Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels: Shocked by The Just Society (Recovering Political Philosophy) 303098852X, 9783030988524

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RECOVERING POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels Shocked by The Just Society

l l oy d w. robe rt son

Recovering Political Philosophy

Series Editors Timothy W. Burns, Baylor University, Waco, TX, USA Thomas L. Pangle, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA

Postmodernism’s challenge to the possibility of a rational foundation for and guidance of our political lives has provoked a searching re-examination of the works of past political philosophers. The reexamination seeks to recover the ancient or classical grounding for civic reason and to clarify the strengths and weaknesses of modern philosophic rationalism. This series responds to this ferment by making available outstanding new scholarship in the history of political philosophy, scholarship that is inspired by the rediscovery of the diverse rhetorical strategies employed by political philosophers. The series features interpretive studies attentive to historical context and language, and to the ways in which censorship and didactic concern impelled prudent thinkers, in widely diverse cultural conditions, to employ manifold strategies of writing, strategies that allowed them to aim at different audiences with various degrees of openness to unconventional thinking. Recovering Political Philosophy emphasizes the close reading of ancient, medieval, early modern and late modern works that illuminate the human condition by attempting to answer its deepest, enduring questions, and that have (in the modern periods) laid the foundations for contemporary political, social, and economic life. The editors encourage manuscripts from both established and emerging scholars who focus on the careful study of texts, either through analysis of a single work or through thematic study of a problem or question in a number of works.

Lloyd W. Robertson

Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels Shocked by The Just Society

Lloyd W. Robertson Department of Political Science St. Thomas University Fredericton, NB, Canada

ISSN 2524-7166 ISSN 2524-7174 (electronic) Recovering Political Philosophy ISBN 978-3-030-98852-4 ISBN 978-3-030-98853-1 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: Universal Art Archive/Alamy Stock Photo This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

To Benjamin

Series Editors’ Preface

Palgrave’s Recovering Political Philosophy series was founded with an eye to postmodernism’s challenge to the possibility of a rational foundation for and guidance of our political lives. This invigorating challenge has provoked a searching re-examination of classic texts, not only of political philosophers, but of poets, artists, theologians, scientists, and other thinkers who may not be regarded conventionally as political theorists. The series publishes studies that endeavor to take up this re-examination and thereby help to recover the classical grounding for civic reason, as well as studies that clarify the strengths and the weaknesses of modern philosophic rationalism. The interpretative studies in the series are particularly attentive to historical context and language, and to the ways in which both censorial persecution and didactic concerns have impelled prudent thinkers, in widely diverse cultural conditions, to employ manifold strategies of writing—strategies that allowed them to aim at different audiences with various degrees of openness to unconventional thinking. The series offers close readings of ancient, medieval, early modern and late modern works that illuminate the human condition by attempting to answer its deepest, enduring questions, and that have (in the modern periods) laid the foundations for contemporary political, social, and economic life. Lloyd Robertson’s Reason, Hope and Education: Notes on the Politics of Gulliver’s Travels, argues that Swift wishes to achieve an education in politics in a large sense: in ancients and moderns, political regimes (including who rules and what way of life prevails), imperialism, war,

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heroism, big-souled and small-souled peoples, and intellectual and moral virtues. Robertson finds Swift’s Gulliver somewhat lacking as a guide to this education, but argues that we can glean an understanding Swift’s fuller teaching by taking account of Swift’s indications of Gulliver’s abilities and limitations. The Travels, Robertson argues, has far more to do with the debate between ancients and moderns than with specific political communities such as the ones Swift knew first hand. He shows how and when Swift draws our attention to some version of the classical republic, as articulated in Aristotle’s political writings and in Plato’s Republic, as opposed to a modern technological regime, as a way to understand and perhaps improve the human condition. He shows that generally speaking, the people in the first and third voyages of the Travels are modern Europeans; the “people” in the second and fourth voyages (rational horses in the latter case) do not refer to “modern” people of Swift’s time, but to ancients, either real or in books. Are the ancients, from our perspective, simply old-fashioned, or do they provide some kind of serious alternative to the regime of modern science? These are questions that Swift, for all his biting humor, took very seriously, showing a clear preference for the ancients over the moderns, but with a deep appreciation of how appealing modern thought, with its promise of beneficent transformation of human nature and nature more generally, can be, and how difficult it must be for us to re-discover the real advantages, as opposed to what might seem the long-lost glory, of ancient thought. Waco, USA Austin, USA

Timothy W. Burns Thomas L. Pangle

Acknowledgments

To the readers who commented on this book for Palgrave Macmillan I owe a great deal, as well as to Editor Madison Allums. Timothy Burns facilitated the process of preparing the manuscript for publication. Scott Staring, Liane Cheshire and Borys Kowalsky organized a conference at Georgian College Barrie in September 2019: Beyond Soft Skills: Redefining the Role of the Liberal Arts in a College Education. They gave me an opportunity to give a presentation on the theme of Gulliver as a student, and I learned a great deal from the conversations that took place. I was hardly more than a smart-aleck teenager when I first encountered the so-called Straussian teachers. By their example, as well as by their support of my own work, they inspired me to wonder if I might learn to think for myself. They could not have done more. Graduate school was an intoxicating combination of thought, sometimes deep thought, and laughter, and that experience I believe prepared me for a study of Gulliver’s Travels. Among many good and even great teachers, the three teachers I especially want to acknowledge are William Mathie, Clifford Orwin and Thomas Pangle. My friends Patrick Malcolmson, Colin Pearce and Lawrence Ashley have all provided encouragement to me in my reading and writing. I have had a great deal of family support over the years, including from my wife Laura. I have benefitted greatly from conversations with my

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son Benjamin. My parents and parents-in-law—the Robertsons and the Gordons—supported me in every way possible during a long, sometimes apparently endless, quest for an education.

Epigraph

…the Grubæan sages have always chosen to convey their precepts and their arts shut up within the vehicles of types and fables; which having been perhaps more careful and curious in adorning than was altogether necessary, it has fared with these vehicles after the usual fate of coaches over-finely painted and gilt, that the transitory gazers have so dazzled their eyes and filled their imaginations with the outward lustre, as neither to regard nor consider the person or the parts of the owner within. A misfortune we undergo with somewhat less reluctancy, because it has been common to us with Pythagoras, Æsop, Socrates, and other of our predecessors. —Swift, Tale of a Tub The desire to take medicine is perhaps the greatest feature which distinguishes man from animals. —Sir William Osler, famed medical researcher; quoted in the opening credits prologue to the movie “Send Me No Flowers”

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Contents

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1 3

Introduction Gulliver’s Travels Today Reading Swift: A Modest Proposal, Tale of a Tub and Other Writings Other Prequels to the Travels: Ancients and Moderns Battle of the Books and Tale of a Tub Approaches to Gulliver’s Travels

11 17 22 31

2

Little People and Big People Big and Small Bodies Souls and Statesmanship Where Are Big Souls Found? The Transition to the Third Voyage

37 37 41 50 55

3

Nameless Moderns: Science, Miracles and Faith A First Look at Modern Science The Promise or Prospect of Miracles Medicine, the Body and Politics The Need to Return to the Ancients

61 61 71 74 84

4

A Realistic Utopia, and Human Passions Old Lilliput Swift’s Realistic Utopia The Upper Classes and Liberal Education

87 88 93 103

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Heroic Ancients Speaking With the Dead Brutus and Others: Heroes and Citizenship Aristotle vs. The Moderns Other Afterlives

109 110 117 125 128

6

Rational Horses and Humans Cruel Humanitarians and Xenophobic Citizens Houyhnhnms vs. Yahoos Plausible Cosmologies Yahoos and Modern Europeans

137 137 144 149 159

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European Imperialism and the Bible Types of Animal and Human Being People of the Book

167 167 176

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What We Can Learn What Do the Houyhnhnms Learn? The Master: Reason, Enlightenment and Physics

185 185 192

Sources

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Index

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction

The thesis of this book is that Swift’s narrator in Gulliver’s Travels, Lemuel Gulliver, becomes dissatisfied with modern Europe. He seeks an alternative that is intellectually fulfilling, but probably more importantly, an example of a community of reasonable public-spiritedness, or a love of justice, such that once individuals experience this community, they are motivated to remain and serve with little need for inducement or compulsion. The problems he finds in modern Europe are not addressed in a significant way, and may even be exacerbated, by modern books. The attractive alternatives he finds seem to come from ancient books and to some extent from ancient practices. Gulliver finds it impossible to enjoy the society of giants in the second voyage because he lives in constant fear there; the land of the Houyhnhnms or rational horses in the fourth voyage seems more promising, except that the exemplary class or society consists of an entirely different species. Gulliver finds the society of the horses to be exactly what he has been looking for, but also a terrible shock. The just city seems to involve and even require cruelty, and probably injustice to outsiders. Gulliver strives to imitate the horses, with mixed success; he kids himself that he has become one of them—perhaps surprisingly, with more success. He probably lives in terror of being treated as “just another Yahoo”—which would mean slavery or death. He does what he can to reject his own people—the human race, and modern Europeans in © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_1

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particular. In the end, having returned home somewhat against his will, he seems to be an oddball and a loner, spending his time with “normal” horses, perhaps slowly getting back to normal himself. Swift shows that he has read certain books, divisible between ancient and modern; Gulliver is forced in a way to try to live these books. The Travels is not a work of political philosophy, but it is a kind of preparation for such a work—perhaps a prolegomena to it. Its main point, providing its overall structure, may be at least to touch on political alternatives as presented and analyzed in great works of political philosophy.1 Gulliver’s first voyage presents, in allegorical form, bitter and partisan debates between Catholics and Protestants (Big-Enders and SmallEnders), on the one hand, and overlapping debates between Tories and Whigs (High Heels and Low Heels) on the other. This partisanship clearly represents the modern politics of Swift’s time, and is just as clearly bad for the British body politic. It drives Gulliver to find a society that is more united and achieves its unity based on reason. The land of the giants in the second voyage is a very promising candidate. Very little is said about the political regime there, but clear sighted and public-spirited aristocrats seem to be based to some extent on the moral virtues, and particularly the great-souled man, in Aristotle’s Ethics. There are brief hints about temples and a Sabbath that may or may not be Biblical or Christian; despite these hints, it is at least possible that the giants are so to speak free from Christianity, and that this freedom does them no harm. Whereas the first voyage only hints at the importance of modern science in the Britain of Swift’s time, the third voyage gives substantial attention to the Royal Society, its discoveries and experiments; here there is virtually no trace of Christian sectarianism. To say the least, Swift stresses the problems that are raised by modern science much more than great opportunities that may arise from it. Later in the third voyage, Swift gets to converse with the dead. The praiseworthy individuals who are praised in these passages are ancients; the only Christian is Thomas More, and his faith is not 1 Kearney:

Philosophy is the subject matter of much of Swift’s work. … He never produced a philosophical treatise. However, Swift was very familiar with the whole of the philosophical tradition …. In his correspondence, Swift shows a fondness for Plato, but only in political matters. The philosopher with whom he has most in common is Aristotle. Kearney (2005), 3.

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mentioned as part of his greatness. In the fourth voyage, it is at least possible that Swift intends the reader to take the Houyhnhnms or rational horses very seriously as a candidate for the best possible human society. The regime of the horses is strongly reminiscent of Plato’s Republic, Aristotle’s Politics, the real Sparta which the Socratics seems to have set out to improve upon, and More’s Utopia. Gulliver seems to be driven mad by his time with the horses, but this may not be the last word on what a good student can learn. Swift, presumably, did better. There is hardly a hint in the fourth voyage that Christianity may be a source of hope for a good life or a good society for human beings. Before presenting my argument in more detail, I will address the question why anything in the Travels is of importance today. I will discuss some “prequels” to Gulliver’s Travels including Swift’s famous essay A Modest Proposal , which prepares us for his art of writing, and serious consideration of debates between ancients and moderns on the part of Sir William Temple, Swift’s longtime employer, and Swift himself. I will clarify how my approach to the text differs from some others.

Gulliver ’s Travels Today Why recommend Gulliver’s Travels to readers today? With all its jokes, does Gulliver’s Travels have anything to teach us about the world today, Western civilization, or problems that we face or are likely to face? One theme in the Travels that remains important today is modern science, and problems that arise with a serious pursuit of science. Surely, the Projectors or scientists in the third voyage are distinctly modern scientists, in rebellion against pre-modern science. They are impatient with slow progress in such human activities as agriculture and medicine; they are determined to carry out bold, even dangerous experiments, with the potential for dramatic results. They are prepared to suffer themselves for science, and they know their experiments may be cruel to others; but they are convinced that many people, perhaps “humanity” in general, will benefit sooner or later. Unfortunately, as Gulliver the narrator reports a bit sadly, the agricultural experiments have so far reduced productive land to a desert, and induced widespread starvation.2 We are also able to see that when there is a determined effort to make human life both

2 Travels III.4, 197. Page numbers refer to the Kearney edition.

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more comfortable and longer lasting (not much point in achieving one without the other), bringing medical experimentation into the picture, the most likely result is a prolonged old age that is miserable in more ways than one—something short of the life both good and long that has been promised (III.10). The people who suffer this way are called Struldbruggs. This possibility, free from comic exaggeration, is not exactly hypothetical or academic for us today. Swift not only deserves credit as the originator of “true” science fiction, based on discoveries about the natural world and technology, possibly the inspirer of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein among other works.3 He forces us to consider whether the modern Western approach is better than any alternatives. To some extent what Francis Bacon presented as a utopia in New Atlantis is presented by Swift as a dystopia. It is not nearly enough to say science is good when it works, bad when it does not; the spirit of experimentation may be, from its beginnings, contrary to a sense of decency and humanity, and for this reason it may undermine any true sense of community. Swift seems to encourage the thought that these problems are not anomalies within a modern project that remains beneficial as a whole; they are typical of, if not essential for, what we mean by modern progress. It is fair to say Swift anticipates the thought of Martin Heidegger that technology is not

3 Swift may have been the first to anticipate: travel by air using an inanimate machine, including the ability to fly closer to, or farther from, the ground, and to both land and take off; and bombardment from aircraft. Asimov (who ought to know) says of the description of the flying island:

Others had invented fanciful flying cities before this, but Jonathan Swift was the first to attempt an explanation of its workings in line with the findings of contemporary science. This section of the book is therefore true science fiction, perhaps the earliest example we have of it. To include earlier works as science fiction involves broadening the definition of the genre to include works not strictly based on a scientific background, and thus little more than adventure fantasy—like, for instance, the first two parts of Gulliver’s Travels. (#10, p. 144)

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a tool that we use, while remaining very much ourselves in some objective way; technology becomes a way of life that changes our thinking, our consciousness.4 As Swift presents it, there is a lack of effective public spirit in modern science. The scientists in the Travels can hardly distinguish success in their own careers, including money, from any other kind of success. The COVID-19 crisis has surely reminded us of this possibility. Even if the very presence of the new coronavirus among much of the human race did not result from a “lab leak,” there were certainly experiments underway, in the category of “gain of function research,” that were actually intended to bring about a virus for which there was no known treatment or vaccine. Funding for this research came from responsible agencies including the US government. The scientists who applied for grants could be counted on to say that once they had a “super bug,” they would be able to develop new treatments and vaccines. Almost incredibly, vaccines came into existence, and then into widespread distribution, within about a year of the outbreak, but they seem to have come from researchers who were entirely separate from the “gain of function” researchers. We can find ourselves on a see-saw of hope and fear, waiting to see what the scientists come up with next. Government leaders can play the role of powerful lay people, not claiming to understand the science completely, but providing funding and sometimes enforcing compliance with rules so that science can be effective and (perhaps) safe. A less dramatic but perhaps more powerful example is smartphones, brought to us by a combination of entrepreneurs and tech geniuses.5 Surely no one thinks either that the influence of these 4 See Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology”:

Likewise, the essence of technology is by no means anything technological. Thus we shall never experience our relationship to the essence of technology so long as we merely conceive and push forward the technological, put up with it, or evade it. Everywhere we remain unfree and chained to technology, whether we passionately affirm or deny it. But we are delivered over to it in the worst possible way when we regard it as something neutral; for this conception of it, to which today we particularly like to do homage, makes us utterly blind to the essence of technology. 5 Swift has Projectors experimenting with various ways of learning and communicating bits of knowledge (or data) more quickly and easily; there is at least a hint or anticipation of a computer. There is also a suggestion that the only “information” that can be conveyed this way is small, more or less meaningless “facts” that are trivial in themselves, and soon forgotten. See the “Projectors in speculative learning,” apparently including the “school

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devices is entirely benign, or that no lasting harm can come from them. For a while there was a question whether government could regulate the new tech businesses at all; now it seems political partisans are likely to capture technology for their own purposes. Other kinds of experts who no doubt know things can advise government or hold influential places within it. Swift would seem to predict that such people can be counted on to underestimate the effect of their careerism on their views of public policy; they will exaggerate the likelihood that what furthers their careers will also benefit the public. The Pentagon and its counterparts in other countries are supposed to be known more for loyalty than for knowledge, but they also use hopes and fears, including the “war on terror,” to maintain indefinite if not endless wars which tend to be good for military/political careers. This is somewhat different from treating citizens as rational individuals who can be expected to deliberate about public policy. If there is one thing Gulliver learns to look out for in his travels, it is a sense of true citizenship, dedication to a common good, which manifests as a willingness to sacrifice for a community. The little people in the first voyage, recognizably the British and French of Swift’s time, are divided into two religious factions, both Christian, and political factions which somewhat overlap the religious ones. It may be the overall weakness caused by these divisions that allows an Emperor or king to rule arbitrarily, with little real political deliberation as to what is good for the community. The big people in the second voyage seem to be free from these problems, and the king rules more wisely, probably partly as a result. The third and fourth voyages teach us that scientific experimentation, and for that matter economic growth, which might benefit a large number of people, is unlikely to achieve a true common good as opposed to the tangible good of individuals out for themselves. Any such achievement would be a coincidence, happening by accident or incidentally. These are issues that we face today. The Houyhnhnms or rational horses in the fourth voyage, at first glance and beyond, seem to be the kind of publicspirited and virtuous citizens that Gulliver has been looking for. In more ways than one, their society is a utopia. Even if Swift goes to an extreme to teach us something about what we are missing, the yearning or demand for justice is surely familiar to us. Today’s “wokeism” is a more or less honest attempt to re-introduce issues of justice into a public realm that of languages” and the “school of mathematics”; III.5, 203–8; Asimov #21, p. 174; #24, p. 175; Houston pp. 430–1, finding a possible source in a work by Comenius.

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in some ways had become “naked,” or into a market in which the selfinterest of individuals can be cleverly bargained. By their focus on real and alleged victims, with alleged victims more prominent as spokespeople in the media, and real victims largely silent, while various people claim to speak for them, the woke seem to think they have identified the most urgent issues of justice, as well as those that are of the greatest and most lasting importance. Of course there is more talk about making someone else suffer or sacrifice than there is of doing so oneself. There is a legitimate fear that mere virtue-signaling may take the place of any kind of virtue; having sent a memorable tweet, one’s work is done. More significantly, if wokeism stands for anything, it is the identification, and then the clarifying of the rights of, as many different groups as possible. Every group has to have its day in the sun, and this celebration of diversity, we are led to believe, will lead to a new unity, greater, deeper or more lasting than any previous unity. It is easy to predict that this might not work.6 If the newly visible groups all see themselves as victims, more or less all having suffered at the hands of the same oppressors—white heteronormal males—it may be that the call to arms means every group ought to have a turn exploiting others, just as the white males have had their turn. The closest thing to justice that may be possible is the fairness of taking turns: one group after another inflicting injustice on everyone else.7 Intersectionality may be intended to solve this problem by ranking the criteria by which we can decide whose turn it is: religion (Islamophobia bad, Christophobia good unless it can be shown that Jesus would be woke if he were alive today), race, gender, country of origin and so on; but surely the ranking becomes another source of contention, and even hate (Is it acceptable or even mandatory for progressives to be anti-Israel, or is this always likely to be a cloak for anti-Semitism?). The woke give the impression that they are generally fighting Nazis or defenders of slavery. It is more likely that they find themselves opposed to some of their fellow moderns, who live and think in a faction different from themselves. Not long ago it seemed that any political faction or government which achieved any long-term success was forced to say it spoke for, appealed to, and considered the well-being of, “the people.”

6 See Forbes. 7 This might be referred to as the “Thrasymachean” view of justice; see Plato Republic

338c–339a.

