Dr.

questing him to bear in mind that the author of the "Tale of a Tub" was not quite the senseless blockhead and poor-spirited delinquent which it has been so studiously sought to make him appear. Barrett's inferred account, as embodied by sir Walter Scott, is to this solemn purport, not very unlike an arraignment before the high-court of Lilliput, or some heavy charge brought by one of the high-heels against the low-heels:-" The disgraceful note with which his degree had been granted probably added to Swift's negligence and gave edge to his satirical propensities. Between the periods of November 14th, 1685, and October 8th, 1687, he incurred no less than seventy penalties for non-attendance at chapel; for neglecting lectures, for being absent from the evening roll-call, and for town haunting, which is the academical phrase for absence from college without licence. At length these irregularities called forth a more solemn censure, for on March 18th, 1686-7, with his cousin Thomas Swift, his chum Mr. Warren, and four others, he incurred the disgrace of a public admonition for a notorious neglect of duties. His second public punishment was of a nature yet more degrading. On November 20th, 1688, Swift, the future oracle of Ireland, was by a sentence of the vice-provost and senior fellows of the university, convicted of insolent conduct towards the junior dean (Owen Lloyd), and of exciting dissension within the walls of the college. He shared with two companions the suspension of his academical degree, and two of the delinquents, Swift being one, were further sentenced to crave public pardon of the junior dean. The bitterness of spirit with which Swift submitted to this despotic infliction, if indeed he ever obeyed it -for of this there is no absolute proof-may be more easily conceived than described. The sense of his resentment shows itself in the dislike which he exhibits to his Alma Mater, the Trinity college of Dublin, and the satirical severity with which he persecutes Dr. Owen Lloyd, the junior dean, before whom he had been ordained to make this unworthy prostration." (Scott's "Life of Swift," vol. i. p. 23.) The unworthiness, we think there is little doubt, would be found to be on the side of the calumniators of Swift's early life and conduct while at college, or we must otherwise consider it an extraordinary fact almost a phenomenon in literary history-that while the writers of his own time, even his most inveterate enemies and his first biographers, make no mention of these dreadful indignities and prostrations, which they would have been too happy to do, it was reserved for the writers of an after-age to discover those minute spots and shades in the solar orb which the nearer vision and closer inspection of contemporary enemies and traducers. of Addison, Steele, and the utterers of Walpole's ingenious forgeries, and those of his creatures, to deprive the dean of his character for honour and integrity - could never enable them to see. How came it that events so recent, alleged to be so disgraceful, which on Swift's rapid rise must have formed the darling topic and common scandal both of colleges and courts, and given a zest to the malignant sneers of his titled enemies whom he had stung to the quick-his envious literary revilers were never keen-sighted enough to discover; nor had witty malignity enough to invent these, along with the other calumnies circulated by his political enemies?

We have shown that sir W. Scott qualifies his assertion of Swift's prostration with a cautious IF,

Their names may be inferred to have been Nathaniel Jones and John Jones, supposed authors of the " Tripos" (though Swift was the Terra Filius)-Mishael Vandeleur and William Brere

tou.

yet afterwards concludes with the broad declaration that he had been ordained to make this unworthy prostration before the junior dean. Now what says

an able and enlightened correspondent of the great biographer, whose arguments, if not well founded, are at least ingenious? He brings forward reasons borrowed from Dr. Barrett's "Life of Swift" itself, upon which the whole of these stupid and trumpery calumnies as to punishment have been founded, to prove exactly the contrary. Nay, he distinctly points out that from Dr. Barrett's own "Life" of the dean it appears that he graduated above a year before the usual time, which in Trinity college, Dublin, is four years and a half; and therefore that speciali gratiâ must mean that he got it by merit, or if it was afterwards suspended, as Dr. B. suggests, it might have been restored to him on intercession of friends. But there appears little to countenance the supposition that he was ordered to beg pardon upon his knees, and nothing to warrant the assertion that he submitted to such an indignity, as there is no trace of his remaining in college after the Revolution, which is the date Dr. Barrett assigns for that censure.

