Swift Classic Reprint

Author : Jonathan Swift
Publisher : Forgotten Books
ISBN 13 : 9781334955471
Total Pages : 214 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (554 download)

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Download or read book The Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D, Vol. 14 (Classic Reprint) written by Jonathan Swift and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2017-01-09 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D, Vol. 14 Perhaps in no literature is there to be found a piece of writing in any sense comparable to this Modest Proposal. Written, apparently, in a light and comic vein, it might deceive the casual reader into the belief that Swift had achieved a Joke. It has the air of a smiling and in different raconteur amusing an after-dinner table. In truth, however, this piece of writing is a terrible indictment made by an advocate speak ing against the result of a tyranny of power which, through wicked stupidity or complacent indifference, had af icted a people almost to ex tinction. The restraint of the writer evinced in firm tract, is the more remarkable, when we remember that he was Ireland's foremost patriot, that he had been her champion for liberty and independence, and that an indignation filled him at all times, lacerating his heart, against the cruelty and oppression and wretchedness of humanity generally. Here, he sits down and writes as calmly as if composing an ordinary sermon, and proposes, in cold blood, to alleviate the poverty of the Irish people by the sale of their children as table food for the rich. He even goes into calculations as to cost of breeding, and shows how a mother might earn eifiht shillings a year on each Chlld, by disposin of its carcass for ten sh' ings. O the million and a half people who in abit the country, he assumes that there are who beget children; of these about are able to provide for their offspring, but the balance of 170 000 must inevitably become a burden. What is to become of them? Niany schemes have been proposed to meet their case, but not one of them has answered. Trade and agriculture gave them no opportunity, since the trade of the country was almost at a standstill, and land was now either too dear to keep or too poor to cultivate. At the time of Swift's writing Ireland had assed through three frightful years of famine. Corn had become so ear that riots occurred at the ports where what corn re mained was being exported. The land, as Swift wrote to Pope (august I Ith, 1729) was in every place strewn with beggars. The poor labourer, had work been found for him, was too weak In body to undertake it. Thousands had already died of starvation and the diseases consequent on hunger. Those that managed to exist did so in filth, and dying every day, as Swift wrote on another occasion, and rotting, by cold and famine, and filth and vermin. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."