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Now it is questionable whether we have such a thing as “the people,” who can more or less be counted on to defend both individual and collective rights. Instead, we have distinct groups of victims, and only groups that make some claim to victimhood are allowed a place at the decision-making table. In Federalist #10, James Madison claims that the best solution for faction, singular—the splitting of the citizenry into groups that are typically opposed in competition, usually on economic grounds—is to have more factions, plural. With more factions, it becomes less likely that one majority faction, or a few factions that can form a majority, will dominate consistently. Different coalitions of factions can prevail, or at least prevent the usual majority from prevailing, on different issues. The underlying confidence of Madison in this paper, however, is that individuals who observe the shifting power balance of factions will see reasons to consider themselves, through thick and thin, part of “the people,” whose thinking is not necessarily dominated by economics or the issues over which governments are lobbied. Marxism suggests that only economics is real, and it shapes our thinking accordingly, with only capitalist ideology or false consciousness preventing us from realizing this, and making historical progress accordingly. The proletariat presumably always has some kind of real and lasting unity; the capitalists have a kind of unity in cutthroat competition, which must be ended. If any capitalists survive the revolution, it can presumably only be by changing their consciousness, and joining the united people. In contrast, Madison suggests in Federalist #10 that economics can powerfully shape our thinking and actions, but we have at least some political and moral thinking that is not determined by economics. Breaking up big powerful factions into smaller ones that sometimes succeed in their political campaigns, and sometimes fail, is a way to strengthen non-economic and in other ways non-sectarian thinking. If all factions are relatively weak, a sense of unity in “the people,” always somewhat fragile, can be strengthened. As bitter factions wane in strength, the people can gain. The woke seem to hope that the encouragement of factions based on “identity,” especially race, gender and sexual orientation, will somehow lead to unity, but it is difficult to see any mechanism by which this will occur. Has it only been the hateful rule of white males that has prevented the essential loving nature of everyone else from coming to the forefront? Is the main solution, a kind of pseudo-Marxist one, to eliminate white male thinking rather than capitalist thinking?

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Jonathan Swift loved to attack what has come to be known as the “Swamp.” When things are over-simplified for purposes of attack and perhaps edification, this means the capital city, and probably other cities, where people with wealth and credentials, including lawyers and doctors, gather and even cooperate, to a limited extent, primarily in order to benefit themselves, and exploit the poor and the weak. We have mentioned the Pentagon, and for Swift generals are fair game; he launched conspicuous attacks on the Duke of Marlborough, probably one of the three greatest generals in British history. It might surprise Swift to see that today there is close collaboration between the woke and the Swamp. How can “hate” speech—racist, sexist, transphobic and so on—be eliminated? Probably only by the growth of the welfare state, which is in a position to require the relevant courses and training sessions, and even to establish a new vocabulary which is more or less, probably temporarily, acceptable. This is fairly easy for the Pentagon, one of the largest bureaucracies in the world; they are used to the idea of training and “making” soldiers, so a bolder campaign of social engineering is attractive to them. Large corporations have the resources to keep up with government mandates and ensure compliance with rules. The close relationship between big corporations and big government does a great deal to put small business out of business or keep out competition. Wokeism belongs to the political left, but it has the odd result of deflecting attention from “old” issues such as poverty or inequality of income (leading to widening gaps between socio/economic classes), poor schools and inadequate housing. There is some continuity in the focus on sometimes racist policing, but “de-funding the police” hardly amounts to a call to reform the whole system of criminal justice, while still keeping the streets safe. An immigration policy that comes close to “open borders” is not only one item on the woke agenda; it is almost presented as a panacea. So many new people will be welcome, the bigots will have no choice but to give way. The woke are not likely to object to the careerism of the public sector, where little progress may be made on the “old” issues, as long as progress is made on education in wokeism. The focus on improving the material conditions of human life, and prolonging life, is always likely to skew politics to the left. There are always the relatively weak, the relatively suffering, those who have been left behind. Why is not more done for them? And then the issue of dignity or self-worth seems to imply that nothing except some kind of complete equality among all individuals will do (As Hobbes says, if everyone has

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honor, no one has honor; equality might mean everyone gets the same small share). Swift’s Projectors or modern scientists in the third voyage of the Travels may anticipate the twentieth-century regimes that were both totalitarian and on the left: Communist regimes. In the fourth voyage, Swift provides some support for a “right wing” regime based on what it achieves for the rulers. The Houyhnhnms regularly debate whether to exterminate all the Yahoos. In a way it doesn’t make much difference to them whether the Yahoos exist or not. They use some of them as slaves, but not all or perhaps many. Despite the overall “lack of passion” of the horses, there seems to be a kind of anger at the very existence of Yahoos. The Yahoos are seen as a jarring and disgusting anomaly in the cosmos. When Gulliver lives among the Houyhnhnms, he seems to be willing to become a kind of storm trooper furthering the rule of the horses over the unfortunate Yahoos. More than once he kills and skins some Yahoos—his fellow human beings—to serve his own purposes. It is difficult today not to read these aspects of the Travels as an anticipation of the Nazis, with a kind of so-called master race, and an exploited population about whom it is regularly asked whether they ought all to be exterminated or not. If there are two choices, presented starkly but without Swift’s comic touches, they may be inhuman humanism of the moderns, on the one hand, and xenophobic citizenship, on the other. When wokeism is combined with a kind of unquestioning acceptance of modern science (setting aside the issue of environmental damage— smartphones seem to require cobalt mines), we can see the following logic unfold: it is not enough to make life on earth more comfortable for human beings; it is no help at all to teach people to reflect on their place in the world or nature, or their relationship to God; all the premodern alternatives can be rejected. What we need to is to produce a better class of human being—perhaps the ultimate challenge of technological science. We arguably do not have either the bodies or the souls we need to be adequately post-modern. Once there are a few promising prototypes, they can be strapped into a space ship and sent on a journey that may be extremely uncomfortable for them despite their conformity with the latest specifications. Then with luck they can establish a colony, better than any previous human society, free from racism and other evils, at some place like Mars. For Swift, such thinking would be an example of the threat posed by modern science, and the way it seems to require we become different from anything we have ever been, as opposed to its promise to help human beings more or less as they are.

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For an alternative Swift seems to turn to the ancients, for whom it seems nothing can redeem us other than an improved Sparta, on the one hand, and the philosophic life, on the other. We do not seem to find here the kind of universal humanitarianism that we might expect from Christianity and post-Christianity. From our perspective today, we might say the Communist Manifesto has caused the deaths of more people than any other book. Before 1900 or so it was probably the Bible. From the perspective of the ancients, Christianity (and probably Islam) has a tendency to undermine an attachment to what is truly good for oneself in this world; after all, it is another world that matters. Even more, perhaps, does Christianity undermine any kind of quiet, disinterested patriotism such as the ancients encourage. Joan of Arc notwithstanding, it must be difficult for a believer to believe that our “countries” or other merely human communities are of any great importance in the larger scheme of things. Gulliver is lucky if he can perform as court jester to the ancients, “diverting” them with his stories about modern Europe. This kind of conversation at least has the potential to become a Socratic crossexamination and self-examination. For some reason, the ancients have both a cheerful optimism that something like an improved Sparta might come about some day, and cheerful acceptance of a world that is much worse than that. They do not seem to angrily demand political change. Since the moderns don’t really encourage either Sparta or philosophy, they are left with no real hope other than “Mars.”

Reading Swift: A Modest Proposal, Tale of a Tub and Other Writings How can we tell, after a careful reading, what side Swift is on, whether ancients, moderns or something else? One method Swift uses in many of his writings is a kind of irony that could be called misdirection: pointing to one or more plausible teachings while offering mounting evidence that they are mistaken or crazy, so that by inference something quite different, even opposite, is suggested as the truth. Swift engaged in a public-spirited way in issues of his day, and he may have wanted to show that whatever education Gulliver may achieve in strange places or strange books, it is best for him, and for his family and friends, if he returns and lives in somewhat the way Swift did. At any rate, one set of beliefs or thoughts to which Gulliver never seems to be exposed in any detail—and of which

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he therefore never sees the possible defects in any comprehensive way— is Christianity or Biblical faith. Swift was of course an Anglican priest, and in what we might call the writings of his time and place, including his sermons, he supports a somewhat sober Christian and public-spirited life—spiced up with less sober writings, all grounded in decent traditions.8 Scholars have suggested that a defense of Christian faith, no doubt combined with some desire to support a politically salutary, non-divisive form of that faith (probably Laudian Anglicanism including some kind of return to a “primitive,” pre-medieval church), was always a high priority for Swift, even if there are appearances to the contrary. In the Travels and other writings, especially those we might call his masterpieces, it could be argued that he shows us the downfalls involved in pursuing other kinds of society, no matter how attractive or even utopian they may appear. It may be possible to see Swift as a kind of Christian Aristophanes, giving expression to rational doubts about the old faith, but using jokes to suggest that abandonment of the old faith is problematic at best.9 It would be a beautiful example of Swift’s irony if the alternative he preferred was one about which he was relatively silent; its virtues might become conspicuous by their relative absence, or they might shine more brightly when the faults of plausible alternatives are explored. If the alternatives that are initially plausible, but ultimately rejected, put a huge emphasis on reason and attempt to take rational arguments to extremes, then Swift may be implicitly pointing us to authorities that are not based on reason in the strictest sense. Probably Swift’s most famous essay is A Modest Proposal , which can perhaps be paraphrased as saying through the voice of a modern British “projector” or official: an apparently enlightened, modern and scientific approach to periodic drought

8 Preaching from the pulpit at St. Patrick’s in Dublin every fifth Sunday from 1713 to 1745, it is thought that Swift produced thirty-five sermons, of which only twelve have been preserved. Swift may have destroyed the other twenty-three. Wikipedia cites the Prose Works edited by Scott to say Swift left all thirty-five sermons to his friend Dr. Thomas Sheridan; Damrosch says Swift “burned” most of them (271). 9 Patey has written on both Swift and Evelyn Waugh, and it is fair to say he sees a similarity in these authors. On the other hand, the New Testament is probably even more discouraging of laughter than the Old Testament, which in turn is more discouraging than Plato.

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in Ireland is likely to lead to an endorsement of infanticide and cannibalism in the name of humanity and compassion.10 Almost any approach is probably better than that, although the complete indifference that is all too common is not much better. It is almost too tempting to say Swift searches for a “happy medium” between doing nothing, and following some apparently rational path to evil.11 A kind of modern science fueled by undeniable or genuine humanitarianism, but tending toward cruelty, is clearly shown to be something to be avoided. We will suggest more than once that books and authors that are important to Swift’s argument are not explicitly mentioned. In the case of Modest Proposal, it has been well argued that Swift has several works of Bernard Mandeville in mind, as well as William Petty’s Political Arithmetic. Especially with his masterpiece, Fable of the Bees, Mandeville is closely identified with “consequentialism” and a stress on economic rationality; old notions of transgression were to be disregarded, and actions were to be seen as good or bad based on economic consequences. The problems of the poor were to be addressed mainly by ensuring laborers were available when needed, at low wages.12 Swift is not the same as the (presumably) fictional but plausible person who presents Modest Proposal to the reader; Swift encourages the reader to disavow the “proposal,” as pleasantly plausible as it might appear at

10 A Modest Proposal for preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick (1729). 11 Swift’s projector says that unless cannibalism is practiced on a considerable scale, abortion will be common. This is treated as a greater evil. Today we hear arguments for abortion on demand that bear some similarity to the projector’s arguments for cannibalism—above all, saving children from a miserable life. 12 The title of Mandeville’s Modest Defence of Public Stews, which advocates for the legalization and licensing of brothels in order to minimize the problems that usually arise from this trade, is echoed in the Swift piece. Prendergast (2014):

If it is accepted that Swift had Mandeville’s Modest Defence in mind when he wrote his own Modest Proposal, we can see him as beating Mandeville at his own game by showing that there were really no bounds on what could be justified by consequentialist reasoning. Although Swift made no direct comment on Mandeville, there is good reason to assume familiarity with his work. … Moreover, as Rawson … suggests the work of the two authors appears to show “a pattern of tacit or interlocking awareness of one another,” and “a reciprocal array of undeclared allusion.”

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first. Swift heightens our sense that we need or yearn for a combination of reason and let us say morality, while leaving a heart-breaking or amusing sense that unfortunately, he has no such successful combination to offer. He leaves us to work something out, no doubt using some materials that are familiar to us, “at home,” at least as a start. Texts that are somehow beyond question, along with traditions, even if they are not explicitly mentioned, may take on great importance. In Tale of a Tub, probably Swift’s other great masterpiece coming just before the Travels, there may be several narrators, but they all seem to be modern rationalists. Narrators are found to be unreliable, as is probably the case with Gulliver.13 On the other hand, the narrators even at the extreme may remind us to some degree of Swift. Swift’s friend Bolingbroke apparently described him as a hypocrite renversé: “with a horror of seeming to pretend to be better than he was, he let it appear that he was worse.”14 It is in this strange, ambiguous context that Swift presents a defense of Anglicanism. The extremes of Roman Catholicism on the one hand, and Puritanism on the other, are avoided by Anglicanism which is grounded both in Scripture and in a kind of traditional prudence. Extremes are apparently introduced in order to show how they are mistaken. It may be that Swift is closer to Gulliver than to his other unreliable narrators: Swift’s disguises give us “all the more reason for trying to find the author, whom none of us can quite detach from Gulliver in his final dark enlightenment, realising that he is but a Yahoo: sly, vicious and lecherous.”15 On the more edifying side, Gulliver is a kind of amateur scholar who hopes to find some way to apply the classics to his own life, and the lives of people at home. The modern intellectual crackpot of Tale of a Tub, on the other hand, trying to identify the “right” reformed Church, bears some relationship to Swift’s clerical career, and the ambitious British bureaucrat and nut in Modest Proposal shares Swift’s interest in doing something for the Irish. Careful readers have suggested that Tale of a Tub does not simply suggest that certain extremes of Christianity indicate, or derive from, or can come about in conjunction with, insanity, but that Christianity itself may do so. Extreme political ambition, religious fanaticism and pushing modern scientific discoveries far beyond

13 See Speck. 14 Damrosch 6. 15 Mullan (review of Damrosch).

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common sense can all be seen as examples of madness, possibly (for all anyone knows) having a chemical or biological cause. There are suggestions that it would be better to be deceived, and live in a kind of fool’s paradise, than to be a crazy show-off who may have gleaned some part of a truth. There is a long-established view that Queen Anne was offended by this work of Swift’s, and any hope he had of becoming a bishop rather than settling for a lesser position was eliminated as a result.16 One would think Swift had many opportunities to assure the Queen and other people who had power over his career of his unquestioned piety and orthodoxy (in the sense of belief in a specific iteration of Anglicanism); but it seems he never quite provided such an assurance. We can touch on a few of his writings relating directly to religion from before the publication of the Travels. Swift’s short piece making an argument against the abolition of Christianity raised questions about the point of view from which he viewed the world.17 He presents himself as more for the practice of religion than for any true faith, which may have lost its force some time earlier; of course, he is quietly urging church leaders to do better. He is more against free-thinkers who believe there is no need for religion than he is against religious people of almost any kind. He thinks the established Church has a great deal to recommend it “for the time being.” Yes, but he surely exaggerates the extent to which there is a real debate about abolishing Christianity and, therefore, runs the risk that some people who would not have thought of such a thing will now do so. Swift’s Project for the Advancement of Religion proposes worldly rewards and punishments to reinforce the practice of religion, with little regard for underlying faith.18 He suggests that hypocrisy is better than nothing, even if only one person in twenty possesses real virtue, and virtue may become a habit with time and age, as opposed to positive intention. Sadly, it has been found that the Queen setting an example of piety and virtue is not enough;

16 See Damrosch 144–6. 17 An Argument to Prove that the Abolishing of Christianity in England May, as Things

Now Stand Today, be Attended with Some Inconveniences, and Perhaps not Produce Those Many Good Effects Proposed Thereby, commonly referred to as An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity (1708); Damrosch 152–3. Prendergast (2010) suggests that this piece responds to one by Mandeville—a kind of early draft of Fable of the Bees. 18 A Project for the Advancement of Religion, and the Reformation of Manners. By a Person of Quality (1709).

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she must use her considerable powers of patronage to reward the appearance of such qualities. It is just possible that Swift had his own case in mind. Swift’s Sentiments of a Church of England Man shows him negotiating his way through both religious and political factions.19 There is a need for an established Church as opposed to denominations that are more factional almost by definition, almost regardless of what exactly that Church teaches; it is possible to maintain proper respect between that Church and either Tories or Whigs, even though Tories might seem more naturally at home with it. There is more of a sense of finding political solutions to political problems than of ensuring that policies are based on specific interpretations of Scripture. An enemy of Swift’s said his “affection to the Church was never doubted, though his Christianity was ever questioned.” A friend wrote that Swift was strikingly observant at home, somewhat in secret, and added: “How happy had it been, both for himself and the world, had he carefully governed his life by that apostolic and truly divine precept, abstain from all appearance of evil.”20 In this connection, we might briefly mention a later work of Swift’s: “A Letter to a Young Clergyman” (1720), in which Swift provides advice as to how a clergyman can improve both his own learning and his communication with others. Swift says very little at all about reading Christian texts, including the Bible.21 He strongly recommends the reading of ancient Greek and Roman texts. When it comes to the ancients, Swift is emphatic that there is no contradiction between the greatest ancient authors and the teachings of the New Testament. Like Jesus, Socrates apparently taught that we should love our enemies. This may be a paraphrase of two thoughts: Socrates would rather suffer injustice than inflict it; and he believed the most likely reason anyone would do wrong was ignorance. At any rate Swift is able to suggest that there is almost perfect agreement between the “ancient heathens” and Christianity when it comes to duty; the only difference is that the Scripture is able to offer facts about “divine providence,” presumably meaning rewards and

19 The Sentiments of a Church of England Man, With Respect to Religion and Government (1708). 20 Damrosch 147–8. The enemy was Jonathan Smedley; the friend was Patrick Delany, a fellow clergyman. 21 A Letter to a Young Clergyman, Lately Entered into Holy Orders (1719–20).

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punishments in the afterlife.22 The ancient thinkers did not need such a teaching for themselves—they had what we might call philosophic reasons for doing their duty; they unfortunately lacked such a teaching, or one with real plausibility and effect, which would have benefitted “the bulk of mankind” or “the vulgar.” Christian teachings agree with the ancients on “duty” and add an effective way to make duty more enforceable. This clearing of the decks, so that there is no reason of religion or morality to resist the great heathens, prepares for a strong recommendation to learn from them, and indeed to make them important to most if not all Christian sermons. “Take the matter in this light, and it will afford field enough for a divine to enlarge on, by showing the advantages which the Christian world has over the heathen, and the absolute necessity of divine revelation, to make the knowledge of the true God, and the practice of virtue, more universal in the world.” Swift does not seem to see any need for more than a bare minimum of Biblical passages, presumably emphasizing rewards and punishments in the afterlife, whereas ancient readings seem to be recommended with no limit. Swift admits that this is an unusual, one might say an unlikely piece of advice for a Christian pastor as to how he can improve his sermons.

Other Prequels to the Travels: Ancients and Moderns Born in 1667, Swift did not really publish substantial works for a general audience until he was over 30. His first lengthy work, published in 1701 (as usual, anonymously), made many references to ancient Greeks and Romans, including in the title—A Discourse on the Contests and Dissensions in Athens and Rome—but was clearly intended to contribute to the political debate of the time between Whigs and Tories.23 Swift drew on ancient Greek and Roman examples, including both historical instances and passages from Aristotle’s Politics, to suggest that if political leaders

22 Strangely, Swift says at one point that “the system of morality to be gathered out of the writings or sayings of those ancient sages, falls undoubtedly very short of that delivered in the Gospel”—as if the substance of duty might differ from what Christ taught. But then he allows this thought to go unrepeated and undeveloped. 23 A Discourse of the Contests and Dissensions between the Nobles and the Commons in Athens and Rome, With the Consequences they had upon both these States .