So much for the accurate examination of Dr. Barrett, and for the evidences upon which to rest the fine spun theory of humiliation and disgrace, so pleasing to modern critics and to that inherent but not very honest desire, of pulling down in one age the idol which the fiat of contemporary opinion and the general assent of mankind have raised up in another. Besides, it always flatters our self-love to depreciate excellence which we cannot reach; and it is difficult to elucidate and expose these ingenious inquiries into Swift's failings, of which the motives, it is evident, are to raise us in our own good opinion, and lessen the feelings of respect and veneration we should otherwise cherish with our belief in the surpassing powers, the vigour of mind, and original genius of this extraordinary man.

66

The dates, moreover," continues Dr. Barrett's refuter, "are very confused and contradictory as to the two Swifts; and while he allows Thomas Swift to have had a scholarship, and suspects that Jonathan had not, he forgets that very few ever remain in Trinity college, Dublin, after graduating, unless they enjoy scholarships; and that Jonathan Swift had one appears further from his remaining in commons, and being, according to Dr. B., suspended from commons by way of punishment, after graduating, which could be no punishment at all to him if his commons were not at the charge of the university." (See note to Scott's "Life.")

If further testimony were wanting to overthrow the brittle fabric of these idle old wives' tales of the dean's early degeneracy, and the strange freaks and vagaries which so long possessed him of running his head against the walls of his college, and frighting the ancient deans and proctors from out their propriety, it is to be found in a letter from Richardson to lady Bradshaigh, dated April 22nd, 1752, in which he says, "I am told my lord Orrery is mistaken in some of his facts; for instance, in that wherein he asserts that Swift's learning was a late acquirement. I am very well warranted by the son of an eminent divine, a prelate, who was three years what is called his chum, in the following account of that fact. Dr. Swift made as great progress in his learning at the university of Dublin in his youth as any of his contemporaries." Leaving, however, these knotty points, with Dr. Barrett, to conjecture, it may be admitted that nothing short of college discipline and the heavy yoke of dependence could sufficiently have restrained Swift's stern and haughty spirit, by placing over him those two unflinching

guardians, poverty and pride, during the most dangerous period of his life. They taught him early how to regulate his mind and passions, to inure himself to thought and toil, and by calm reading and meditations on history and living manners to prepare himself for the distinguished part he was destined to perform. That such a character could at the same time have been that of a low college reprobate, brawler, and haunter of obscure taverns, rather exceeds the bounds of human belief, especially when it is admitted that there is such extreme confusion in regard to dates and the names of the two cousins as to have given rise to erroneous statements in other respects. On the breaking out of the civil broils in Ireland, Swift, then in his twentyfirst year, left that kingdom to visit his mother at Leicester, anxious to consult with her in regard to his future prospects. On reaching England he proceeded on foot, his usual mode of travelling from the commencement of his career, to his mother's dwelling, without friends, interest, or money-circumstances, however, to which we perhaps owe the future author of Gulliver, whom affluence might at once have made a contented bishop or a renowned professor. He had now the pain of beholding his mother almost wholly dependent on the precarious bounty of friends. With her he remained some months, and she judiciously advised him without hesitation to communicate his circumstances to sir William Temple, the distinguished statesman, who had married one of her relations.a This advice Swift resolved without longer delay to pursue, and accordingly again set off on foot for Sheen, at which seat the most accomplished scholar and the wisest as well as most experienced man of his times was then residing, aloof from the intrigues and corruptions of a court. Sir William received him not only with his usual urbanity and politeness, but with great kindness, of which the fact of Swift's first residence with him during a space of two years-however annoying it may have proved, in regard to trivial circumstances, to one of his irritable disposition and pride-may be considered as a sufficient proof. His story was heard with compassionate attention, and his sensible compliance with his mother's wishes, in submitting his natural pride to the dictates of dutyhis dignified and self-respecting manner, together with his friendless position-all appealed to the good feeling and generosity of a man like sir William Temple. In this elegant retreat, where he was comparatively his own master, free from the arbitrary surveillance and little inquisitorial rules of college life, Swift found what was most valuable to him-sound advice to direct the prosecution of his studies, refined society and conversation, leisure for historical researches and undisturbed reflections. With a zeal and resolution almost unprecedented in the annals of study, and only equalled by the fire and vigour

