delightful and picturesque, the satire just sufficient to give an exquisite flavour or seasoning to the body of the narrative; that Brobdingnag is wonderful, monstrous, but softened by the character of Glumdalclitch, and abounding in excellent political and moral observations; that the voyage to Laputa is ingenious, but somewhat tedious, and absurd as a satire on philosophers and mathematicians; and that the voyage to the Houyhnhums is a gross libel on human nature, and disgusting from its physical indelicacy. We need not point out the inimitable touches of description and satire in Gulliver-the High Heels and Low Heels, the Big-endians and Little-endians; the photograph, as we may call it, of the emperor of Lilliput, with his Austrian lip and arched nose, and who was almost the breadth of one's nail taller than any of his court, which struck an awe into his beholders; and the fine incident of Gulliver's watch, which the Lilliputians thought was the god he worshipped, for he seldom did anything without consulting it. The charm of Swift's style, so simple, pure, and unaffected, and the apparent earnestness and sincerity with which he dwells on the most improbable circumstances, are displayed in full perfection in Gulliver, which was the most carefully finished of all his works. Some tracts on ecclesiastical questions, and the best of his poetry, were afterwards produced. His other prose works were-A History of the Four Last Years of Queen Anne-not published till long after his death; Polite Conversation, a happy satire on the frivolities of fashionable life; and Directions for Servants, a fragment which also appeared after his death, and on which he bestowed considerable pains. It exemplifies the habit of minute observation which distinguished Swift, and which sometimes rendered him no very agreeable inmate of a house. Two other prose works are better known-the Journal to Stella, and * The negotiation for its publication was conducted by Erasmus Lewis, secretary to the Earl of Oxford, and one of Swift's most intimate friends. Lewis sold the copyright to the publisher, Motte, for £200. We have seen the original documents, which were then in the possession of the Rev. C. Bathurst Woodman, Edge baston, near Birmingham. Sir Walter Scott states that Swift made a present of the copyright to Pope, but the statement is unsupported by evidence. In an unpublished letter to Motte, Swift states that he derived no advantage from the Miscellanies, published in conjunction with Pope, Arbuthnot, and Gay. He was born to introduce, Refined it first, and shewed its use he shines equally pre-eminent. He was deficient in purity of taste and loftiness of imagination. The frequency with which he dwells on gross and disgusting images, betrays a callousness of feeling that wholly debarred him from the purer regions of He could romance. Laugh and shake in Rabelais' easy-chair; though it was still, as Coleridge has remarked, the soul of Rabelais dwelling in a dry place.' |