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are too lacking in public spirit to cooperate, there must be institutions, enjoying some stability, which can restrain them and channel their ambitions. Swift entered a debate about ancients and moderns with his book Battle of the Books , published in 1704 but substantially written in 1697, somewhat earlier than the Discourse.24 This book concerns debates among intellectuals and scholars, rather than Parliamentary and political activists, and it was personal for Swift insofar as he was coming to the defense of his employer and perhaps mentor, Sir William Temple. In 1690 Temple published his “Essay Upon Ancient and Modern Learning.” He makes it clear he is partly responding to a famous essay by Bernard de Fontenelle, “Digression sur les Anciens et les Modernes.” He more explicitly mentions an attempt by Thomas Burnet to provide a scientific explanation for events in the Bible, and an imaginative exploration, again by Fontenelle, of what it might mean if there are other worlds with rational beings living there.25 Temple claims the two authors somewhat undermined the merits of their works by advancing a kind of exaggerated argument that modern achievements, either in “Learning and Knowledge” or poetry, are simply greater than comparable ancient achievements. The writings on the world of the past, and possible worlds in space, explored the implications of discoveries that had been made by modern science, and presumably could only have been made based on previous advances in modern as opposed to pre-modern science.26 Swift 24 Battle of the Books was published in the same volume as Tale of a Tub, largely written perhaps in 1696. The Dedication is addressed to Lord John Somers, a member of the Whig Junto whom Swift found admirable apart from party politics. In the mid-1690s Somers was at the peak of his career, Lord Chancellor and newly created Baron; he came under repeated attacks by his enemies beginning in 1699 and 1700, was removed from office by the King, and within a short time largely retired to private life. By 1704 Somers had returned to much of his earlier respectability and prominence, although the Whigs did not come back into office until 1708. Swift may have made a strategic decision as to when to publish with a dedication to Somers. 25 Temple refers to “two Pieces that have lately pleased me …one in English upon the Antediluvian World, and another in French upon the Plurality of Worlds.” The first is Burnet’s Sacred Theory of the Earth, originally in Latin, published in English in 1684 and 1690; the second is Fontenelle’s Entretiens sur la Pluralité des Mondes, translated into English in 1688. He goes on: “I was so pleased with the last … that I enquired for what else I could of the same hand, till I met with a small Piece concerning Poesy”; this is Fontenelle’s 1688 book on “Poesies Pastorales,” which included some poetry, a “Discourse” on this type of poem, and the “Digression sur les Anciens et les Modernes.” 26 A serious study of fossils as evidence of ancient plants and animals that were quite different from contemporary ones came to England in the 1660s with Hooke and Steno.

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shows some interest in both kinds of scientific finding in the Travels.27 Fontenelle had become a leader in a debate in France about “ancients and moderns.”28 The background to the debate was a confidence that Descartes had made progress in science, particularly with his insistence on an experimental method, with one proposition having to be proven before progress is possible toward testing another proposition. Impressive or even spectacular discoveries were already being made based on Descartes’ method, or on similar modern methods that may not have been articulated in the same way, and this seemed to show the clear superiority of modern science to ancient science in particular. There were still questions about how this had happened. Had there been steady progress, with a gap in the Dark Ages, so that the modern discoveries were ultimately based on ancient ones? Or had there been a real departure, with modern science being altogether more realistic and promising, starting on a different foundation from the beginning? Those who were convinced that modern science, led by Descartes among others, was altogether superior, then turned their attention to poetry and the arts. Could it be that every intellectual and cultural pursuit was better in modernity than it had ever been, and was making progress that could not even have been imagined earlier? We might point out first that Temple agrees with previous debaters on the terminology. “Moderns” means thinkers, poets and other intellectuals who brought about a new age of learning, at least comparable to what we know of the ancient Greeks and Romans. The long intervening period, which apparently did not leave behind examples of learning The most groundbreaking work on telescopes looking into space and finding “worlds” there was probably done by Galileo, who published the Siderius Nuncius in 1610. 27 Swift refers almost in passing to fossils (II.7, 151), apparently recognizing that knowledge about the past can be gained by a careful study of such things. On the other hand, it is not clear any big political question can be settled this way. Does it really matter whether Yahoos or Houyhnhnms were actually aboriginal in Houyhnhnm-land? In a funny way, a kind of realistic space travel may have been invented by Swift; he holds out no hope that there are interesting or superior people or beings out there somewhere. 28 Between the publication in France of Fontenelle’s Plurality of Worlds and his Poesies, Charles Perrault recited a poem at the meeting of the French Academy, extolling moderns, particularly poets, at the expense of the ancients. The French debate got caught up in questions such as whether human beings have declined in overall quality or will decline in the future—something Swift takes up in various ways; poetry is a major theme, with progress in science perhaps simply taken for granted. Somewhat surprisingly, Fontenelle in his praise of Descartes did not accept the findings of Newton on gravity.

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of the same stature, can be referred to as the Christian Dark or Middle Ages. We can simply note here that Swift shares with Temple the assumption that the real debate about first class learning has to do with the ancients and the moderns; medieval thinkers, and those most engaged in disputes about varieties or types of Christianity, are a distraction by comparison.29 It is striking that in “A Letter to a Young Clergyman” (1720), Swift deplores medieval or earlier Christian texts. On early Christian texts, he says the “ancient fathers in the church” made a mistake in denouncing heathen philosophers; “those fathers lived in the decline of literature; and in my judgment (who should be unwilling to give the least offence) appear to be rather most excellent holy persons, than of transcendent genius and learning.” When Swift says “ancient” fathers, he seems to refer to people who lived long before the High Middle Ages; Thomas Aquinas, with his great commentaries on Aristotle, can hardly be said to have “denounced” all heathen philosophers. Swift may be suggesting that later medieval thinkers are not worth mentioning.30 We will see Aquinas and Duns Scotus treated as insignificant “moderns” in Battle of the Books . We will touch on some of Temple’s main points, acknowledging some genuine progress by moderns, but generally very much in favor of the ancients. If moderns say, as Newton did (in 1675), that moderns are like smaller people standing on the shoulders of giants, this implies that the work begun by giants can be advanced in small steps by lesser people. One would think that when it comes to the humanities, the lesser people cannot understand themselves without a study of the thought of the giants. There may be more people in the modern world than there were in the ancient world, and this probably increases the chances of great discoveries. Temple says we simply do not know how many “ancients” there were, especially great or thoughtful ancients, as records are somewhat limited. There can be “learning and knowledge” without books, so even if we were confident the ancients produced few books, which is not the case, this would not be decisive. We might note that the Houyhnhnms in Swift’s Travels have no “letters” or books. Temple takes 29 One may of course wonder about the great scholastic thinkers, who will come up below. What about the architecture and related visual arts of the High Middle Ages—the flying buttress, and Gothic cathedrals? Temple says that in ancient times painting, statuary and architecture achieved “inimitable excellencies” that are “undisputed”; 20. 30 Such thinkers tended to write in Latin; Swift says he is “heartily glad” that Latin has been “almost entirely driven out of the pulpit.”

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for granted that some famous ancient Greeks are still at the pinnacle of knowledge or learning, and many literate Greeks were fortunate in being able to learn from such people in person, rather than only through books as is the case for the moderns. His interest in the Greeks takes him, somewhat surprisingly, to the Brahmins of India; he is convinced that the wisdom of the Brahmins made its way to Greece, and influenced what we call Greek wisdom. We will suggest below that the Brahmins could have been a model for Swift’s Houyhnhnms. Possibly there were very early Greeks, now largely unknown, who were even greater than the now-famous Greeks. Hippocrates, Plato and Xenophon are the earliest philosophers of whom we have detailed accounts; but there are records to show that there were “more ancient sages” who were “much the greater men” (16). Temple suggests that from time to time there are great individuals, in various fields of activity including war/empire building and the pursuit of wisdom. Their greatness is such that they owe little or nothing to any predecessor, and it is unlikely their work can be duplicated or improved upon. In this connection he names Thales, Pythagoras, Democritus, Hippocrates, Plato, Aristotle and Epicurus, and claims that their successors were always prepared to be seen as doing work of secondary importance (17). If anything Temple is even more emphatic to this effect when it comes to poetry. Homer and Virgil are the giants (52). Unfortunately, Temple bestows similar praise on someone named Phalaris (35), and these passages have been taken by many readers to undermine the credibility of Temple’s entire project.31 Surely as moderns we want to say it is modern science that most clearly surpasses ancient achievements. To say the least, Temple deals with this issue quite briefly. He does not acknowledge many discoveries that can be attributed to modern Europeans, and the ones that can be so attributed do not impress him. He mentions the Copernican “System” in connection with Astronomy, and Harvey’s findings on the circulation of blood. He claims these two discoveries “have been of little use to the World,

31 It has been established for some time that the “Epistles of Phalaris” were in fact

spurious, dating from several centuries after the time of the real Phalaris, and either written or falsely attributed to Phalaris in order to embellish his reputation. The letters were widely diffused in Europe for centuries before Temple wrote. Richard Bentley disposed of the controversy and proved Temple to be completely wrong, in a book published in 1699. Bentley’s name comes up in Battle of the Books .

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though perhaps of much honour to the Authors” (25). The navigation of the world by modern Europeans was made possible first by the magnetic compass—an example of a loadstone or magnet—and then by other instruments. Temple admits that the global navigation itself is new, but again he is hesitant to give credit to the moderns. The Europeans with all their navigation, according to Temple, have largely confined themselves to coastlines, and to the acquisition of wealth and luxury rather than knowledge. If the ancients had arrived at the same tools of navigation, everything might have been different (27–8). Temple seems to admit that the use of the compass for navigation is a “great and fortuitous” invention of the moderns, one that has opened tremendous opportunities. What has actually been achieved, however, is apparently paltry in comparison with what was possible. We could add that as far as we know now, the magnetic compass came from China. At his gloomiest, Temple suggests that the real peaks of modern thought and innovation are already past as he writes in the late 1600s. Since he seems to think the community of intellectuals can only focus on one set of ideas at a time, he gives the impression that the profitless absorption with theology in the Middle Ages was largely ended, it was replaced with something new and promising, and this too somehow petered out. Temple seems to acknowledge that all knowledge, ancient and modern, is more or less good; he mainly accuses the moderns of not achieving very much of it.

Battle of the Books and Tale of a Tub In Battle of the Books Swift takes up Temple’s cause and suggests that Temple has done some good in reviving the spirits of advocates for the ancients, and at least making it clear that the moderns will not have an easy victory. To say Swift has written briefly, pithily, with no overstatement or arrogant assertions, and with humor, showing qualities that Temple did not, is an understatement. Picturing the ancients and moderns first as souls in a kind of afterlife, Swift suggests the moderns “started” the controversy by complaining that the ancients were on the higher of two hills—the “two tops of the hill Parnassus.”32 The occupation of the 32 S. 2. For the ancient Greeks, Parnassus was the holiest of holy sites. The oracle at Delphi, dedicated to Apollo, was only one of many associations in religious myth; the mountain was also sacred to Dionysius, and the home of the Muses. There were thriving communities on and near Parnassus in pre-Greek or proto-Greek Mycenean times. The

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height by the ancients was a mere accident of time, yet the moderns now complain that the greater height of the ancients spoils their view. The ancients suggest that even allowing the moderns to be so close to them was an act of generosity on their part. The moderns have no intention of starting from scratch somewhere else, and gradually building up to whatever height they are able. They seem to believe there is some common source of knowledge that they share with the ancients; there are two peaks of one mountain, and they want to trade places so as to enjoy the highest. Being the highest implies being the best; the moderns are close to the peak, and they want to try a kind of shortcut to take it over. They would rather have part of the highest peak torn down than to accept the status quo; their commitment to knowledge for its own sake is questionable. They seem at least as interested in being known as wise as in actually being wise. It is as if they appeared in the world, announced that they knew roughly as much as the ancients, yet insisted that they had something new, an approach or method that was “anti-ancient,” that would lead to dramatic results that were not available to the ancients. The ancients refuse to either trade places, or tear down the part of the peak on which they say they are aboriginal. Of course at one point the moderns repeat Bacon’s observations that the ancients are actually more “modern” than the so-called moderns.33 “Modern” for detractors might mean youthful, impetuous, experimenting in a haphazard way; “ancient” might imply the tried and true. The people we call ancients were moderns in the sense of new in their day, however (unless we accept Temple’s account of more ancient teachers and authorities); it may be their ideas, rather than later ones, that are to some extent raw or unprocessed. We could also turn this comparison around. If youth is associated with energy and creativity, these qualities may be found more with the ancients; with the moderns we might expect a certain decrepitude and senescence. If the typical modern attitude to life is to wish for it to be both longer and more comfortable, this may speak more of old age than youth; youth may wish to live for the moment. The Struldbruggs, suffering from endless old age and decrepitude, may once again be an example from which we can learn. At any rate, we might say the name is so ancient it is clearly not Greek, but it is difficult to ascribe to either a Mycenean or an even more ancient Anatolian language. 33 S. 8. Francis Bacon: “antiquity is the youth of the world”; Advancement of Learning,

I.8.

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moderns believe in identity politics, whereas the ancients do not. The moderns see themselves as a group with an identity. They think they deserve to be on top, it would just be a matter of time before they get there in any case, so the shortcut they are demanding simply speeds up the inevitable. They want to replace an unjust outcome with a just one. From the ancient perspective, this is all pure assertion on the part of the moderns. The moderns have yet to prove they deserve any high position, and it is reasonable to expect them to work away quietly and see if they actually rise or not. According to the ancients, rising to the top has always been a matter of merit, and justice requires that this remains the case. This controversy has generated books, and Swift says the battle has been conducted for some time by the books themselves. Swift depicts famous authors as attacking one another, including with actual weapons instead of mere words or ink. One key event was a rebellion by Duns Scotus, a medieval scholar. He persuaded “his master Aristotle” to overthrow Plato “by main force, and turn him out from his ancient station among the divines, where he had peaceably dwelt near eight hundred years.” The two usurpers “have reigned ever since in his stead.”34 This disruption persuaded “our ancestors” that it was necessary to keep controversial books in chains or irons, and this solution kept things quiet until a nameless but determined modern, who was a librarian, deliberately stirred things up. Swift implies that Plato deserved to remain in a ruling position; the medieval consensus, wrapped in the authority of Aristotle, was artificial, and perhaps likely to stifle debate that could be quite useful. Swift may be the hero here, restoring a fuller appreciation of the ancients in contrast to both medieval and moderns. Aristotle was one ancient who was prepared to overthrow another, his teacher. When a fuller battle develops later, Aristotle and Plato are both clearly among the ancients, and Scotus and Thomas Aquinas are among the moderns. After describing many different groups or ranks among the modern army, each with appropriate equipment and training, Swift says: “The rest was a confused multitude, led by Scotus, Aquinas, and Bellarmine;

34 S. 3. There was no good Latin translation of the works of Plato (except the Timaeus ) in the time of Scotus, and virtually no one could read Greek. Aristotle’s works by contrast had come to be fairly widely available in good Latin translations. William of Moerbeke is said to have translated the works of Aristotle from Greek into Latin at the request of Thomas Aquinas.

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of mighty bulk and stature, but without either arms, courage, or discipline.” The only moderns who are lower than these famous medievals are “rogues and ragamuffins, that follow the camp for nothing but the plunder, all without coats to cover them.” Scotus also comes up in the Travels, when Gulliver gets to speak with the dead. He has the opportunity to ensure Aristotle and Scotus meet; Scotus derives his reputation from being some kind of expert on Aristotle, but the latter has never seen or heard of him. Aristotle “was out of all patience with the account I gave him of Scotus and Ramus, as I presented them to him; and he asked them, ‘whether the rest of the tribe were as great dunces as themselves?’”35 Swift obviously has great respect for Aristotle, and he has Aristotle explain to Descartes that it is always a mistake to believe that any “system of nature” or teaching in natural philosophy could be more than conjectural (III.8, 222). Aristotle admits that he made mistakes, and it is just possible that Swift shares the old ancient belief that Plato was Aristotle’s superior.36 If Plato and Socrates are known for open-ended inquiry, including “aporetic” dialogues, Aristotle based on his extant works is more known for somewhat didactic or dogmatic textbooks; he may have lent himself to a medieval treatment more than other ancients.37 Returning to Swift’s books in Battle, the “chains” that were necessary to keep the two groups of antagonists apart may have been dogmas or oversimplifications that made it seem there was hardly any overlap between the questions addressed by ancients and moderns/medievals. There are brief references to the exchange between Temple and Richard Bentley, who now appears in the character of “the guardian of the regal library,” or the King’s library, and a determined if not fanatical

35 III.8, 221–1. The word “dunce” meaning “intellectually lacking” was added to the English language by way of various attacks on the thinking and works of Duns Scotus. There may have been Protestants attacking Catholic medievalism well before Swift who achieved this usage, but Swift and his friends probably gave it wider currency. 36 When Gulliver mentions the agreement between the Master Houyhnhnm and “the Sentiments of Socrates, as Plato delivers them,” he says this is “the highest Honour I can do that Prince of Philosophers”; IV.8, 301. This is the only mention of Plato in the Travels. 37 When Gulliver is getting to know the king of the giants, he finds that there are some intellectuals who are at least trying to be moderns: they make “a determination exactly agreeable to the modern philosophy of Europe, whose professors [disdain] the old evasion of occult causes, whereby the followers of Aristotle endeavoured in vain to disguise their ignorance …” (II.3, 111–2).

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defender of the moderns.38 This is all fun, but Swift focusses more than Temple and Bentley on major themes of controversy between ancients and moderns. It is the moderns led by Bentley who wish for war. They reject a truly intellectual or philosophic exchange of views between people who disagree; they want a bigger, more unpredictable conflict where crude matters of war preparation seem to count the most. It seems the ancients would have been content to be ignored. They had been neglected for a long time, and it seems they did not object to this treatment. We might go so far as to say that they cared far less than the moderns about posterity or reputation. They fight on the defensive, not the offensive. The moderns consistently outnumber the ancients, and they score some hits, but somehow the ancients pretty well achieve a draw. Both armies have “horse” or cavalry, light horse, bowmen and dragoons (S. 6). For the moderns Harvey is “the great aga” of the Dragoons, whom we might say are modern Projectors, and Paracelsus appears as a “stink bomb flinger,” or alchemist. Swift may be briefly suggesting that the moderns, addressing and sometimes exaggerating hopes and fears, may not be rigorous in distinguishing science from pseudo-science. Hippocrates is the commander of the ancient Dragoons, reminding us that the ancients (perhaps more than the medievals) had medical science of some kind. For both ancients and moderns, it seems the philosophers or thinkers, along with the greatest poets, are presented as bowmen or archers rather than any kind of cavalry; this may mean they are not found among the rich or the landed or titled gentry. Probably the most famous part of Battle of the Books is the competition not between human thinkers and books, but between a bee and a spider. The early skirmishes between Aristotle and Plato on the one side, and Descartes and Hobbes on the other, are interrupted when everyone stops to observe the bee and the spider. In one of Swift’s most wonderful “fairy tale” passages, a bee who is motivated merely by curiosity flies through a broken glass into a building, and destroys a spider web (10). The spider angrily abuses the bee, and the two animals engage in a debate in which each defends his own way of life. The spider, according to Swift, is not serious about learning from a debate, or about the search for truth in general: he “began his Argument in the true Spirit of Controversy, with Resolution to be heartily scurrilous and angry, to urge on his own

38 S. 30.

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Reasons, without the least Regard to the Answers or Objections of his Opposite; and fully predetermined in his Mind against all Conviction.” According to the spider, the bee never contributes anything to nature, and actually steals food. The spider himself, on the other hand, is able to build things out of what he eats and then regurgitates, or perhaps defecates (11). The bee replies with a kind of teleology: he would not have his wings and voice from Providence if he were not meant to use them for “the noblest ends”: contemplation, and a kind of consumption that leaves no flower or plant worse off than before. The spider’s efforts at construction, even if they display labor and method, have just been shown to be of little use to anyone. The spider depends for raw materials on “dirt”— cast-offs and leavings—from a number of sources; there is nothing noble about the material for construction, and the construction itself turns out to be useless and weak, whereas the bee produces honey and wax (12).39 All the contending books watch and hear this debate, and then Aesop (who at another point is asleep) draws the conclusion that applies to them. For, pray Gentlemen, was ever any thing so Modern as the Spider in his Air, his Turns, and his Paradoxes? He argues in the Behalf of You his Brethren, and Himself, with many Boastings of his native Stock, and great Genius; that he Spins and Spits wholly from himself, and scorns to own any Obligation or Assistance from without. Then he displays to you his great Skill in Architecture, and Improvement in the Mathematicks. To all this, the Bee, as an Advocate, retained by us the Antients, thinks fit to Answer; That if one may judge of the great Genius or Inventions of the Moderns, by what they have produced, you will hardly have Countenance to bear you out in boasting of either. Erect your Schemes with as much Method and Skill as you please; yet, if the materials be nothing but Dirt, spun out of your own Entrails (the Guts of Modern Brains) the Edifice will conclude at last in a Cobweb: The Duration of which, like that of other Spiders Webs, may be imputed to their being forgotten, or neglected, or hid in a Corner.