It was during this visit that Swift's first love affair occurred. He became enamoured of a miss Betty Jones, afterwards Mrs. Perkins, of the George inn, Loughborough. (See his letters to Mr. Kendall and Mr. Worrall.)

b The statement made by a nephew of sir William and repeated by sir W. Scott and some other biographers, that Swift was hired by his uncle to read to him, and to be his amanuensis, at the rate of 20. a year and his board-high preferment to him at that time-and that he was not admitted to his conversation or to sit at table with him, is another specimen of those injurious fictions to which we cannot allude in terms of too much severity. So the man, it appears, who was admitted to the intimate confidence of his noble relative and friend-who dined at the same table with William III., who in the intimacy of discourse taught him to eat asparagus in the Dutch fashion -who was intrusted with secret missions to the king-who was selected to edite his uncle's works (for such sir William was by marriage), and to whom he left a legacy as a mark of gratitude-we are to conclude dined in the servants' hall!

of his native genius, Swift recommenced his system of self-education upon a more regular and enlarged plan than any pursued by the sophistical heads of a college, and extended it from poetry and history, long his favourite pursuits, to other important branches of human learning, which he now prosecuted with an avidity necessary to every great writer; surpassing that attributed to Cervantes, Rabelais, Molière, and Pope; and with an unremitting assiduity in accordance with his more happy and improved circumstances. From the more known and read he extended his inquiries to the more abstruse and laborious writers; and, it is said, had the courage to encounter the profundities of Cyprian and Irenæus. No wonder the first interruption of these studious habits and intense application was the recurrence of a disorder which had attacked him at a still earlier period of life, attributed by him to a surfeit of fruit that induced a peculiar coldness of stomach, giddiness, and momentary loss of recollectionsymptoms of the same disorder of which his uncle Godwin had died. His complaint became so violent that he was advised by his physician to try the benefit of his native air, but, receiving no advantage from the change, he returned to sir William Temple's, who had meanwhile removed to Moor-park, near Farnham. Here he met with the utmost sympathy from its distinguished owner, who obtained for him fresh advice; and Swift was enjoined to take more constant and more violent exercise, which he daily practised by running up a hill, it is said, near the house, and back again, every two hours; the distance being about half a mile, which he used to perform in less than six minutes. It is not surprising that, afflicted with a disorder of so dangerous and tormenting a nature, which gradually increased until it terminated in total debility and prostration of mind, he should snatch at any chance that offered to relieve him from so disagreeable a companion. But, with all due deference to medical knowledge, the writer of this may observe as a curious fact, having been a persevering pedestrian in his day, that the only unpleasant symptom of which he, in common with all other peripatetics whom he met, had reason to complain, was an occasional giddiness and a sense of coldness and weakness of the stomach after long-continued exertion. Now, if it is recollected that the dean was not only a determined student and a most rapid writer, by fits and starts, amidst all the turmoil of court visits, literary patronage, and state councils, but that he was, on economic principle and by the advice of his physicians, accustomed to perform all his long journeys (each of hundreds of miles) on foot, it is no forced or unfounded theory to assume that he either contracted or greatly aggravated the disorder with which he was afflicted, by the means he was advised to take for its removal. If a cause like this, or that of having eaten an improper quantity of fruit, is adequate to account for the affliction with which throughout life he was visited, it seems as violent as it is a harsh and unjustifiable supposition to attribute such a misfortune to early immoral excesses. Yet there are men who, in accordance with the system of defamation pursued, have not scrupled to insult the memory of Swift, and to vilify that great and moral character which extorted the admiration of his worst enemies, and won the applause and veneration of his friends, by the magnanimity with which he provided for and protected his political adversaries, when provoked by their ingratitude almost beyond human endurance to "whistle them down the winds, a prey to fortune." It is mortifying to reflect that, in order to account for a certain eccentricity of conduct usually found to accompany