39 If one were to re-construct a Swiftian bestiary, one would need to consider what Gulliver says to the King of the Brobdingnagians: “… among other Animals, Bees and Ants had the Reputation of more Industry, Art, and Sagacity than many of the larger Kinds”; Travels II.6, 139. The King partly responds after he learns about gunpowder, and the ways in which modern weapons can maim and destroy the human body: “He was amazed at how so impotent and groveling an Insect as I … could entertain such inhuman Ideas”; II. 7, 148, cf. II.3, 115. The Master Houyhnhnm later says that it is “no Shame to learn Wisdom from [small] Brutes, as Industry is taught by the Ant, and Building by the Swallow”; IV.9, 307.

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We need not comment on these passages at length except to say that Swift questions whether the moderns, in their characteristic mode of operating, are ever likely to replace or supplant the ancients in all important fields of human study and thought. As a rule ancients were not even trying to do the things of which moderns are so proud; what the ancients worked on may not be as immediately impressive, but we may still have a lot to learn from them. It is at least plausible that Greek authors, once they came about at the highest level, stressed the accomplishments of books more than buildings.40 Books do not directly build anything; we might say they either succeed in bringing enlightenment, or they don’t. Perhaps the moderns do not really value a book unless it can be used to offer or inspire a kind of method for building things. “I make (or I somehow support making), therefore I am.” The ancients don’t even emphasize books in the sense of something that lasts; they emphasize thought and speech in themselves, even if they are ephemeral. The moderns, when they are not building things, engage in a purely poisonous use of words (14). Returning to Aesop: For any Thing else of Genuine, that the Moderns may pretend to, I cannot recollect; unless it be a large Vein of Wrangling and Satyr, much of a Nature and Substance with the Spider’s Poison; which, however, they pretend to spit wholly out of themselves, is improved by the same Arts, by feeding upon the Insects and Vermin of the Age. As for Us, the Antients, We are content with the Bee, to pretend to Nothing of our own, beyond our Wings and our Voice: that is to say, our Flights and our Language; For the rest, whatever we have got, has been by infinite Labor, and search, and ranging thro’ every Corner of Nature: The Difference is, that instead of Dirt and Poison, we have rather chose to fill our Hives with Honey and Wax, thus furnishing Mankind with the two Noblest of Things, which are Sweetness and Light (14).41

40 Thucydides (I.10) makes no direct mention of the Parthenon, built in his lifetime, or other grand buildings on the Acropolis of Athens or elsewhere. He predicts that people in the future will exaggerate the power of Athens, based on her buildings, and will greatly underestimate the power of Sparta, which has so to speak no buildings. 41 Swift seems to have given the English language this phrase “sweetness and light.” Ancient bees apparently make not only honey, but beeswax for making candles and thereby producing light—not the brightest or most impressive light, but light as opposed to darkness nonetheless. Perhaps it is light that does not dazzle or deceive.

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When we think of writings on politics, ancient utopias are not necessarily meant to be “built,” and the best arguments about them show why they are unlikely ever to be built. (Philosophers would probably have to give up being philosophers in order to be kings; less sweetness and light, more digging in the mud.) For the moderns, even theories that seem utopian (self-interested people can achieve a stable peace, if not exactly a love of justice, based on the “invisible hand” of a market) are anti-utopian in the sense that they are meant to inspire the building of something. One paraphrase of Karl Marx is promising but questionable: the ancients wanted (merely) to understand things, the moderns want to change things. The ancients may be philanthropic; they surely expect their writings to be of some real benefit to someone, and they might not be surprised that their ideas are still part of “the ideas of the West.” It may be unlikely that there would be any Marxist Communism if there had not first been communism in Plato’s Republic. It is difficult to say of the ancients, however, that they are humanitarian in the sense of wanting to build things that can be expected to benefit many people within a fairly short time. In Tale of a Tub, Swift took up debates between the ancients and moderns again, although one of his jokes is to insist that any such effort is probably a waste of time. The putative author claims to be a member of a Grub Street society of writers, whose voluminous works are increasingly disparaged. Part of the problem is that there are rival groups of writers who are jealous, and who have successfully claimed credit for many of the best works of the “Swift” group. Another problem is that people no longer know how to interpret thoughtful works that come in the form of “types and fables”—apparently simple old-fashioned stories, like nursery rhymes. Readers can be fooled by the outward splendor or humor of a story, and fail to search for the underlying “precepts and arts,” or wisdom, of the writers. Readers “will by no means be persuaded to inspect beyond the surface and the rind of things.” Swift’s narrator claims to have travailed “in a complete and laborious dissertation upon the prime productions of our society [that is, one specific Grub Street group], which, besides their beautiful externals for the gratification of superficial readers, have darkly and deeply couched under them the most finished and refined systems of all sciences and arts, as I do not doubt to lay open by untwisting or unwinding, and either to draw up by exantlation or display by incision.” The narrator lists several books he claims to have reviewed to prepare for writing the present essay. One book or story is allegedly called “Wise

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Men of Gotham.” There were folk sayings and rhymes about men of Gotham, known as either wise men or fools, going back to the reign of King John, 600 years before Swift’s time. The men are said to have feigned idiocy in order to prevent a royal tour from coming through their village. Their objection was not simply to the one visit, but to the road being improved to a highway fit for a king, which would bring much more traffic. Assuming there is some wisdom in maintaining the peace of a village, the men of Gotham were wise, not fools, and they may have meant no disrespect to the king. About the book the author says: This is a treatise of immense erudition, being the great original and fountain of those arguments bandied about both in France and England, for a just defence of modern learning and wit, against the presumption, the pride, and the ignorance of the ancients. This unknown author hath so exhausted the subject, that a penetrating reader will easily discover whatever has been written since upon that dispute to be little more than repetition. An abstract of this treatise has been lately published by a worthy member of our society.

Someone in Swift’s group has published an “abstract” of a great treatise which defends the moderns against the ancients. If the “abstract” on the subject of the moderns was joined with a presentation on the ancients, it is not unreasonable to suggest that Swift is referring here either to Sir William Temple’s work or to his own Battle of the Books . Swift or his narrator then claims that the moderns are wiser than the ancients, indeed that they are all-knowing, to the extent that there is some doubt whether the ancients even existed. We know that such claims are all highly suspect coming from Swift. As the essay proceeds, Swift, through his unreliable narrator or narrators, provides a kind of torrent of examples of modern theories, and exaggerated pride in such theories. It can readily be concluded either that they are ridiculous, or that the experiment to test them would be inhuman in a way that would more than outweigh any possible benefit. To give only one example, the modern narrator says Homer’s ignorance can be proven in many instances—especially in the case of his ignorance of the Church of England and other modern matters. Swift’s exterior presents an attractive “rind” or exterior, particularly to defenders of the moderns, but if they read carefully they are as likely to disappointed by the defense of the moderns as Queen Anne was by the defense of the Church of England. All of this prepares us for

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Gulliver’s Travels, where the ancients are given much more of a voice, along with a dramatic presentation of their views, than in any earlier work of Swift’s.

Approaches to Gulliver ’s Travels A dissertation or academic monograph usually requires an extensive discussion of the existing literature on one’s chosen topic, so as to indicate what exactly is new in one’s approach, or what one adds to the edifice of knowledge. I will offer a very truncated version of such an account of the literature on Gulliver’s Travels. It may be necessary as a first step to show that Swift was a serious student of various texts, ancient and modern, and the Travels is partly an examination or exploration of these texts. Before his travels begin, we learn that Gulliver had three years of study at Cambridge and has spent his hours of leisure “in reading the best Authors, ancient and modern” (I.1). There is no doubt Swift read such works as well—and probably more carefully than Gulliver.42 Unfortunately, Gulliver seems to have a poor memory for authors he has read, or schools of thought he has been exposed to. A great deal of effort has been expended in trying to identify “literary” sources for the Travels, partly in order to judge the degree of Swift’s originality—his ability to go beyond his sources. My project is an attempt to locate this work primarily within the traditions of political philosophy. It has been very unusual for scholars to focus on ancients and moderns, or political philosophy, as the major themes of Gulliver’s Travels. Allan Bloom’s essay is an inspiration in this regard.43 Many of the arguments in this book have been inspired by Bloom; my hope is that I demonstrate an intelligent engagement with his arguments and suggestions. Harvey C. Mansfield has provided me with further encouragement in some published interviews, suggesting that behind the largely unnamed but obviously relevant moderns, such as Newton, Bacon, 42 Damrosch says that Swift came to have his own taste in books, somewhat distinct from the way they were emphasized in his school days: “In later years he showed no interest in theological dogma, regarded abstract philosophizing with contempt, and loved the classics”; 24. “Temple was a voracious reader with a superb library, and Swift took advantage of it”; 80. “In later days Swift was deeply proud of the way he had educated himself,” and would stress that such a process, of deep learning and “stripping” oneself of prejudices, inevitably required a long period of time; 81. 43 Bloom (1990): “Giants and Dwarfs: An Outline of Gulliver’s Travels.”

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and Descartes, Swift has in mind Machiavelli, arguably the great founder of distinctly modern thought.44 A return to the ancients is not based only on concerns about this or that “extreme” of modern thought, but on the observation that modernity may have taken an importantly wrong direction from its beginnings. Mary P. Nichols has written about “Swift’s criticism of the Houyhnhnms.”45 She touches briefly on all four voyages. In [his] fantasies, Gulliver’s imagination is fueled by the ancient and modern books which he reads. Lilliput is based on Lockian commercial principles. Brobdingnag is premodern and technologically undeveloped, the lands of the third voyage caricature a Cartesian paradise, and the land of the Houyhnhnms is modelled on Plato’s Republic. (1161)

We will comment on Nichols’ arguments as we go along. Her most valuable contributions are on the fourth voyage. She says the Houyhnhnms “would be ideal citizens of Plato’s Republic, where the private is eliminated in favor of the public or the common” (1155). In showing that Swift does not recommend guiding human life strictly by reasoning about means and ends, and referring to the way rational but inhuman proposals are satirized in Swift’s Modest Proposal, Nichols somewhat confuses modern and ancient rationality. In Modest Proposal, individual parents are expected to sacrifice their own children for money— for their own material gain. To the extent the reader gets caught up in these plans, she or he is expected to see the social and economic benefit of a smaller population. For the Houyhnhnms, to maintain small family sizes, and small overall population, without inflicting (as far as we can see) any cruelty on their own children, is all a matter of course. They are not “free from passion”; their actions demonstrably serve the common good, which is measured in economic terms only in the sense that they do not starve. The idea of making money from such arrangements would be relatively rational but ignoble Yahoo thinking, not the thinking of the Houyhnhnms or the Republic. Nichols shows that Gulliver is not identical to Swift, and we need to see where Gulliver is mistaken. She suggests that Gulliver remains too much of a modern, even in his appreciation of the Houyhnhnms or Plato’s Republic. Nichols says there is no room in the just city of Plato’s Republic for Socrates and suggests that something 44 “Harvey Mansfield XIII Transcript.” 45 Nichols.

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similar must be true of the community of the Houyhnhnms. She also suggests that Gulliver’s excessive or mistaken liking for the Houyhnhnms indicates an attraction to moderns such as Descartes, but also to the young Socrates, before the “Socratic turn,” or to the pre-Socratics. Swift arguably, like the Socratic Socrates, points us more toward supporting an actual non-utopian community, and friendship, than to an ultra-rational ideal.46 We might respond partly by saying that if there is a Socrates among the Houyhnhnms, there is only one, and it is the Master. We can certainly not provide exhaustive answers to such questions, but we will return to them in our conclusion. Douglas Patey has focused on ancient vs. modern science while suggesting that Swift was working toward some kind of synthesis—the best of Aristotle along with the best of modern science. This is no doubt a prudent approach and may indeed be unavoidable for a thoughtful person. Swift, however, may have wanted to explore some difficult choices without suggesting we can simply choose what we like from two or more dramatically different alternatives. Patey also joins scholars who suggest that Swift considers the Anglican traditions of his time to provide an orientation to the best possible approach to human life. Credit must be given to Anne Gardiner, who almost single-handedly established the view that Swift always writes as a pious Anglican, trying to steer his readers toward this position. Rather than ancients vs. moderns, with ancients meaning ancient Greeks and Romans, she suggests that Swift has in mind the primitive as opposed to the medieval Church. There are obviously bad Christians in the Travels who are sinners from a Christian perspective; the people and creatures who are in no way Christian are arguably even more mired in sin, or in a kind of ignorance that is almost certain to block them from salvation. Gardiner at least focusses on the questions: Given what we know about Swift, why would he write this sometimes puzzling masterpiece? And what is likely to be his guiding intention? Asimov’s annotated edition of the Travels is a valuable resource for anyone who wants to take the book seriously as the source of intellectual positions on difficult topics. Asimov is firmly in favor of modern science in contrast to anything earlier and indeed is probably in favor of virtually everything modern in contrast to everything ancient. This somewhat relentless bias or inclination has provoked him to examine many passages in which Swift seems to

46 See pp. 1168–9.

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prefer the ancients, in a way taking them seriously, and making the effort to add evidence in favor of the moderns. For any readers of Jonathan Swift, scholarly or not, the fantasy and creativity in his masterpiece are hard to resist. Gulliver’s Travels is famously or notoriously funny. It has been discovered several times by Hollywood, but mainly to focus on the first voyage (little people) with perhaps some attention to the second (big people). The main lesson in this context is the predictably modern or post-modern one that we ought to learn to see all people as fundamentally the same, despite differences that might turn out to be superficial. As a subject of academic study, the Travels seems to belong to specific fields of specialization, including eighteenth-century English literature. The dominant questions seem to be: How to classify Swift’s writing in comparison with contemporary works?; how was he shaped by contemporary events?; and what were his sources? Some understanding of contemporary events seems essential if we follow Swift’s stories, and we will make some reference to such events as we proceed. A great deal has been learned about similarities between the Travels and other works in the genres of international travel and “voyages imaginaires.”47 The comparison with Dafoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719), written at about the same time as the Travels, is an obvious one, but Swift seems only to mock it: Captain Robinson hires Gulliver as ship’s surgeon for the third voyage, and Gulliver finds human footprints in the sand when he arrives at Houyhnhnm-land. Gulliver appears in many lists of “utopian” writings, and a comparison to More’s Utopia (1516), in which the term “utopia” is coined, can indeed be very fruitful. Swift’s attacks on the Europe of his time may have been inspired to some extent by a work in Latin, Joseph Hall’s Mundus Alter et Idem (1605–1607).48 Swift had a good classical education, and scholars have noted that Swift was likely inspired by two works of Lucian, and by Ovid’s Metamorphoses.49 Swift identified some of his own writings as satires, and some

47 The full title is close to Travels Into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts … by Lemuel Gulliver (Faulkner edition, 1735). 48 “An Old World and a New”; see Tieje. 49 Lucian: A True History or A True Story (second century CE) which could be

classed as “fantastic tales” and inspired Rabelais and Cervantes; and Dialogues of the Dead (somewhat like Gulliver’s conversations with the dead in the third voyage, possibly involving time travel). Ovid, Metamorphoses; on Swift and Ovid see Kelly (2008) 441– 2 and Fox 32. Other possible sources that have been discussed include what might be

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scholars have located him in a tradition that includes Aristophanes.50 Swift makes it clear that he may have higher regard for Homer and Aristotle than for any other writers or thinkers. These and other references can serve as an introduction to a valuable education, and not only to the work and thought of Swift. It is possible, however, to become preoccupied with trying to find the source or inspiration for this or that passage, where Swift himself may admittedly not be much help, while overlooking the greatness and originality of what Swift has done. Nancy Crampton has written on the possible influence of Cyrano de Bergerac’s Voyages to the Sun and the Moon (1648) on Swift.51 She stresses Swift’s achievement: The romance [the Travels ] occupies a high place in English literature because of the extent of the knowledge shown, the brilliancy of the wit, the richness of the humor, the variety of the fancy and conversation, the vigor of the thought, and the pungency of the satire. (2)

Ralph Tieje argues at length that Swift’s work can be located within a genre, but also says Swift achieved peaks of his own. … however much incident the famous Dean of St. Patrick’s may have borrowed, he still holds by his originality a high place in the development of the voyage imaginaire. Before him imaginary states had been described for their excellence; before him satirical voyages had been written narrating the hero’s experiences in strange lands; but he, for the first time, combined the two ….

called early or proto-science fiction, including Johannes Kepler’s Somnium (1620–1630) and Godwin’s The Man in the Moon (1620s); imaginative works about time travel and the dead including Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus; Thomas Brown’s translation of G.B. Gelli, Circe; Perrot D’Ablancourt, translation of Lucian’s Dialogues of the Dead that included some additions by D’Ablancourt himself; works of La Rochefoucauld and Philastratus. 50 Holdridge cites Derek Mahon and says “like Aristophanes, Swift parodies the abuses of rationalism, yet remains aware … that any lapse from a briskly rational standard … and Pandora’s box might turn into a temple of winds.” Nordell has linked the Travels to Aristophanes’ Clouds and various dialogues of Plato. A copy of the plays of Aristophanes in Greek and Latin, inscribed by Swift, sold in 2015 for $20,000 U.S. 51 Cyrano de Bergerac, Histoire des Etats et Empires de la Lune.

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Tieje is impressed not so much by works that may have influenced Swift, as by authors who were definitely influenced by Swift.52 Rabelais, like More, wrote approximately two hundred years before Swift; his famous novels focus on the giants Gargantua and Pantagruel. Voltaire, who was a contemporary of Swift’s, wrote that “Dean Swift is Rabelais in his senses, and frequenting the politest Company. The former indeed is not so gay as the latter, but then he possesses all the Delicacy, the Justness, the Choice, the good Taste, in all which Particulars our giggling rural Vicar Rabelais is wanting.”53 Walter Scott, who wrote with some authority, has perhaps offered the greatest praise of Swift in this respect: As an author, there are three peculiarities remarkable in the character of Swift. The first of these has rarely been conceded to an author, at least by his contemporaries. It is the distinguished attribute of originality, and it cannot be refused to Swift by the most severe critic. Even [Samuel] Johnson [who was somewhat critical of Swift’s works] has allowed that perhaps no author can be found who has borrowed so little, or has so well maintained his claim to be considered as original. There was indeed nothing written before his time which could serve for his model, and the few hints which he has adopted from other authors bear no more resemblance to his compositions than the green flax to the cable which is formed from it.54

All acute readers have noticed Swift’s originality—his ability to turn his materials, whatever exactly they are, into something new, stimulating and instructive.

52 Tieje:

[Swift’s] practice rendered great service to the satirical type of the voyage imaginaire; for whereas in Hall the attack was of a general nature and in Cyrano de Bergerac so vague as to lose much of its force, in Swift it is direct and trenchant. The object upon which his wrath falls can never be mistaken. … The effect of this new development upon the imaginary voyage is seen in Swift’s immediate descendants — Desfontaine, Brunt, Holberg, Bethune, and Houmier. (200–1) 53 Letter XXII, Letters Concerning the English Nation, trans. Lockman. 54 Scott, “Notes and a Life of the Author,” 487.

CHAPTER 2

Little People and Big People

Big and Small Bodies There is obviously a preoccupation with the human body in the first two voyages of Gulliver’s Travels. In both of these voyages, the differences in size between big people and little people impose substantial and constant constraints on what people can do, and even on how they think. When movies have been made based on Swift’s masterpiece, they tend to focus on the first voyage—Gulliver vs. the little people—and the message tends to be that we should make an effort to find a common humanity between and among people who might appear very different “on the outside” or to the naked eye. This is surely part of Swift’s teaching. We are shocked at the repeated suggestions that any human beings might be eradicated as nuisances or vermin, since (with the possible exception of the Yahoos) we are able to see their human qualities. At the same time, however, differences in sheer size and power prove difficult to overcome even for well-meaning people. At the beginning of the first voyage, having barely survived a shipwreck, Gulliver falls into a deep sleep and awakes to find himself tied down by the little people. His first thought is of how he might trample and kill as many as possible of his tiny captors (I.1, 19, 21–2). He is more impressed by the threat they pose to him than by any possible common humanity. Individually they are no match for him, but

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_2

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with their substantial numbers, they are probably able to exert considerable power over him—possibly even kill him. Sometimes there seems to be a rough equality between all of the little people, loyally following their emperor, and one Gulliver.1 Gulliver gradually ceases to fear them. On the other hand, the little people, if anything, come to fear him more rather than less when they see his great power on display. The Lilliputians hope Gulliver will use his strength to destroy the military power of their arch-enemy, Blefuscu. Instead, Gulliver tries to make a new peace between the two sides, thereby enraging his original allies without really winning over the other little people, who are also afraid of him. The Emperor and his advisers have changed from planning to kill him in such a way that his enormous body can be disposed of, to planning to blind him so as to be able to use him while keeping him helpless.2 Given his power, he must be either an enemy or a slave. Gulliver has been foolish to forget or overlook the threat to him—he persuades himself that his efforts to please have succeeded, despite evidence to the contrary. He never seems to realize how reasonable it is for the little people to be afraid of him, and he is surprised when a friendly spy tells him how badly things are going (I.7).3 It is merely the other side of the same coin to say that when he is among the giants in Brobdingnag, Gulliver is never entirely free from fear about his bodily well-being. The giant peasant who puts him to work in show business threatens, probably inadvertently, to work him to death. Even when he realizes how sick and exhausted Gulliver is, all this peasant can think of is a P.T. Barnum-like ad campaign: see the creature before

1 It is never clear why the little people, who are modern in some ways, lack gunpowder. The war technology of Swift’s time did not allow so much for big bombs that could kill many people at once, as for fairly small weapons that required many people at once to be deployed. Asimov says the fact that Lilliputians do not have gunpowder is convenient for Gulliver; the little people have little power to harm him; #44, p. 15; see also the demonstration of Gulliver’s pistol and gunpowder at the end of I.2. 2 I.1, 19–23, I.2., 31, I.7, 74–77. Gulliver assumes wrongly that the leaders of the little people have given up all thought of killing him; they are actually trying to postpone the terrible issue of disposing of his huge corpse, while also thinking of the uses to which he can be put. 3 For Gulliver to have a friendly spy at Court may be a matter of luck, but this nameless person seems to have thought that Gulliver did him a great favor by speaking on his behalf with the Emperor.

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it is too late.4 The giant peasant is indifferent more than cruel. Once Gulliver is among the aristocratic giants, things seem much better. He has a female minder who is constantly on the lookout for his comfort. The King and others enjoy his company, and wish him well. Yet the “ridiculous and troublesome Accidents” to which he is subject seem just as likely to kill him as any deliberate campaign to do so.5 It is hard to see how it can be safe for someone so small to live among people who are so big, and appeals to reason are not likely to make a great deal of difference. As Swift presents the situation, it would be unreasonable to expect the big people to disrupt their lives and re-orient the attention that they apply consistently and intelligently to the good of their society, for the benefit of one tiny squeaky animal—even if this animal seems in every other way to be human.6 Surely at least a few of the giants show that they are capable of treating little Gulliver with extreme kindness.7 One’s body and one’s thinking are not entirely separable; we are forced to wonder if body and soul are separable. It is very easy for big people to achieve a kind of detachment from, or indifference to, small ones; small people, on the other hand, have little choice but to be preoccupied with what the big people are doing and thinking. When Gulliver is among the people smaller than himself, armies are required to provide enough “dressed” or prepared food for him, several times a day.8 He apparently does not lift a finger to get his own food; he takes the service for granted, if anything

4 II.3, 108–110. 5 In the second voyage, Gulliver is so afraid for his physical security and his life, he can

hardly think straight. He is something like the opposite of the great statesman he tried to be in the first voyage. Threats include being bitten by a baby, being attacked by animals, whether well-meaning (a monkey) or not, and being dropped or left in places where he might die. See II.1, 98, 100; II.2–3; II.5, 127–8. 6 The King asks for a kind of scholarly consultation as to what kind of creature little Gulliver is; the answer seems to come back “unknown” (II.3, 111–12). The King of Brobdingnag seems to treat Gulliver as more or less human—particularly because of his ability to speak intelligently. 7 Asimov is surely wrong to suggest that the giants, even Gulliver’s young female guardian Glumdalclitch, who always “tended” him with “much Care and Kindness,” saw him as somehow less than human; see #2,#4, and #5, p. 85, and passages on the girl’s care for Gulliver at II.2, 102–3, and II.3, 109. 8 Enough for 1728 of their own people; I.1, 20–21; I.2, 31–2; I.3, 45; I.6, 68.

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believing it is a result of hospitality rather than fear.9 When he is among the big people, feeding him is only difficult in the sense that they have to cut very small portions from their own plates.10 The body also thrusts itself into the forefront, so to speak, when we come to the other end of the feeding process: the elimination of Gulliver’s wastes. In Lilliput, a team of people has to work to dispose of Gulliver’s feces every day—probably a more disgusting job than anyone in that country has ever had before. The first time he urinates in his new home, he causes a minor catastrophe; when he tries to help by urinating on the Queen’s palace to put out a fire, this disgusting desecration is regarded as worse than if the building had simply been destroyed.11 When he is with the big people in the second voyage, Gulliver tries to find some privacy so he can void without being noticed. As Bloom says: “… in Book I [Gulliver] is shameless—he defecates in a temple and urinates on the palace; and in Lilliput, the people care. In Brobdingnag, where they could not care less, he is full of shame, will not allow himself to be seen performing these functions, and hides behind sorrel leaves.”12 When naked ladies spend time with him for their own amusement, they force him to watch while they urinate—filling what are from his perspective huge containers. He presumably gains some insight into how disgusting it was for the Lilliputians to deal with his waste when he was the big one. Laughter can help us see the shamelessness of big people around little people, and how this may cause problems for both. When Gulliver is with 9 See Gulliver’s thought that after not being killed at once, and then getting a meal (a huge task for his hosts) he is “bound by the Laws of Hospitality to a People who had treated me with so much Expense and Magnificence”; I.1, 21. Asimov may make the same mistake when he stresses how generous the Lilliputians are to Gulliver; to some extent he is trying to “correct” the obvious impression that the giants are better or more impressive people than the little people; see #14, p. 87—mistreatment/neglect by the giant peasants. Gulliver may understate the extent to which the two little Emperors run regimes based on fear, if not terror. Service to Gulliver is commanded by an Emperor. 10 I.1, 20–21; I.2, 28, 31–2; II.1, 96; II.3, 113–14. 11 I.5, 58–9. There seems to be agreement that this refers to Swift’s unorthodox defense

of Anglicanism and the British throne in Tale of a Tub, and Queen Anne’s displeasure at it. See Damrosch 144–6, 254–6. 12 Bloom (1990) p. 39; see Travels II.1, 100–1. Gulliver is not completely shameless when he first encounters the little people; in his first few hours in the home that has been found for him (the former temple), he goes into the farthest corner to “disburthen” himself; he soon finds that he needs some air, and on later occasions he goes outdoors (I.2, 27–8).

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the big people, even a plate of food, and the close-up sight of the Queen eating, is nauseating because things are much too big to be normal (II.3, 114); something similar is true of a naked woman’s breast and indeed a naked body in general.13 In the land of the Giants, flies defecate in Gulliver’s food and drink (II.3, 117), a frog deposits “odious slime” in what is supposed to be potable water (II.5, 131), Gulliver tries to jump over cow dung and instead falls in (134–5). The body, the need to deal with bodily needs, and anxiety about all such matters, never seem to go away. Another example comes in the first voyage when Gulliver shows his “equipment,” so to speak, to a large crowd. When the Lilliputians make a triumphal military march, with big Gulliver straddling the procession like an archway, the soldiers are able to look up and see his genitals because his clothes, despite the best efforts of little tailors, are in rags. At least some of the little people laugh. As with the episode in which Gulliver urinates on the Queen’s palace, an attempt by a giant to be helpful only has the effect of stripping away the dignity or grandeur that the little people associate with their institutions. In this case, it was the Emperor who suggested the parade, but he must have been disappointed with the results. Not only by his mere presence, but also by the functioning of his body, the giant keeps reminding them of how small the little people are.14

Souls and Statesmanship If Gulliver functions as a lens throughout the Travels, we might think the first two voyages allow us to look through two kinds of lens: a magnifying glass to see small things in the first, and a telescope to see larger, more distant ones in the second.15 Gulliver possesses a “pocket perspective,” 13 II.1, 98–99, including the reflection that Gulliver could hardly tell the difference between two faces when he was among the little people; II.5, 128–9. See Asimov #16, p. 96, #13, p. 109. 14 I.3, 42–3. This may be the only time the little people laugh in the Travels. Gulliver includes the word “admiration”; as in the movie “Young Frankenstein,” he seems pleased to be able to assure the little people that all parts of his body are proportionately as large as the most obvious parts. 15 See Armintor, Donoghue. The telescope and microscope were two modern inventions in which Swift took an interest; they appear in eccentric ways in the Travels. The Lilliputians lack spectacles or any kind of glass; the Brobdingnagians have spectacles, a magnifying glass and a looking glass; see I.2, 37, I.5, 54, II.2, 103, II.3, 111, 115. The Laputans have a telescope (III.3, 186). Gulliver refers to having seen a louse through a

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which is able to magnify small things looking in one end, and allows one to see things at a distance looking in the other.16 One might think big people and small people both suffer from a problem of perspective, and one is no better than the other: too much detail (too many trees, not enough forest) or too little.17 In fact Swift makes it clear in both of the first two voyages that bigger is better—it comes with less fear, more ability to achieve and consider a bigger perspective. Both big and small people have a partial rather than complete perspective—each lacks the other’s perspective—but bigger is truly bigger, more comprehensive. Being big in soul, perhaps in addition to body, brings the potential for publicspiritedness and a kind of wisdom. In the first voyage, there is an emphasis on politics and religion, and above all the divisiveness—the lack of true public-spiritedness—that they seem to encourage. Of course the running joke is that the various countries of little people are strongly reminiscent of the politics of the Britain of Swift’s time. Feuding Catholics and Protestants are represented as “Big-Enders” and “Small-Enders,” Whigs and Tories as “Low Heels” and “High Heels.”18 The arch-rival of Lilliput, the main land of the little people, is Blefuscu—more or less France—encouraging the Catholics and the Tories in the hopes that this will weaken microscope back in England (II.4, 121)—the kind of image that was captured in Hooke’s Micrographia; none of the people Gulliver visits seem to have a microscope. 16 In the first voyage, Gulliver has both a “Pair of Spectacles” and “a Pocket Perspective,” neither of which he shows to the Emperor when he is searched, and both of which are new to the little people; I.2, 37. His spectacles protect his eyes from arrows; I.5, 54. “The pocket perspective [glass], like the modern opera-glass, gives from one end a magnified image and, from the other, far sight”; Donoghue 248. In the third voyage, he has both a pocket glass and a “burning-glass.” The pocket glass makes appearances in all voyages except the second. 17 A famous line from the first voyage: the little people “see with great Exactness, but at no great Distance”; I.6, 60. In the second voyage, little Gulliver, living with giants, is forced so to speak to see the feces of insects in his food; the “large Opticks” of the giants “were not so acute as mine in viewing smaller Objects,” so the giants noticed nothing; II.3, 117. 18 I.4, 49–52. Gulliver is first told about High Heels, who are allegedly “most agreeable to our ancient Constitution,” and Low Heels who are favored by the (present) Crown and Administration. His Imperial Highness the King has one heel slightly higher than the other, so that he wobbles. This political/constitutional dispute probably has to do with the powers of the Crown as compared to Parliament. The war with arch-enemy Blefuscu has to do with a dispute about religion and an ancient text, famously focused on whether to break an egg on the small or large end. There is no doubt some overlap between High Heels/Big End and Low Heels/Small End.

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Lilliput/England. Among the elite, a great deal of time is spent in flattering the Emperor and competing for empty honors. Big Gulliver takes very little interest in the feuds and disputes of the little people, including what are obviously religious as well as political disputes. The “politics” of Lilliput only really gets his attention when it is a matter of foreign policy: he sees how similar the two “empires” of little people truly are, and concludes without much reflection that reason will point out a way for him to be a uniter rather than a divider (to borrow a phrase). This enrages the Emperor of Lilliput, who wants him to use his great power to destroy partisan and foreign enemies.19 Gulliver tries to “divert” the Emperor from his design “by many Arguments drawn from the Topics of Policy as well as Justice,” but to no avail (I.5, 56). The little people seem to have notable virtues; they are cooperative, industrious and ingenious—especially in solving problems related to caring for Gulliver. All of this, however, turns out to be a function of a kind of slavery: they are rightly afraid of the Emperor, who is capable of inflicting terrible punishments on those who do not obey him. In a way the turn to violence in order to impose one or another kind of sectarianism comes naturally to small people; they are used to obeying, or groveling in the presence of, an Emperor, and everyone below the Emperor loves to deploy autocratic power as much as possible.20 Gulliver to some extent hides this from the reader. The main concern for him is whether he is personally in danger or not; it becomes more and more clear that he is not in the sense that unless the little people cripple him, he can simply run away. It is the little people who are in danger— from each other, from various lords and knights, from sectarian wars, and by the arbitrary decrees of an Emperor. There is admittedly a kind of debate among the Emperor and a few “counsellors” as to what to do about Gulliver; one might say the final decision is not entirely arbitrary. A few high officials are determined to propose to the Emperor that Gulliver be killed for refusing to destroy Blefuscu and indeed for 19 If Gulliver were to succeed in conquering Blefuscu on the Emperor’s behalf, the Emperor’s plan included “destroying the Big-Endian Exiles, and compelling that People to break the smaller End of their Eggs; by which he would remain sole Monarch of the whole World”; I.5, 56. 20 Stories about Lilliputians acting collectively are punctuated with stories of strict orders being given and followed. Everything is done as the Emperor, or at most “his Majesty in Council,” commands, including giving Gulliver a sleeping potion just in case he does not live up to a kind of treaty; I.1, 22–3.

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carrying out some kind of negotiation with the enemy. One of the antiGulliver lords is the High Admiral, who has been humiliated by Gulliver’s easy trick of pulling an entire fleet around by a string; another is the High Treasurer, who suspects Gulliver of having some kind of sex with his wife; three others have joined in the attack.21 The Emperor is somewhat disposed toward leniency; Gulliver is informed that he was “often urging the Services you had done him.” The Emperor is probably a bit bigger than the little people who serve him. Gulliver’s best friend at Court proposes the compromise of merely blinding Gulliver, thus making him a strong but somewhat helpless slave who will work for food; the “whole Board,” presumably with one exception, regards this as much too lenient, indeed immoral given the seriousness of Gulliver’s offences. His “Imperial Majesty” was “fully determined against capital Punishment”; he was impressed by arguments that merely blinding Gulliver was not a severe enough punishment, and he said that “some other [punishment] may be inflicted hereafter” (I.7, 71–76). Gulliver says he is learning for the first time about the ways of Courtiers and Courts. It was a Custom introduced by this Prince and his Ministry … that after the Court had decreed any cruel Execution, either to gratify the Monarch’s Resentment, or the Malice of a Favourite; the Emperor always made a Speech to his whole Council, expressing his great Lenity and Tenderness, as Qualities known and confessed by all the World. This Speech was immediately published through the Kingdom; nor did any thing terrify the People so much as those Encomiums on his Majesty’s Mercy; because it was observed, that the more these Praises were enlarged and insisted on, the more inhuman was the Punishment, and the Sufferer more innocent. (77)

In some ways Gulliver’s case is unique for the little people; but in the end the Emperor proceeds in his usual way, killing and torturing in the name of mercy or love. If the Emperor is bigger than the people around him, he is also more cruel, more carried away by various titles and claims of superiority; he somehow shares in the general smallness, in soul as well as body, of the small people.

21 Gulliver doesn’t seem to consider that the Treasurer bears the brunt of the cost of feeding Gulliver; I.2, 31–2, I.6, 69.

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In keeping with the strong sense that Swift is presenting a comical version of Britain, Gulliver’s (relative) greatness in the first voyage has inspired a great deal of discussion in the scholarly literature as to which real-life leader Swift might have had in mind. Candidates include John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke; and Robert Harley, First Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer.22 Swift’s employer/mentor, Sir William Temple, is another possible model.23 We can take Bolingbroke as a promising candidate. Bolingbroke dedicated himself to public service in England; only when he was turned out of office, and arguably treated with ingratitude, did he switch from the incumbent (Anglican) Royals to the (Catholic) Pretender, and from England to France. Even though he was aware of the flawed thinking, and all too often the fanaticism, of people in England and France, Bolingbroke remained committed to trying to lead them.24 There are analogies to Gulliver and his actions in both Lilliput and its archenemy Blefuscu, and the real Gulliver or Swift may have learned to see things as Bolingbroke did by reading and reflection, more than by physically traveling anywhere. Swift seems to suggest that someone like Bolingbroke will correctly see himself as bigger than those he seeks to serve—almost as too big for the situation in which he finds himself. On the other hand, he is likely to fail in his attempt to become a recognized or legitimate leader of the little people. This is not simply a failure of reason,

22 Asimov suggests that both Bolingbroke and his Tory ally Harley/Oxford may have

been the model for Gulliver in the first voyage (only Bolingbroke fled into exile in real life) and Lord Munodi in the third voyage. On Gulliver as Bolingbroke and/or Oxford see Asimov #17, p. 22, #2 p. 28, #6,7 p. 46, #3,4,5,6,7 pp. 59–60, #9 p. 61„ #14 p. 63, and #3 p. 66. On Munodi see Travels III.4, Asimov #3 p. 163, #6 p. 164. Generally, Asimov is skeptical of arguments that people and events in the Travels are exact matches for one person or event in “real life.” There is no reason why Swift cannot combine two or more people or fictionalize. 23 Particularly for Lord Munodi—a great Lord, who thinks independently and is at odds with the Projector regime. From early in his life Swift was employed by Temple, who had performed valuable public service in a series of diplomatic postings over twenty years, then retired to country living. When he left public life, Temple wrote that he had had “enough of the uncertainty of princes, the caprices of fortune, the violence of factions, the unsteadiness of counsels, and the infidelity of friends ….” Of course Swift heard some of the thoughts of Temple and the others in conversation. 24 Bolingbroke’s most famous book, The Patriot King, was not published until 1738, some years after the publication of the Travels, but the argument there is reminiscent of Gulliver in Lilliput.