guardians, poverty and pride, during the most dangerous period of his life. They taught him early how to regulate his mind and passions, to inure himself to thought and toil, and by calm reading and meditations on history and living manners to prepare himself for the distinguished part he was destined to perform. That such a character could at the same time have been that of a low college reprobate, brawler, and haunter of obscure taverns, rather exceeds the bounds of human belief, especially when it is admitted that there is such extreme confusion in regard to dates and the names of the two cousins as to have given rise to erroneous statements in other respects. On the breaking out of the civil broils in Ireland, Swift, then in his twentyfirst year, left that kingdom to visit his mother at Leicester, anxious to consult with her in regard to his future prospects. On reaching England he proceeded on foot, his usual mode of travelling from the commencement of his career, to his mother's dwelling, without friends, interest, or money-circumstances, however, to which we perhaps owe the future author of Gulliver, whom affluence might at once have made a contented bishop or a renowned professor. He had now the pain of beholding his mother almost wholly dependent on the precarious bounty of friends. With her he remained some months, and she judiciously advised him without hesitation to communicate his circumstances to sir William Temple, the distinguished statesman, who had married one of her relations.a This advice Swift resolved without longer delay to pursue, and accordingly again set off on foot for Sheen, at which seat the most accomplished scholar and the wisest as well as most experienced man of his times was then residing, aloof from the intrigues and corruptions of a court. Sir William received him not only with his usual urbanity and politeness, but with great kindness, of which the fact of Swift's first residence with him during a space of two years--however annoying it may have proved, in regard to trivial circumstances, to one of his irritable disposition and pride-may be considered as a sufficient proof. His story was heard with compassionate attention, and his sensible compliance with his mother's wishes, in submitting his natural pride to the dictates of dutyhis dignified and self-respecting manner, together with his friendless position-all appealed to the good feeling and generosity of a man like sir William Temple. In this elegant retreat, where he was comparatively his own master, free from the arbitrary surveillance and little inquisitorial rules of college life, Swift found what was most valuable to him-sound advice to direct the prosecution of his studies, refined society and conversation, leisure for historical researches and undisturbed reflections. With a zeal and resolution almost unprecedented in the annals of study, and only equalled by the fire and vigour

It was during this visit that Swift's first love affair occurred. He became enamoured of a miss Betty Jones, afterwards Mrs. Perkins, of the George inn, Loughborough. (See his letters to Mr. Kendall and Mr. Worrall.)

The statement made by a nephew of sir William and repeated by sir W. Scott and some other biographers, that Swift was hired by his uncle to read to him, and to be his amanuensis, at the rate of 201. a year and his board-high preferment to him at that time-and that he was not admitted to his conversation or to sit at table with him, is another specimen of those injurious fictions to which we cannot allude in terms of too much severity. So the man, it appears, who was admitted to the intimate confidence of his noble relative and friend-who dined at the same table with William III., who in the intimacy of discourse taught him to eat asparagus in the Dutch fashion -who was intrusted with secret missions to the king-who was selected to edite his uncle's works (for such sir William was by marriage), and to whom he left a legacy as a mark of gratitude-we are to conclude dined in the servants' hall!