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but of the ability to reach a reasonable appreciation of the limits of politics. If Gulliver makes a mistake in the first voyage, it is at least partly in exaggerating the power of reason.25 If the real Bolingbroke was something of a “social conservative,” quite prepared to put up with Catholic and Tory beliefs and practices as long as they were predominant, he was probably also flexible enough to say that once something new has become established, even if this was because of a mere whim of a king, there is no reason to get too concerned about it. Both sides in these bitter factional disputes are wrong, from the point of view of a great statesman, to take them so seriously. Big Gulliver seems to follow this kind of thinking to a serious misjudgment that the little people will accept his leadership in largely ignoring the sectarian disputes. Gulliver is notably big among the Lilliputians, but somehow he is not big enough or wise enough. Receiving honors from little people can surely not amount to much, but being named a “Nardac” impresses Gulliver, if only as a kind of assurance that the king of the little people trusts him (which he does not).26 Using foreign policy to heal the divisiveness of domestic policy is a sign of the underlying weakness of the society and probably of any agreement that might be reached in this way. What makes Gulliver’s failure in Lilliput potentially tragic, rather than simply comic, is the fact that fictional Lilliput is in some ways more reasonable than real Britain. The little empire of Lilliput, while suffering from some problems remarkably similar to England as Swift knew it, is free from others: there seem to be no Christian sects other than Roman Catholics and Anglicans (Big-Enders and Small-Enders), and no political factions other than Whigs and Tories (Low Heels and High Heels). In the real England, there were dissenters or non-conformists of various kinds and various political factions.27 There is apparently no equivalent to 25 Stanlis suggests that Gulliver, like Bolingbroke, made the hubristic mistake of seeing himself as altogether greater than his fellow citizens, and the same kind of hubristic mistake may run through all of Gulliver’s voyages; Stanlis 418–19. This fits with an argument that Swift agrees with Gulliver at the end in saying the worst human sin is pride (IV.12, 333–4). 26 Travels I.5, pp. 56, 58, I.7, 78, I.8, 82. At I.6, 70, Gulliver emphasizes that he has a higher rank than the man he may be cuckolding. Asimov says Gulliver takes “absurd pride in Lilliputian rank”; #33, p. 57. The Nardac promotion is referenced in #5, p. 45. 27 In 1662, five years before Swift was born, the Act of Uniformity gave currency to the term “non-conformists” for Protestants who did not agree with Anglican practice; given the establishment of the Church of England, any non-Anglican could be referred

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Ireland, with its seemingly intractable problems with which Swift struggled. Gulliver gives at least substantial hints that Lilliput was less riven by sects, and indeed lived by better laws, in the recent past.28 It is as if the people of Lilliput have a memory of being notably better than the British, and it ought to be possible to achieve such benefits again.29 The superior Lilliput laws have to do with the education of girls along with boys; punishment for people making false accusations and committing fraud; the use of rewards as well as punishments; and reliance on moral virtue, as well as a belief in a Divine Providence, as a qualification for public office.30 Gulliver admits that the “peculiar” laws of Lilliput are not executed as well as they were drafted, and “the People” have fallen into “scandalous Corruptions” in the last few generations “by the degenerate nature of man” (I.6, 63). The Bolingbroke perspective might mean a willingness to give the benefit of the doubt to “foreign” ways—something that we see in Gulliver in every voyage. There is also a kind of conservatism; things seem to have gone downhill since “the good old days.”31 The land of the giants in the second voyage seems to have a ruling class of Bolingbrokes or statesmen, rather than an isolated individual. to as a non-conformist. In 1689, the year Swift turned 22, the Act of Toleration brought about a shift to the word “dissenter.” This Act “gave all non-conformists, except Roman Catholics, freedom of worship, thus rewarding Protestant dissenters for their refusal to side with James II. They had to promise to be loyal to the British ruler and their heirs.” The Puritans had never formed a distinct organized group—they joined with various denominations that shared their rejection of Roman Catholic practices, and what sometimes seemed the excessively easygoing Anglican acceptance of such practices. By 1689 the main dissenting groups were Presbyterians and Congregationalists. The Test Act of 1673 required officeholders to avow specific Anglican beliefs. 28 Apparently some of the worst things Gulliver sees—the introduction of “small-

endism” by a child’s prank or mistake, the ridiculous exercises to win honors, and even the cruelty of the Emperor’s punishments (or perhaps only the glowing words about brutal punishments resulting from love)—are innovations going back no more than a few generations. See I.4, 51; I.6, 63; I.7, 77. 29 See I.6, 61–67. For a discussion of two different “old Lilliputs,” see below. 30 Gulliver actually says he might “say a little in [the] Justification” of the “peculiar”

laws of Lilliput, “if they were not so directly contrary to those of my own dear Country.” He never makes any attempt to become a political reformer on any of his stays back home. 31 Throughout most of the first voyage, “most Lilliputians display characteristics which would have justified Gulliver had he passed the same judgment on them as the King of Brobdingnag did upon the English”; Speck 117–8.

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They have arrived at solid maxims about politics, with an emphasis on maintaining the unity of the ruling class, and thereby to some extent the whole society. They maintain mandatory military service, like any good ancient republic, both for the discipline and patriotism this practice can instill and reinforce, and to maintain readiness in case of war. Unlike any ancient republic we know of, there is no indication of slavery; this will become relevant when we consider the “final” utopia in the Travels —the land of the Houyhnhnms.32 The giants are free from the problems of Lilliput, which in different ways undermine public-spiritedness. In some of their early conversations, the King of the giants famously supports free thought more than free speech (II.6, 143) and is skeptical of any alleged political science that does not aim at improving the lives of people in front of one’s eyes (II.7, 148–9). He listens to Gulliver describe the “Schisms in Religion, and Parties in the State” in England; the King, “after an hearty Fit of laughing, asked me whether I were a Whig or a Tory” (II.4, 114–5). To some extent the freedom and decency of this regime seem to be a matter of good luck; Brobdingnag simply has not had any foreign enemies since time immemorial, and even their most recent civil war was some time in the past (II.7, 151–2). Setting luck aside, the giants deserve some credit for maintaining this basically peaceful and public-spirited state of affairs. They have chosen freedom, and they are willing to pay a price for it. When Gulliver describes Britain’s “chargeable and extensive Wars,” the King asks “what Business we had out of our own Islands, unless upon the Score of Trade or Treaty, or to defend the Coasts with our Fleet.” He was “amazed” to hear of a mercenary standing army: … if we were governed by our own Consent in the Persons of our Representatives, he could not imagine of whom we were afraid, or against whom we were to fight; and would hear my Opinion, whether a private Man’s House might not better be defended by himself, his Children, and Family; than by half a Dozen Rascals picked up at a Venture in the Streets, for small Wages, who might get an Hundred Times more by cutting their Throats. (II.6, 143)

32 When little Gulliver introduces himself to the Queen of the giants, he says he is a “slave” to his peasant master, who works him in show business; II.3, 108–9. Gulliver may remain blissfully unaware of how work in the fields is done, or how food is prepared for the aristocrats. In Lilliput there is a sense that the people in general are slaves; the aristocrats, somewhat servile themselves, probably have servants (I.6, 64–5; cf. 68–70).

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The aristocrats among the giants are clearly presented as truly bigger or more admirable than the Lilliputians—bigger in their souls as well as their bodies.33 The King is not an Emperor, and there is no sign that he either orders cruel punishments or congratulates himself for leniency for whatever punishments he supports.34 It seems to be taken for granted that he is first among equals, deliberating with leaders, probably chosen from an aristocratic class, but not with others.35 The aristocrats are not trying find and solve problems among the poor, including the disabled who are seen begging on the street; if little Gulliver’s considerable difficulties are pointed out to them—by his young female handler—they can easily address at least some of them without much thought.36 There is a notable love of money among the giant peasants. It is fair to say the giants lack Christian charity or universal humanitarianism, whereas the little people have some version of these things.37 In the absence of any really pressing political problems, domestic or foreign, the giants seem committed to enjoying an aristocratic life, including magnificent poetry, music, certain other aspects of a liberal 33 To say the difference between big and small relates to spiritual depth, and intellectual capacity that is relevant to a good human life, is one guiding motif of Bloom’s interpretation of Gulliver, especially the first two voyages; see “Preface,” Bloom (1990), 9, along with “Giants and Dwarfs,” 39–41. Gardiner (2004), although she thinks in terms of an earlier church and a present church, sees that the Lilliputians are “spiritual midgets” and the Brobdingnagians are “spiritual giants.” 34 At one point, Gulliver gets to witness the execution of a murderer; no one editorializes about the punishment, or the King’s role, in any way (II.5, 129). The main punishments we see are in relation to Gulliver. The “Queen’s Dwarf” is whipped and given to another lady (II.3, 116) because of putting Gulliver in danger, despite the lack of a truly harmful intention. A monkey terrifies Gulliver, while apparently trying to mother him, and is killed despite, again, the lack of any bad intention (II.5, 131–133). 35 We learn when Gulliver observes military exercises that the army is “under very good Discipline”: “how should it be otherwise, where every Farmer is under the Command of his own Landlord, and every Citizen under that of the principal Men in his own City, chosen after the Manner of Venice by Ballot?” (II.7, 151). 36 There are beggars on the streets of the city—many with severe disabilities or medical conditions that apparently account for their inability to work for pay (II.4, 120–1). See the Lilliputians by contrast: “the old and diseased among them, are supported by hospitals; for begging is a trade unknown in this empire”; I.6, 67. 37 Asimov points out the “low state of medicine and hygiene” in the land of the giants (#9, p.102, also #14, p. 95) and repeatedly contrasts the virtue of the Lilliputians with the vice of the Brobdingnagians; see Asimov #21, p. 98, #8 p. 94, #3 p. 92, #14 p. 87, #12 p. 86, #8 p. 85.

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education, good food, entertainment, and laughter.38 They are free from any pressing need to demonstrate public-spiritedness, so they wear their patriotism lightly. They are somewhat isolated from the world, not really knowing or caring whether their ways are different from anyone else’s. They do not defend their ways out of bigotry, or blind adherence to tradition, but because they are supported by reason. The King is eventually persuaded to listen to what Gulliver says about modern Britain. It is easy for the King to show that in many ways Britain fails the test of reason. His lack of curiosity is supported initially by the fact that he knows that the laws and practices of the giants are good. Having learned about some foreign ways, he knows he can demonstrate that they are inferior. Gulliver was willing to consider changing the ways of Lilliput and Blefuscu, possibly because he did not recognize them as “his own”; Swift has sent him to a strange place. In the second voyage, where he has no choice but to see it is “home” that he is discussing with the King, he foolishly tries to defend what is merely familiar, while realizing to some extent, with some shame, what he is doing. He seems much smaller than he did in the first voyage. Very early in Gulliver’s accounts to the King of the giants about Britain, the King observes to his first Minister “how contemptible a Thing was human Grandeur, which could be mimicked by such diminutive Insects as [Gulliver].” Gulliver feels “Indignation to hear our noble Country, the Mistress of Arts and Arms, the Scourge of France, the Arbitress of Europe, the Seat of Virtue … the Pride and Envy of the World, contemptuously treated” (II.3, 115). Gulliver’s words here closely resemble similar puffed-up words that are spoken on behalf of Lilliput in the first voyage; the Emperor is the “Delight and Terror of the Universe” (I.3, 44). Such exaggerated praise is both contemptible and a barrier to self-knowledge.

Where Are Big Souls Found? Does Swift give us any indication as to why the little people are little? Did something happen to make them this way? If it is partly a matter of luck, can we identify a society which has had the luck of producing or finding 38 II.3, 114–15; II.6, 137; II.7, 148–50. In order for the giants to pay any attention to Gulliver, it helps to be endowed with “wit and humor”; this is displayed first by the Queen, only later by the King, but the King may be pretending in showing austerity and gravity (II. 3, 110).

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some big souls? On this question Anne Gardiner is at her best. The debate between Big-Enders and Small-Enders among the little people is a good starting point. Eating an egg out of the big end or the small end has something to do with disputes about the Eucharist or the real presence of Christ in the communion service.39 The “Big Enders” or Catholics were apparently the dominant if not only Christian sect until the recent past. The country was united, in something like the way the giants of Brobdingnag still are. The “Small Enders” became a faction because of a disgraceful attempt to turn an accident or prank by a royal child into a custom that all must follow. A destructive fanaticism was built on a royal whim (of course reminiscent, at least vaguely, of Henry VIII).40 Presumably a united Britain was better able to stand up to France, or indeed to ally with or avoid war with that country, when they shared a religion. It would seem to follow that Swift thinks Britain was better off in the Old Catholic days of unity. Swift might have arrived at the thought of a literal, physical shrinking from an awareness that political and religious factions teach us to belittle each other, and over time we belittle (or “beclown”) ourselves, and make ourselves smaller. We might expect, then, that when Swift points to a better future for Lilliput, it has to do with Christianity, and with at least substantial elements of an oldfashioned version of Christianity. Perhaps surprisingly, there is no evidence of such hopes or expectations.41 On the surface there are two pictures of “old Lilliput.” One is definitely Christian: Big-Enders only, no SmallEnders, big church buildings, perhaps burial practices that go back in a strange way to the earliest days of Christianity.42 There seems to be a

39 If Gardiner is correct, “big end” refers to the Roman Catholic belief that there is a Real Presence “both on the altar and in the communicant”; “little end” refers to a Lutheran or perhaps “high church” Anglican belief that there is a Real Presence “only in the communicant.” These alternatives could be referred to as “transubstantiation” and “consubstantiation”; Gardiner 2004. See also Cunningham p. 348. 40 I.4, 49–52. Gardiner (2004). 41 In fairness, Gardiner notes that our narrator Gulliver seems not to be a Christian

at this stage (he identifies himself as a Christian once, much later, in an attempt to save his life)—he is not looking for Christianity, and he may not know what to look for. See Gardiner (2004). 42 The only building the little people can find for Gulliver to sleep in is “an ancient Temple, esteemed to be the largest in the whole Kingdom”—huge for them, desecrated by regicides and perhaps (as Gardiner suggests) by Puritans at some point in the past; I. 1, 25; Gardiner 2002, 2004. We are told that the little people bury their dead in a

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seamless transition to the other old Lilliput, with fairly strict laws, but this turns out to be a kind of little utopia which seems to have nothing to do with Christianity. Swift pretends that the old laws of Lilliput, which have fallen into disuse, assumed the power of selfish and materialistic human passions, with no reference to sin, guilt, or shame. Without suggesting there was anything wrong with the passions themselves, rulers or lawgivers set out to manage the results of such passions by means of rewards and punishments in this life, with no reference to an afterlife, other than vaguely to “divine providence.” There is not only no reference to the Bible or any Christian teaching, it seems that this promising society, a possible model for the near future, was based on contradictions of such teachings.43 Continuing into the second voyage, one might expect the giants are bigger precisely because they have kept the Old Catholic ways alive. Gardiner looks high and low for evidence that this is why Swift finds the giants to be superior, but she finds virtually nothing. Just as the Brobdingnagians are giants in comparison with Gulliver, they have books read by children that say the people used to be even bigger.44 Contrary to Gardiner’s suggestion, this seems to have nothing to do with the Bible45 ; it simply reinforces the thought that bigger is better—being bigger makes you better adapted to your environment, less fearful. There may also be a tendency for conservative societies to suggest that the ancestors or the founders were impressive in ways that the present people are not. The religious temples in Brobdingnag are very old; there has apparently been no sectarian split. Gardiner says the description of them is consistent with early Christianity, but there is nothing to link these buildings,

specific way, and the “vulgar” as opposed to the learned keep up old beliefs about the resurrection that is in store for the dead; I.6, 61, Gardiner 2004. If the belief here is an example of Christian teaching, it is very garbled and refers to a practice that was always very rare. 43 See Ch. 5 below on the details of the “little utopia” that is connected with Lilliput. 44 II.7, 150–1. This book, “of little esteem except among the Women and the Vulgar,”

dealing with the “degeneration” of nature, what man was like originally, the “laws of nature” and “how we were made,” may be the same little book that is used by young girls, “giving a short account of their religion”; II.2, 107. Gardiner 2004. 45 A Creator is merely implied, and there is no reference to a Fall. Fossil evidence is regarded as real evidence which can be used to confirm “history and tradition”; there is no reference to Scripture. The story seems to bear more resemblance to Lucretius than to the Bible; see below.

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with “Statues of Gods and Emperors cut in Marble larger than the Life,” to Christianity as opposed to some other religion.46 The “ancients” who are to be praised do not seem to represent medieval or early modern Christians, or even “primitive” or “ancient” Christians.47 It is much more difficult to match people and events in the second voyage (at least among the aristocrats) to anything in Swift’s time, or even the previous few centuries, than it is in the first voyage. Big people were apparently more common in the past, or in some ideal society that might be inspired by books. The contrast between the land of the giants and the little people of the first voyage is one example of Swift’s clear preference for ancients over moderns throughout the Travels. The portrait of the Brobdingnagians, particularly the aristocrats led by the King, is closely reminiscent of Aristotle’s Ethics up to about the fifth book—where the main themes are the moral virtues including justice.48 One might think above all of the magnanimous or “great-souled” man who possesses all the moral virtues, beginning with courage, and is therefore a human peak in a somewhat ambiguous relationship with the just

46 II.4, 123. Gardiner 2002, 2004. Gardiner points out that saints are referred to once in Scripture as “gods,” and a country’s kings might be seen as emperors. A church building roughly like the temple of the giants would belong to the primitive or ancient church, before the Middle Ages. Constantine the Great probably initiated the building of large churches “decorated with elaborate images of Jesus and saints.” It might be more normal for a civilization to deny “godlike” treatment to human beings until a late stage. Alexander the Great “made the divinity of kings standard practice among the Greeks.” Of course there were ancient Greek temples featuring both gods and heroes; in the Agora at Athens, the famous “labors of Heracles” were recognized on the outside of the temple called Hephaisteion, primarily dedicated to “the god of the forge.” In later Roman times, “no fewer than 94 altars … are known to have been dedicated in Athens to the emperor Hadrian.” There are famous Hindu temples depicting gods and heroes on the outside walls, such as the one at Pattadakal, Karnataka. 47 For the giants, Wednesday is “their Sabbath” (II.2, 106); the use of the word deriving from Hebrew may be suggestive, but a visitor to a strange land might say “their Sabbath” to mean something other than “the Sabbath.” It is possible that no group inspired by the Bible has ever declared “the Sabbath” to fall on a Wednesday. 48 Mansfield. See also Bloom (1990), 38 (adding that the giants may be Romans), 47. Kearney seems to accept that the Giants may be Romans, but if so they are Romans “without philosophy” (meaning in particular “speculative” as opposed to “natural” philosophy) (382, 387; cf. xiv: Brobdingnag “parodies Swift’s contemporaries against the backdrop of ancient Rome”).

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man.49 The great-souled man is aware of his superiority to others. He is inclined to be somewhat harsh with people who claim improperly to be his equal, but he speaks “ironically,” in a way gently as well as justly, to people who are clearly below him.50 He seeks honor, but shuns smaller honors, sometimes remaining idle until an opportunity for great honor comes along. Such a man does not necessarily seek office, or a ruling position, but in a way he is always in training for such a position. There is even a suggestion that this worthy individual, with a worthy soul, has a large body.51 The great-souled man is a “perfect gentleman” (1124a4– 5); it is not out of the question that such a person could be a tyrant, as the Emperor of Lilliput arguably appears to be; but it is unlikely.52 Aristotle corrects the common political view that happiness consists of honor and suggests that what is sought by honor-seekers, at their best, is actually active virtue.53 Honor seems to depend on others, on their opinions, so a life of honor may lack self-sufficiency. The activity in “active virtue” implies political life, serving a community, but with more of a sense of self-sufficiency for an individual. The fact that there is a plausible Greek source for these giants in the Travels does not mean the Brobdingnagians, with their unmistakably foreign qualities, are necessarily Greek, or European; to some extent the warrior-citizen gentleman is a transcultural ideal.54

49 Aristotle NE IV.3. Contrast justice in Book V: generally thought to be the good of others rather than oneself. Moral virtue makes one prepared or ready to serve, and in some cases eager to serve in order to demonstrate and live virtue, and to be recognized. What might seem a sacrifice is not necessarily seen as such. 50 IV.1124b17–23. When it comes to the virtue of truth-telling, irony or selfdeprecation is treated as a vice; the best-known practitioner of irony is probably Socrates. See II. 1108a20–23; IV.1127b23–31. 51 1223b5–8. Aristotle includes other references, bordering on the ludicrous or comical, to what we might call “merely physical” attributes—a deep voice, a slow gait and so on; 1125a13–16. 52 See Xenophon, Hiero. 53 NE I.5, 1095b14 ff. 54 Aristotle’s warrior-gentleman is familiar from various cultures, including Chinese; the

Brobdingnagians have clothing that could be Persian or Chinese (II.3, 113), and their temples do not seem to be necessarily those of ancient Greeks or Romans any more than of Christians (II.4, 123). In Aristotle’s Politics, of the cities with the three best actual regimes, only two (Sparta and Crete) are Greek; the third, Carthage, is a community of Asians settled in North Africa (1272b24 ff.). In Plato’s Republic, Socrates suggests the

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The Transition to the Third Voyage One way in which the second voyage of the Travels fits with early books in the Ethics is that any full presentation of intellectual virtue is still to come. Intellectual virtue, somewhat separated from moral virtue, dominates the third voyage, and in the fourth there is a kind of reconsideration of different kinds of virtue. Obviously, this is not to say there is no intellectual virtue of any kind in the first two voyages. The little people in the first voyage are ingenious problem-solvers and calculators; to some extent these skills have been imposed on them by layers of “masters,” culminating in the Emperor.55 Even at best they focus on small immediate tasks, either losing sight of a larger picture or entertaining more or less imaginary thoughts about it.56 When we turn to the second voyage, even in a peaceful and stable society the gentleman’s judgments as to what is admirable require a measure of prudence to be put into practice— and prudence is one of the key intellectual virtues later in the Ethics.57 Even in the midst of all his personal fears, it seems Gulliver cannot help but admire the political judgment of the aristocratic giants; Aristotle says prudence is recognized as a way of judging what is good for both oneself and one’s community. The second voyage anticipates the fourth, the land of the Houyhnhnms, in that difficult or abstruse kinds of study are considered primarily in terms of their effect on a community—are they salutary, or immediately helpful, or not? Beyond such questions, the King of the giants can be described as somewhat lacking in curiosity. Gulliver is forced to try to get the King’s attention, and then to convince him to listen to stories and arguments that might make Gulliver seem impressive despite his diminutive stature. None of this is easy.58 Despite Gulliver’s failure to succeed by reason in the first voyage, he still rule of philosopher kings is possible in “some barbaric [i.e. non-Greek] place”; 499c. On the gentleman in Aristotle and elsewhere see Lowith. 55 Generally speaking the proportion between small person and large in the first two voyages is 1 to 12, but this doesn’t always work perfectly. See Chapter III on how Lilliputian calculations can be assessed. 56 The appearance of huge Gulliver threatens their “cosmology,” which consists of believing there is nothing more than the two little empires (I.4, 50–51). The debate about transubstantiation seems confined to the most superficial actions concerned with egg-breaking; there is no theology or metaphysics. 57 See NE VI.5, VI.7, 1141a21 ff. 58 II.3, 110–12; 114–15.

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has faith that reason can overcome differences in bodies when he arrives among the giant aristocrats. Gulliver somewhat desperately persuades the King to listen to an account of life “back” (as we might say) in modern Europe. He offers an argument that small creatures may have as much wisdom as big ones; in fact he claims that “we observed in our Country, that the tallest Persons were usually least provided with [reason].”59 The King probably finds Gulliver to be surprisingly reasonable for something so small, but otherwise we might suspect that this is nonsense. Big people have stature; they are likely to be taken seriously in some ways because of that stature. On the other hand, having a large body may be helpful if not a necessity for manual laborers. In the Politics Aristotle says “nature wishes to make the bodies of free persons and slaves different,” with a certain kind of size and strength going with slaves. Reason is more associated with masters or those who are not slaves. Slaves “ought” to have bodies that are strong, without necessarily being big, “with a view to necessary needs”; masters “ought” to have bodies that are straight and useless for necessary tasks, “but useful with a view to a political way of life (which is itself divided between the needs of war and those of peace).” Warriors, especially where there is no gunpowder, probably have to be both big and strong, so there may actually be more need for masters to be big and strong than for slaves. Obviously, the desired “natural” tendency, whatever it is exactly, often does not work out, but if someone were born the size of a human in a common type of statue, Aristotle suggests “everyone” would agree that such a person would deserve to be a master, while smaller people ought to be slaves. Some combination of size and “stateliness” matters.60 Aristotle’s discussion reminds us of questions that are not even touched on in the conversation between Gulliver and the King; Gulliver says matter-of-factly that intelligence tends to be lacking in big

59 II.6, 138–9. The Master Houyhnhnm later seems to agree to some extent, saying that it is “no Shame to learn Wisdom from [small] Brutes, as Industry is taught by the Ant, and Building by the Swallow”; IV.9, 307. One might learn some things from some small creatures; it does not follow that small ones are generally smarter than big ones. The King had earlier inferred from Gulliver’s behavior that even “insects” have some sense of dignity and importance, greatly exceeding any reality (II.3, 115); if they can rationalize and invent, it seems to follow that they can reason in a way. 60 1254b 27–39, Bloom (1990), 39–40. There was a bronze statue of the late Quebec Premier René Lévesque in Quebec City that was “realistic” at 5-foot-5; it was replaced by one that was 8 feet tall.

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people, as if to provoke the King into listening.61 Only after Gulliver prompts him more than once does the King agree to listen to details about Gulliver’s background or anything to do with modern Europe.62 His curiosity about such matters remains somewhat less than is shown by the Master Houyhnhnm in the fourth voyage.63 His openness to what Gulliver says indicates a genuine but limited attachment to reason.64 It would require a higher degree of intellectual virtue to consider such matters more seriously. As the Lilliputians demonstrate, “reason” can be consistent with “small” human beings; it does not necessarily ascend to very impressive virtues, moral or intellectual.65 The Brobdingnagians demonstrate moral virtue more than intellectual. 61 In fact we seem to encounter one of Gulliver’s lies here. Who has ever heard of any evidence that in the England of Swift’s time—or anywhere else, at any time—tall people tend to be cognitively lacking? Asimov, unusually for him, does not address this dubious pseudo-scientific observation. At best there may be a dim echo here of the notion that Aristotle’s magnanimous man is big in body as well as soul, but somewhat lacking in intellectual virtue; or there may be an oral tradition, partly captured in the giants’ treatise for children (II.7, 150–1), that there were giants in the past, a terrible threat to smaller people, and the former were ultimately defeated thanks to the guile or craft of the latter, our ancestors. 62 II.3, 114–15; II.6, 138–9. 63 The King, we are told, listened carefully over five audiences, “each of several Hours,”

and “heard the whole with great Attention; frequently taking Notes … as well as Memorandums of several Questions he intended to ask me”; II.6, 140. In the fourth voyage, the Master Houyhnhnm is curious about everything—especially comparisons between modern Europeans in general, Gulliver, and the Yahoos in Houyhnhnm-land. The two of them speak “at several times for above two years” (IV. 5, 274, and generally IV.3–4, 266–71 and following). One obstacle to Gulliver talking about things back home is that the truth sounds like a pack of lies. There is so much conversation about such things that Gulliver has had to do some editing; IV.5, 274; IV.7, 291. 64 Patey (1995) says the successful appeal to reason answers a Swiftian question, “what is there in us that survives comparison—what that cannot be rendered ludicrous, shameful, or disgusting when magnified to Brobdingnagian proportions or shrunk to Lilliputian?.” The Swiftian answer is apparently that “our proper dignity” must “reside” with reason (233–4). This seems true, but with some limitations. Gulliver and the King may be able to communicate across the gap or chasm between very big people and very small ones, but the chasm remains. 65 The Lilliputians “are most excellent Mathematicians, and arrived to a great Perfec-

tion in Mechanicks”; I.1, 23–4, I.3, 45–6. They demonstrate that a number of small calculations might allow for building impressive machines or devices—potentially even for making scientific discoveries. This insight is taken to dramatic extremes in modern science, and in the third voyage of the Travels. The great-souled man, unlike the Lilliputians, does not engage in small calculations; NE 1122b8, Politics 1337b15–17.

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Gulliver explains to the King at one point that the British have powerful weapons using gunpowder, capable of doing terrible harm to enemy forces (II.7, 148–9). Such weapons would allow the King of the giants to become master of the world he knows—the kind of dream the Emperor of Lilliput had. The King is horrified at the idea.66 Gulliver may have been trying to impress him, but his suggestion has the opposite effect. “He was amazed how so impotent and groveling an Insect as I (these were his Expressions) could entertain such inhuman Ideas….” This prompts Gulliver to reflect on the limitations on the King’s awareness and thinking. A strange Effect of narrow Principles and short Views ! that a Prince possessed of every Quality which procures Veneration, Love and Esteem; of strong Parts, great Wisdom and profound Learning; endued with admirable Talents for Government, and almost adored by his Subjects; should from a nice unnecessary Scruple, whereof in Europe we can have no Conception, let slip an Opportunity … I take this defect among them to have risen from their Ignorance; they not having hitherto reduced Politicks into a Science … (II.7, 148)67

The study of politics may be the clearest case, according to the King, in which intellectuals move away from the prudential judgments that are always needed, to fanciful speculations that are useless at best. The giants do not even seem to list “politics” as a field of study. “The Learning of this People [the giants] is very defective, consisting only in Morality, History, Poetry and Mathematicks; wherein they must be allowed to excel.” “Mathematicks” may be a link to both the first and third voyages—the modern, British voyages, but “the last of these [studies] is wholly applied to what may be useful in Life; to the Improvement of Agriculture and all mechanical Arts.”68 The richness of Swift’s writing is such that we can find both an ironic meaning and a non-ironic one. Gulliver insists 66 Gardiner suggests a contradiction: Gulliver seems to be pro-tyrant, using new technology, here, whereas he is more or less anti-tyrant and anti-technology elsewhere; Gardiner 2004. In the present case, tiny Gulliver is trying to think of some way to impress the huge and authoritative giant; he is still somewhat inclined to think like a modern. 67 One might be reminded of the Randy Newman song, “Political Science.” 68 See generally II.7, 148–9, including the desirability of growing two blades of grass

instead of one.

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that the King of the giants speaks in a somewhat naïve way because of a lack of experience of the world, of “the Manners and Customs that most prevail in other Nations”—meaning a more typical, nasty and competitive world. There may be some truth to this.69 Asimov suggests that the King of the Brobdingnagians might “resort to gunpowder” (instead of turning down the opportunity offered by Gulliver) if his throne were “in jeopardy.” In a way the ruling gentlemen of the giants show how Bolingbroke and others would behave if they had the fortunate opportunity of peace and unity: virtue could be valued for its own sake, along with public-spiritedness, rather than for the sake of honor.70 Such a life is not likely to be as intellectually challenging as a life in a more discordant or corrupt time. The aristocratic giants of the second voyage are not stupid, but they are somewhat lacking in curiosity. The King has scholars brief him about little Gulliver—apparently a strange new organism. He has some awareness of books, and intellectual trends, but his curiosity seems to go so far and no farther (II.3, 111–115). In way it is all water off a duck’s back.71 The giants are pleased with the world they live in for its satisfaction of human needs—at least for the healthy and the wealthy. They do not assume there is a better world somewhere else—they may even assume the opposite. Considering their circumstances, their assumption that there is no world anywhere that is very different from, and better than, their own is more rational than the belief of the Lilliputians that there are exactly two little empires, Lilliput and Blefuscu, and that is all.72 The little people show the limitations of reason, or the difficulties of introducing a new perspective, when people are trapped in a very stunted or constrained world view; the giants seem to show that people with a substantially bigger and better world view can be complacent in a different way. In today’s language, we

69 II.7, 146–9. 70 Asimov #4, p. 124; see Aristotle NE 1095b23–96a4. 71 The King of the giants has scholars come up with a classification of Gulliver’s species

(II.3, 111–12); earlier the King guesses on his own that Gulliver is an example of “clockwork”; II.3, 110–11. Neither of these assessments seems to have any effect on how the King treats Gulliver. See generally II.3, 111–15; II.6, 138–9, 143–5. 72 The little people don’t want their cosmology, consisting of two empires of small people, disrupted (I.4. 50–51). The King of the giants confidently enters into conversation on such matters, confident that nothing Gulliver says can possibly disrupt him or his worldview.

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might say they live in a “bubble of privilege.” Gulliver is too big to be a comfortable Lilliputian, but too small to be an aristocratic giant. His relative littleness shows that he has something in common with the little people, and intellectual virtue may be something that links all little people with the third and fourth voyages of the Travels. Gulliver has presumably been inspired by his reading; on his long voyages he spends his “hours of leisure … in reading the best Authors, ancient and modern; being always provided with a good number of books.”73 Gulliver is eager to learn and memorize, and quick to learn languages. Once he begins a career of long sea voyages, his curiosity is a factor in why he continues this way; but his motives are somewhat unreliable, he certainly does not plan the famous voyages, and in various ways his journeys suggest that learning can be a bad thing.

73 I.1, 16. When he gets to speak to the dead in a kind of afterlife, he knows the names of some authors whom he wishes to hear from (III.7, 219–20; III.8, 221–2); perhaps the wisest, as in Dante’s Inferno, is Aristotle.

CHAPTER 3

Nameless Moderns: Science, Miracles and Faith

A First Look at Modern Science The third voyage has a focus on modern science which was anticipated to some extent in the first—particularly with calculations, such as the volume of a sphere.1 On some matters, including working out how much food big Gulliver would require, the Lilliputians make mistakes of which Swift himself may have been unaware.2 There are hints of modern science, and even of the Royal Society, in both of the first two voyages.3 Scientific or technical tools may allow us to see things magnified, or at some remote distance, but this is likely to distort a human perspective. In the third voyage, we are once again in—and to some extent above—Great 1 The Lilliputians “are most excellent Mathematicians, and arrived to a great Perfection in Mechanicks”; I.1, 23–4, I.3, 44–6. The Lilliputians have estimated the “Circumference of our Dominions,” but they need Gulliver to measure this more exactly. Patey (2010), 399 note #9. Nichols adds that the medicine of the little people “is both efficacious and painless”; Nichols 1981, p. 1161. 2 On how much food Gulliver will require, the calculations of the little people are precise, but mistaken; Asimov #21, p. 33. See further problems with a simple 1/12 formula, #25, p. 10. 3 As has often been noted, “Lilliput” and “Laputa” may be hard to tell apart. See Kalpakgian, 367–9. At the point in the second voyage when Gulliver has managed to kill four huge wasps, he mentions that he kept the stings, and eventually donated three of them to Gresham College, headquarters of the Royal Society; II.3, 118.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_3

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Britain, this time with Ireland added, and roughly in Swift’s time. At the end of the second voyage, there were lingering questions about intellectual as opposed to moral virtue. If the giants of the second voyage, or at least the leaders among them, demonstrate a perfection of moral as opposed to intellectual virtue, the scientists of the flying islanders achieve something like the reverse. In the third voyage, in a Swiftian or funny way, we see examples of the intellectual virtues as described in Book VI of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics —coming after the moral virtues including justice, perhaps supplementing or completing them, possibly in some ways conflicting with or undermining them.4 For Aristotle, philosophic wisdom = intellect + science (1141a19), but with a particular focus on “the most exalted/honored things in nature” particularly “the most evident things in the cosmos”—the stars and the planets (1141b1– 3). There is almost a choice to be made between a concern primarily with human life and human communities, on the one hand, and nonhuman nature, on the other: “it would be odd to believe political [science or capacity] or prudence is the most serious [kind of knowledge]; since humanity is not the best or highest thing in the cosmos” (1141a16–22). Swift may have these passages in mind when he shows the flying islanders to be concerned with the non-human world—one might say the actual “cosmos”; their “cosmology” seems to be a matter of locating our planet in relation to the sun, moon and stars.5 Unfortunately, this concern seems to render the scientists useless or vicious as human beings, both for themselves and others. They may personify Aristotle’s warning that those who achieve wisdom may be lacking in prudence, which in a way is the capstone of moral virtue (NE 1140a24 ff., 1141b14 ff.). Aristotle tells us that mathematics lends itself to quick study by bright people, including young people, who may be lacking in both character and experience; we are likely to want something

4 References are to the Nicomachean Ethics or NE. The main intellectual virtues are art or craft (techne), knowledge or science (episteme), prudence, wisdom (sophia) either in an art/craft or in general, and intellect (nous). 5 There is no reference to the stars, Sun or planets in the second voyage, and only one reference to the moon by Gulliver; there are many such references in the most “scientific” parts of the third voyage. The Lilliputians measure time by “moons.” The Houyhnhnms have some limited interest in the movements of the sun and the moon, and eclipses; IV.9, 307–9.

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different in rulers and citizens.6 In some of the most famous passages in the Travels, Swift presents two types of modern scientists: theoretical scientists on the flying island of Laputa, and more practical Projectors on the land of Balnibarbi below. The island Laputans (III.2–3), absorbed by “mathematics and music,” but also achieving genuine learning in astronomy, largely ignore each other and other people; they are aware of people on land only as a source of tax revenue, which they use the magnetic island to extort. Even worse for them, we might say, is that their pursuit of truth does not keep them calm, or free from dangerous human passions. Their astronomical studies, partly replicating actual discoveries from about Swift’s time, have caused the scientists to fear several possible disasters. Since science causes them to be afraid, it is natural in a way for them to turn to unscientific astrology as a source of hope—both a hope for fortunate events, and simply for the ability to make predictions, and gain a kind of control. Probably because of a different kind of fear, the scientists follow the news of the day, particularly the political news, and they angrily debate what the politicians are doing. The lives of the scientists are full of terrors that prevent them from sleeping at night. They “are under continual Disquietudes, never enjoying a Minute’s Peace of Mind.” (179–80).7 Indeed one can wonder if their supposedly theoretical studies have become, if they were not from the beginning, an anxious, fearful scouring of the skies and the principles of mathematics to find some comfort, some hope, in a world that is increasingly hopeless and terrifying for a human being as opposed (say) to a god. Down below, the “Academy of Projectors,” an actual organization that has been created to expedite and coordinate certain kinds of scientific experiments (III.4–6), was formed when people who were originally from “earth” went up to Laputa, “either upon Business or Diversion,” and then came back down after five months “with a very little Smattering in Mathematicks, but full of Volatile Spirits acquired in that Airy Region” (III.4, 196). We might say that the spunk or determination of the Projectors is more conspicuous than their knowledge of any subject.8 Their acquired “volatility” makes them want to change the way things are done on earth. 6 NE I.3, 1094b22 ff., III.3, VI.8, 1142a12 ff. 7 Astrology and politics III.2, 179; fears/disasters 179–80; wives (lack of normal human

contact) 180–81. 8 III.4, 194–8, III.5, III.6. III.4 provides a kind of overview, and III.6 is dedicated to the political projectors.

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Their zeal is partly shown by the fact that the raw materials for their experiments tend to be disgusting and/or dangerous: mud, excrement and gunpowder all put in an appearance. The Projectors’ hopes may be the good news here. … the Professors contrive new Rules and Methods of Agriculture and Building, and new Instruments and Tools for all Trades and Manufactures, whereby, as they undertake, one Man shall do the Work of Ten; a Palace may be built in a Week, of Materials so durable as to last for ever without repairing. All the Fruits of the Earth shall come to Maturity at whatever Season we think fit to chuse, and increase an Hundred Fold more than they do at present; with innumerable other happy Proposals.

Swift or Gulliver presents the bad news almost apologetically: The only Inconvenience is, that none of these Projects are yet brought to Perfection; and in the meantime, the whole Country lies miserably waste, the Houses in Ruins, and the People without Food or Cloaths. By all which, instead of being discouraged, they are Fifty Times more violently bent upon prosecuting their Schemes, driven equally on by Hope and Despair…. (III.4, 196–7)

The Projectors are constantly asking themselves: Why not gain deliberate power over nature, instead of the somewhat accidentally discovered magnetism of the island (which may be more like gravity), to help a great many people, if not the majority or even all? Of course, the beneficiaries of this approach are likely to be future and somewhat hypothetical people; the real people in front of the Projectors’ eyes seem to be suffering horrible torture and death by virtue of the new scientific experiments.9 The Islanders would seem to have little to fear, yet they fear more or less everything; the Projectors are fearlessly playing with fire. Apparently, it never occurred to the scientists in the sky to mount any kind of campaign on earth; it would be difficult for many people to gain any real understanding of the work of the Laputans. We might say 9 For his depiction of a potentially fertile land laid waste, Swift may have been inspired

by his tour of Ireland in 1723. Lord Munodi (III.4, 194–198), who has resisted the new practices and kept his land fertile, may be based on Swift’s friend Robert Cope; Swift stayed at his estate in 1722. The cause of severe Irish poverty, according to many observers, was British policies in general rather than scientific or engineering projects specifically; Damrosch 345–347.