of his native genius, Swift recommenced his system of self-education upon a more regular and enlarged plan than any pursued by the sophistical heads of a college, and extended it from poetry and history, long his favourite pursuits, to other important branches of human learning, which he now prosecuted with an avidity necessary to every great writer; surpassing that attributed to Cervantes, Rabelais, Molière, and Pope; and with an unremitting assiduity in accordance with his more happy and improved circumstances. From the more known and read he extended his inquiries to the more abstruse and laborious writers; and, it is said, had the courage to encounter the profundities of Cyprian and Irenæus. No wonder the first interruption of these studious habits and intense application was the recurrence of a disorder which had attacked him at a still earlier period of life, attributed by him to a surfeit of fruit that induced a peculiar coldness of stomach, giddiness, and momentary loss of recollectionsymptoms of the same disorder of which his uncle Godwin had died. His complaint became so violent that he was advised by his physician to try the benefit of his native air, but, receiving no advantage from the change, he returned to sir William Temple's, who had meanwhile removed to Moor-park, near Farnham. Here he met with the utmost sympathy from its distinguished owner, who obtained for him fresh advice; and Swift was enjoined to take more constant and more violent exercise, which he daily practised by running up a hill, it is said, near the house, and back again, every two hours; the distance being about half a mile, which he used to perform in less than six minutes. It is not surprising that, afflicted with a disorder of so dangerous and tormenting a nature, which gradually increased until it terminated in total debility and prostration of mind, he should snatch at any chance that offered to relieve him from so disagreeable a companion. But, with all due deference to medical knowledge, the writer of this may observe as a curious fact, having been a persevering pedestrian in his day, that the only unpleasant symptom of which he, in common with all other peripatetics whom he met, had reason to complain, was an occasional giddiness and a sense of coldness and weakness of the stomach after long-continued exertion. Now, if it is recollected that the dean was not only a determined student and a most rapid writer, by fits and starts, amidst all the turmoil of court visits, literary patronage, and state councils, but that he was, on economic principle and by the advice of his physicians, accustomed to perform all his long journeys (each of hundreds of miles) on foot, it is no forced or unfounded theory to assume that he either contracted or greatly aggravated the disorder with which he was afflicted, by the means he was advised to take for its removal. If a cause like this, or that of having eaten an improper quantity of fruit, is adequate to account for the affliction with which throughout life he was visited, it seems as violent as it is a harsh and unjustifiable supposition to attribute such a misfortune to early immoral excesses. Yet there are men who, in accordance with the system of defamation pursued, have not scrupled to insult the memory of Swift, and to vilify that great and moral character which extorted the admiration of his worst enemies, and won the applause and veneration of his friends, by the magnanimity with which he provided for and protected his political adversaries, when provoked by their ingratitude almost beyond human endurance to "whistle them down the winds, a prey to fortune." It is mortifying to reflect that, in order to account for a certain eccentricity of conduct usually found to accompany

genius of an original and exalted kind, and for a distemper which most probably was owing to an inherent malady, a learned physician could be found, so lost to reason and science, so dead to honour and the duties of his profession, as directly to ascribe the vertigo of Swift, with all its distressing consequences, "to habits of early and profligate indulgence."

It is with feelings of unalloyed delight that the writer can in this instance record the clear-sighted views and the triumphant refutation of this cruel and absurd calumny by the immortal author of "Waverley," who, though little inclined to do more than strict justice to an author who launched his severest philippics against the Scotch nobility and people, yet holds the scales with an even hand, as far as his knowledge of the subject extended, and never consciously advanced that which he did not believe to be the strict truth. "To the hypothesis of this ingenious writer," says the illustrious biographer, "we may oppose, first, the express declaration of Swift himself that this distressing malady originated in the surfeit mentioned in the text, a cause which medical professors have esteemed adequate to produce such consequences. Secondly, his whole intercourse with Stella and Vanessa indicates the very reverse of an ardent or licentious imagination, and proves his coldness to have been constitutionally inherent, both in mind and person, and utterly distinct from that of one who retains wishes which he has lost the power to gratify. Those who choose to investigate this matter farther may compare Swift's 'Journal to Stella' with Pope's 'Letters to the Misses Blount,' in which there really exists evidence of that mixture of friendship, passion, and licentious gallantry, which the author of "Hygeia" has less justly ascribed to the correspondence between Swift and Stella. Lastly, it may be briefly noticed that the coarse images and descriptions with which Swift dishonoured his pages are of a description directly opposite to the loose impurities by which the exhausted voluptuary feeds his imagination. . . . We may therefore take Swift's word for the origin of his malady as well as for his constitutional temperance. And until medical authors can clearly account for and radically cure the diseases of their contemporary patients, they may be readily excused from assigning dishonourable causes for the disorders of the illustrious dead."-(Note to "Life," pp. 25-29.)

This masterly refutation of so calumnious a charge is creditable to the generally enlightened biographer of the extraordinary genius and no less wonderful wit whom he has commemorated; and it might moreover be remarked that, in all cases brought before the tribunal of public opinion where doubts exist, as is actually the fact with regard to some of these newly broached aspersions on Swift's moral and political character, it is invariably allowed to give the accused the benefit of those doubts-particularly when his most intimate contemporaries and his nearest neighbours had never either heard of or raised any malicious reports of the kind. But to dismiss this unworthy discussion, obtruded only in

The learned Dr. Beddoes, who, in the ninth essay of his work called " Hygeia," pursues a train of fallacies in unison with those so fond of raking, like lord Orrery, into the offals of genius-straining every na ral infirmity into moral turpitude, raising mole-hills into mountains, and delighting to revel in the humiliation and misfortunes of true greatness.

As a further specimen of the same medical sagacity which advised Swift to run up a hill every two hours, which attributed his giddiness and deafness to profligacy and excesses, we shall insert, for the amusement of our readers, the notable prescription for his cure, by another physician, Dr. Radcliffe, "for a noisse in the head and deflness proseeding from a colde moyst humor in the head;" which, if taken, in all human probability added not a little to the existing malady:-"Take a

justice to the calumniated dean-unhappy enough in the company of such baneful guests for lifeand from the necessary obligation of a biographer not to shrink from the question;-it appears that about this time Temple began to discover some of the great qualities of his young relation's mind, his striking originality of remark and acute powers of reasoning and observation; so that Swift himself has recorded that he then grew still more in confidence with him. He was always admitted to sir William's confidential interviews with the king, who was then in the habit of visiting at Moor-park to consult him whom he vainly wished to make his prime minister; and the great statesman being often confined to his chamber by the gout, the duty of making known his sentiments and advising with his majesty devolved upon Swift. It must have been an amusing scene; and the entertainment was no doubt mutual; for while the king, all whose ideas ran upon the extermination of his species-war, thought it the highest honour to offer to the studious poet, then busied in composing Pindaric odes, a whole troop of horse, and to teach him to eat asparagus in the Dutch fashion, stalks and all, the views of the latter were directed to the more pacific aim of church preferment. Nor is it unlikely that he obtained some definite promise to that effect; for that he evidently counted upon it appears from a letter (1692) addressed to his uncle, in which he says, not to take orders till the king gives me a prebend."

"I am

In the fourth year of his residence with sir William Temple, Swift went to take his master's degree at Oxford, to which he was admitted on the 6th of July, 1692. He was much pleased with the courtesy and urbanity shown him upon this occasion, and pointedly observed that he felt himself under greater obligations within a few weeks to strangers, than ever he had been in seven years to Dublin college: "Oxford to him a dearer name shall be Than his own mother university;

Thebes did his green unknowing youth engage,
He chooses Athens in his riper age."-(Dryden.)

The reception which he thus met with in the firs seat of British learning, independent of his connexion with Temple, afforded a satisfactory proof of the successful progress of his studies; and, inspired as he always appeared in his happier moments, it was at Oxford that he offered his first poetical effupint of sack whey, make very clear half sack and half water; boyle it in sum plane racel sage and a sprige of rosemary; take it gowing to rest, with thirty or forty drops of spirit of hartshorn; continue it as long as you find benefit by it" (he safely might) "specially the winter season; he may sweaten or not with sirop of cowslep." He ordered "allsoe a spice capp, to be made of clowes, masse, and pepper, mingled, finely powned, and put between two silke, and quelted to wear next the head, and for a season to be sowed inside his wig."

a In a letter from the dean to Mrs. Howard (Aug. 19, 1727) he observes," About two years before you were born I got my giddiness by eating a hundred gold pippins at a time at Richmond; and when you were four years and a quarter old, 'bating two days, having made a fine seat about twenty miles farther in Surrey, where I used to read-there I got my deafness; and these two friends have visited me one or other every year since, and being old acquaintance have now thought fit to come together."

b" Alderman George Faulkner of Dublin, the well-known bookseller, happening one day to dine in company with Dr. Leland the historian, the conversation reverted to the illustrious dean of St. Patrick's. Faulkner, who was the dean's printer and publisher on many occasions, mentioned that, one day being detained late at the deanery house in correcting some proof-sheets for the press, Swift made the worthy alderman stay to dinner. Amongst other vegetables, asparagus formed one of the dishes. The dean helped his guest, who shortly again called upon his host, when the dean, pointing to the alder man's plate, first finish, sir, what you have got upon your plate. What, sir, eat my stalks?' Ay, sir, king William always eat his stalk. And, George." rejoined the historian (who was himself remarkably proud and very pompous), were you blockhead enough to obey him? Yes, doctor; and if you had dined with dean Swift tête-à-tête, you would have been obliged to eat vour stalks too.'"-(Scott).