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the Projectors on land are making an effort to demonstrate to taxpayers the benefits of the science they are paying for.10 They are addressing a problem that has been faced by many past scientists and philosophers: to the extent that ordinary people have any sense of what you are doing, what benefit do they derive from it, why should they tolerate it to say nothing of pay for it?11 (We might note that the people down below seem to be becoming more ingenious in avoiding taxes (III.3, 188–191).) To the extent that the scientists in either place have prudence or practical wisdom in an old-fashioned sense, they may have come to realize that it is necessary for them to support or perhaps even manufacture some kind of commitment to a common good that will unite scientists and nonscientists. If a truly common good is impossible, they may settle for the accumulation of the bodily or material goods of many individuals, who may think and act more or less as one body, at least in their support for science. Going a bit deeper, if the new theoretical science tends to make people fearful, sleepless and miserable, perhaps Islanders, Projectors and common people can all benefit from focusing on conquering the new despair by cultivating the new hope. In a way the Projectors on earth have more imagination than the Laputans above when it comes to what human beings might have the power to do. “Flying islands” may make us think today about space travel, but the Laputans are tied to Earth in more ways than one; they study the stars, but give no thought to traveling toward them. One might wonder whether traveling out into space would make the Laputans less fearful than they are, or more fearful. Not all projects are failures. The accomplishments of the Laputans when it comes to astronomy appear to be undeniable.12 Not only that, progress in astronomy has practical benefits, especially when it comes 10 As he tours the labs on earth, Gulliver is panhandled by the first Projector he meets (III.5, 199), and promises another that he will look into the possibility of a patent for an ingenious machine—ensuring both credit and profit (206). It is probably difficult for a politician to tour a lab today without being more or less panhandled. 11 Socrates says he stings the body politic, or the common people, like a gadfly stinging a horse in order to keep it awake; Plato Apology of Socrates 30 d-31a. It is not clear how either Socrates or the “horse” would benefit from such a transaction. He also says he ought to be rewarded by having all his needs met at the city’s expense, like an Olympic victor (36d-e). In fact his proposal would probably entail treating him more generously than any Olympic victor had been treated. 12 Asimov says the Laputans’ “prediction” about two moons of Mars, while not precisely accurate, is “frequently cited as the most remarkable scientific prediction ever

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to navigational instruments.13 With these exceptions, however, it would be an understatement to say Swift does not provide a realistic picture of the real accomplishments of the Royal Academy, even in his time, and of course he had no way of predicting developments which are so impressive to us, which came in following centuries.14 For one remarkable example, the description of the movements of the so-called magnetic island seems to fit gravity, famously described in detail by Isaac Newton, more than magnetism; Swift refuses to credit a new discovery, especially one that is usually ascribed to Newton.15 If magnetism, gunpowder and the printing press are three discoveries or inventions that mark “modern science,” they are indeed present among the scientists of the third voyage, and absent in other voyages; but Swift implies that little progress has been made on these since the Chinese, many centuries earlier.16 Of all

made in literature.” Asimov #21–25, pp. 158–9. Noted by Lynall (2017), 454–6, 458. Swift probably relied on Kepler’s calculations. 13 The flying island includes an “astronomers’ cave” with “great variety of sextants, quadrants, telescopes, astrolabes, and other astronomical instruments”; III.3, 184. The sextant is described in some writings of Newton that were still unpublished at the time of the Travels; Newton also made an important contribution to the development of the telescope. The quadrant was greatly improved by various English inventors, including Captain John Davis (1550–1605), and John Flamsteed (1646–1719), the first Astronomer Royal. The astrolabe can be traced back to Hellenistic Anatolia or Turkey about 200 BC; after many improvements it crossed from the Greek-speaking world to the Islamic world in the eighth century AD, and was in use in Europe by the eleventh century. 14 See, for example, Robert Boyle’s list of futuristic projects for scientists to work on

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/7798201/Robert-Boyles-Wish-list.html; also the 1718 Royal Society pamphlet “designed to advertise its accomplishments, and to encourage communications from outside parties” (Atkinson 23–4). There is some overlap between the Royal Society’s list of subjects and issues and Swift’s treatment of the moderns in the Travels. 15 Much of the discussion of the scientists in the third voyage is a kind of satire on the

career of Sir Isaac Newton, 25 years older than Swift, who is surely still thought of as one of the greatest scientists in English history; see the rebellion by Lindalino (Dublin) (III.3, 188–191), and its relation to Swift’s Drapier’s Letters: Asimov #30–#32, p. 160; Gardiner; Lynall (2008), 27 citing Arthur E. Case. On gravity see the ingenious argument of Siyeon Lee; also Asimov #11, 12, p. 156. Various details about the scientists in the third voyage fit Newton among other luminaries: the pursuit of astrology and politics, a kind of money-grubbing, and fighting with rivals, including Robert Hooke, for credit for famous discoveries/inventions. 16 See Kearney, “The Man Who is Not” (388) quoting Bacon; and Patey (1995) (227) on the importance of these three discoveries. “Magnetism” is a discovery that greatly pre-dates Swift. The tendency of a magnetic lodestone to attract iron had been known

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the people we meet in the Travels, no one but the modern Europeans known to Gulliver and Swift seems to have the kind of gunpowder that is useful for weapons—a nightmare.17 Swift insists on intruding on Gulliver’s perspective in the third voyage, making the work of the Academy both more paltry and more vicious than it could possibly have been. Somehow despite the mockery and belittling, something of the grandeur or ambition of the modern project shines through.18 Marjorie Hope Nicolson is generally credited with showing that the Projectors are based on the Royal Society, and the specific experiments Gulliver discovers were admitted failures published in the Transactions of the Society. Several scholars have shown that the work of both groups of scientists, “above” and “below,” is inspired by great thinkers, especially Descartes and Bacon.19 Descartes, we might say, represents more of the need for a strictly disciplined, experimental approach, assuming as little as possible; Bacon for an inspiring vision that what we call “nature” can be made much more to our liking.20 for centuries; this discovery underlies the workings of a magnetic compass, which may have come into existence in China at the beginning of the first millennium AD, but was probably not known in Europe until about 1200. The “art of printing,” but not a true printing press, as we are reminded in the Travels, goes back to ancient China; II.7, 149. A type of gunpowder, more useful for fireworks or flaming arrows than for “guns,” also goes back to ancient China; European “improvements” began about 1400 A.D. Swift comes close to denying any significant recent improvement in technology, except perhaps for the telescope that is used in astronomy. 17 The King in the second voyage rejects with horror to the introduction of gunpowder at II.7, 148; see also IV.5, 276–7. 18 It would be wrong to suggest that Swift is “anti-science.” For one example, Gulliver is the only one in the Travels who mentions the problem of longitude (III.10, 236; IV.11, 320); on Swift’s interest in this problem, which involved the use of a portable but accurate timepiece, see Lynall 2014. 19 Renaker (1979) has suggested that the land of Balnibarbi represents Newtonian England; the more mathematical and theoretical Laputa represents Cartesian France; pp. 936 ff. Renaker credits Nicolson for the “discovery” that Swift is satirizing the Royal Society, but then Renaker goes on to clarify that this applies to Balnibarbi, not Laputa; Laputa has learned from Descartes. With reference to one eye inward, the other toward the Zenith (III.2, 173–4), Bloom (1990) says the ruling islanders are “perfect Cartesians”; 47. On the same passage Asimov suggests there is a reference to “the two great wonder instruments of the age that so greatly extended the sense perception of human beings, the microscope and the telescope, respectively”; #1, p. 147. With the pairing of England and France, as Renaker points out, we see a parallel to the first voyage and the pairing of Lilliput and Blefuscu; “L” and “B” are reversed on that reading. 20 See Nichols 1163–64. In the Discourse on Method, Descartes demonstrates how he undermines or demolishes any belief that is not proven, even or especially if it is taught

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Beyond these and other moderns, we might consider the influence of Machiavelli.21 There are two key passages in Ch. 25 of Machiavelli’s Prince. First, at the beginning: it is good to build dams and dikes in order to lessen the rule of fortune over us—not in the sense that this had never been done before, but that it should be done systematically or determinedly, in order to channel or mitigate natural forces to maximize human benefit. We can render at least some harmful storms harmless. Secondly at the end: it is good to beat Fortuna, and keep on beating “her”: nature is resilient, no lasting harm will be done to “her,” and it is only by striving—by exceeding apparent limits—that one can maximize one’s own benefit, sometimes in surprising ways. As is often the case, we are left to do some detective work as to Swift’s sources; he acknowledges the work of some great moderns, while leaving them nameless except for one brief reference to Descartes—who seems to lose in a debate with Aristotle. The faith in modern science, driven by hope and fear, keeping despair at bay, is one of the most striking points of departure between modern Europeans and the ancients. The rational horses of the fourth voyage in particular must come as a bit of a shock, partly because they are presented with a different kind of exaggeration. Swift is of course free to give technical improvements to the people he creates, or withhold them.22 There is little sign of anything that could be called technology among the rational horses.23 The King of the giants in the second voyage says he welcomes a method to grow two blades of grass instead of one; there is no sign of by some authority, then starts from the beginning with “I think, therefore I am,” and proceeds by an experimental method. Bacon says that one of the two purposes or uses of knowledge is the “relief of man’s estate”; and that “nature only reveals her secrets under torture.” See Advancement of Learning I.5.11 (knowledge is “a storehouse for the Glory of the Creator and the relief of man’s estate”); Wisdom of the Ancients XIII. 21 See Mansfield. 22 The use of glass is an example. The Lilliputians lack spectacles, perhaps the oldest

type of glass used to improve human vision, or any kind of glass; the Brobdingnagians have spectacles, a magnifying glass and a looking glass; see I.2, 37, I.5, 54, II.2, 103, II.3, 111, 115. The Laputans have a telescope (III.3, 186). Gulliver refers to having seen a louse through a microscope back in England (II.4, 121)—the kind of image that was captured in Hooke’s Micrographia; none of the people Gulliver visits seem to have a microscope. 23 Some hard and menial work is done by enslaved Yahoos; there may be a trade-off between the use of slaves and the development of labor-saving technology. There are no wheeled vehicles or devices in the fourth voyage as there are in the other three; see sledges

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even this much innovation in agriculture among the horses. The complete lack of technology, from a modern perspective, makes the rational horses defeatist—they are not even trying to make a noticeable difference in the comfort of life on earth. Perhaps the most extreme examples are medical practice and medical research. Gulliver says of the health, life and death of the Houyhnhnms: “they are subject to no diseases, and therefore can have no need of physicians. However, they have excellent medicines, composed of herbs, to cure accidental bruises and cuts in the pastern or frog of the foot, by sharp stones, as well as other maims and hurts in the several parts of the body” (IV.9, 308–9). They remain in good health until death approaches; aware of this inevitability, they say their good-byes and calmly die. The key to their consistent good health seems to be a simple vegetarian diet and a bit of exercise (IV.2, 258–9). Yahoos, by contrast, have an “undistinguishing Appetite to devour every thing that came in their way” (IV.7, 294). Their proneness to being sick is no doubt related to their insistence on consuming luxuries (when they can get them) and poisons. All of this is reminiscent of Plato’s Republic.24 In the third voyage, we barely see a medical Projector in action, and as with other cases, there is no mention of actual promising Royal Society projects of which Swift must have been aware.25 Gulliver sees one Projector carry out an unsuccessful experiment on a dog, then offer to make the same experiment on Gulliver (III.5, 202). This sad experiment may be barely ahead of the actual medical practices of Swift’s

IV.2, 259, IV.9, 310. As with Lilliput, there is no glass at all. Unlike in Brobdingnag, there are no books. 24 It is Glaucon’s insistence that citizens of the just city should be able to eat “relishes” or luxuries, including meat, that primarily causes the disappearance of the “healthy city,” and the rise of a feverish or unhealthy one which lends itself to a much richer debate about justice (372a ff.). This may mark the transition from “citizens” having some opportunity to live like Houyhnhnms, to actual human beings struggling to achieve some version of justice given a fairly rich array of human desires. As Bloom points out, Socrates suggests that poor health always results from poor habits; Bloom (1968) 362, commenting on Republic 404a-e. 25 William Harvey performed vivisections on many animals in the seventeenth century to establish with some precision how the circulation of blood in a mammalian body, including the human body, worked. Cheselden, Harvey and Boyle (the last of whom refused to perform dissection or vivisection) all worked on establishing an accurate anatomy of the human body. One would think Swift might have enjoyed depicting serious researchers, cutting away on bodies both alive and dead, but none of this kind of “real” work of Swift’s time appears in the Travels.

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day. He makes no reference to blood-letting, to which he was subjected himself and which remained prevalent long after his death. On the other hand, Gulliver suggests when he is reporting on “Britain” that the standard “diagnosis” of an illness is some kind of repletion—too much of something or other—and the best treatment is removing some substance from the body (IV.6, 284–5). There is a similarity between this aspect of “modern” medical practice and the way the Houyhnhnms treat—not their fellow rational horses, but the Yahoos (IV.7, 294–5). We see one Projector trying to teach blind people to learn as much by touch and smell as seeing people might learn by sight; there is no mention of actual research into the eye and vision.26 According to Gulliver/Swift, medical practitioners, as opposed to researchers, will be strongly motivated to do what is profitable, including committing fraud and murder, rather than what is beneficial. Since doctors are unable to guarantee a patient’s survival, but are able to guarantee death, the best way to build a reputation is apparently to ensure one’s predictions come true.27 Their mistakes will be forgotten or, to borrow an old undertaker’s joke, buried. It is well known that when it comes to the name “Laputa,” Gulliver’s usual facility with languages fails him, and he has no translation to offer. The word is most likely the Spanish for “whore.” The Projectors want money and ask for it, but they seem willing to work hard even in the absence of money. Medical doctors may be the most “whorish” of the scientific people we see in action—the most inclined to deliver direct and even hands-on customer service, as it were, whether based on reliable evidence or not, and to expect immediate payment. Of course where there is faith in science and technology, support for entrepreneurship and patents may be seen as a way to ensure new discoveries become available quickly, and are able to benefit many people.

26 III.5, 200–01. Kepler and Descartes both contributed to studies of vision in the century before Swift, and the Royal Society oversaw a successful cataract surgery shortly after the initial publication of the Travels. 27 IV.6, 286. Part of the motivation for Gulliver’s journeys is that he is a medical practitioner, concerned about the unethical practices of his peers, and in fact unable to compete with them with his more ethical approach (I.1, 16).

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The Promise or Prospect of Miracles Swift contrasts the somewhat grubby reality of modern science with the apparent fact that people are likely to have great faith in it. The mere fact of having experiments underway will generate hopes to overcome fears and even despair; if the experiments generate new fears, that will somehow be an argument for more, and probably more dangerous and expensive, experiments. The modern scientists have taken on some of the trappings of a new church, bearing a kind of eerie or “perverse” similarity to the old churches, particularly the Roman Catholic Church.28 Despite their failures, the Projectors are far from giving up and part of their goal seems to be to reproduce divine miracles, demonstrating that if such conspicuous events happen at all, it is due to natural causes. If the main promises or hopes of the Projectors are to produce more food with less labor, this is at least somewhat reminiscent of some of the miracles in the Bible.29 A few projects seem intended to make farmland more productive.30 The only specific experiment we see that promises more food, or literally food from a surprising source, is one that is supposed to return human excrement to its original food.31 “Extracting Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers”—which we might paraphrase as converting waste food into energy—seems to be a similar example: the energy might be used to grow more food.32 The 28 Cunningham p.351: “The lives of the inhabitants of Laputa exhibit perversions of the ‘holy mysteries’ of the Mass: their ill-fitting clothes bear, like liturgical vestments, emblems of the heavens; a large table, like an altar, before the throne is laden with mathematical instruments.” 29 Exodus 16; John 6; Matthew 14: 13–21. 30 Sowing land with chaff, one of the “universal artist’s” projects (203), harks back to

the sixth project, using hogs to plow the ground (201). 31 III.5, p. 200. Asimov says:

“This [reducing excrement to food] is not nearly so ridiculous a project as might be thought. It is exactly what has been done as long as life has existed on earth. …. As a matter of fact, if manned space flights of any length are to be undertaken in the future, there will have to be a recycling of food, water, and air, and human excrement will indeed have to be restored to its original food state in one way or another. At that time the poor “projector” of these pages will finally be recognized as an unappreciated pioneer in a vital piece of research.” (#4, p. 170) That is indeed the spirit. Apparently today there are 96 bags of excrement on the moon, left there by the crew of Apollo XI. Recycling of both excrement and urine have been identified as priorities for the International Space Station. 32 On some of the projects related to energy and agriculture Asimov says Swift was surprisingly “prescient” if not prophetic; #2, p. 168; various notes pp. 170–173.

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Projectors all seem to share a confidence that the apparent or alleged limits of nature ought to be tested, and might be exceeded, or shown to be a kind of mirage on the way to discovering what might be real limits. Newton in Swift’s time in some ways not only improved on his predecessors, but also anticipated Einstein much later. We might say the zeal of the Projectors is a promising sign, even if their results are paltry so far. Such thoughts come to the surface when Gulliver describes a Projector’s experiment that bears a resemblance—one could say an eerie resemblance—to a Christian sacrament. One Projector is experimenting with the eating of a wafer so that the wafer can “operate” and impart knowledge—a kind of short-cut to the old-fashioned approaches to education. This happens within one group among the people Gulliver calls “the projectors of speculative learning.” I was at the Mathematical School, where the Master taught his Pupils after a Method scarce imaginable to us in Europe. The Propositions and Demonstration were fairly written on a thin Wafer, with Ink composed of a Cephalick Tincture. This the Student was to swallow upon a fasting Stomach, and for three Days following eat nothing but Bread and Water. As the Wafer digested, the Tincture mounted to his Brain, bearing the Proposition along with it. But the Success has not hitherto been answerable, partly by some Error in the Quantum or Composition, and partly by the Perverseness of Lads; to whom the Bolus is so nauseous, that they generally steal aside, and discharge it upwards before it can operate; neither have they been yet persuaded to use so long an Abstinence as the Prescription requires. (III.5, 207–8)

Suddenly Swift is using medical jargon to refer not to an actual experiment scientists are likely to carry out, but a Catholic sacrament. It is not difficult to see here a mockery of the doctrine of transubstantiation—that a wafer is transformed in a sacrament, and in its new form changes the student or communicant for the better.33 There are strict rules which in a way prepare excuses if the transformation fails: one may not have fasted enough, or prepared the wafer properly, or allowed it to digest properly. In Swift’s world it would be Protestants (“lads”—adherents of a newer 33 There is similar mockery when Gulliver describes the way food is served to the flying islanders; III.2, 175, Cunningham pp. 350–1. Gardiner (2004) says it was actually a high church Anglican, Richard Hooker, not a Roman Catholic, who suggested “the Eucharist causes an interior conversion within the communicant.”

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faith) who would be refusing to follow the strict rules, but who might still want some form of Communion or Eucharist with fewer rules, and less of a definite promise of how and when exactly God Himself becomes present. It would be typical of the Roman Catholic Church to have some specific characters inscribed on the wafer; “IHS” would be an example.34 This is not the only place in the Travels where we see transubstantiation mocked. In the first voyage, the Big End of an egg vs. the Small End refers to the issue of transubstantiation.35 A strictly Protestant view that a wafer is just a wafer, Communion simply a memorial, seems to be ruled out in that context; the choices are Roman Catholic or Anglican/Lutheran.36 In the fourth voyage, there is a strong suggestion that even to debate such matters, regardless of which side one is on, is a sign of dangerous madness, threatening the unity, peace and sanity of a community (IV.5, 275). In all these cases, is Swift leading the mockery, or showing that Gulliver, far from choosing the right sacraments rather than the wrong ones, is failing to understand or appreciate Christianity at all? Cunningham refers to the failed learning by wafer passage as one of the “perversions of the Eucharist” in Gulliver’s Travels.37 We might say the Catholic Church has left itself open to skepticism about any and all miracles by promising that specific miracles happen with each Mass. Scientists might discover that there is no evidence of such a thing. It might seem part of the meaning of a miracle that it is unpredictable and surprising; the Church seems to have made some miracles more predictable. Swift may join with intellectual debunkers against Rome, using them as it were as strategic allies, but according to Cunningham this is to point eventually to the less specific, detailed or dogmatic approach of the primitive church— some centuries before the High Middle Ages—the Anglican Church, and perhaps the Orthodox Churches.38 Cunningham sketches some of what is known about Swift’s practice as Dean of St. Patrick’s and then uses this 34 Cunningham does not mention this example—the first three letters of the name “Jesus” in Greek—but mentions both a crucifix and the words “Agnus Dei”—“Lamb of God” (John 1:29). 35 Glendinning says on the big end/small end dispute: “And this mockery from Swift, who defended the Church as established by law and the disabilities of Dissenters and Catholics with repetitive, fiery, well-reasoned—and perhaps ludicrous—arguments” (182). 36 See Cunningham p. 348; Gardiner (2004). 37 See especially Cunningham pp. 348–9. 38 On the importance of the primitive church for Swift, see Gardiner (2002).

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information as a source to interpret the Travels —Swift’s greatest masterpiece alongside Tale of a Tub.39 Swift was known to say that human beings are unable to understand the mysteries of the Christian faith, including the Trinity. Any discussion of such matters is a waste of time at best. “What is true of the Trinity and the Incarnation is also true, we may suppose, of the Eucharist” (346).40 Cunningham seems to think a Christian church ought to avoid promising “miracles” to happen in the short term, in this life—with the implication that it is best to promise things in another world, in the afterlife, and perhaps even to keep those promises a bit vague.41 We begin to see a way to distinguish the Christianity of the medieval Church from other kinds or sects. For the old Church, theology was so much the dominant field of study (“queen of the sciences”) and accepted interpretation of the world, that anything strictly “scientific” would be regarded with suspicion. For some Protestants, science may be presumed to be true, while claims about supernatural intervention in human life are distrusted. In the past there was no strictly natural world, but a charmed or enchanted one, to some extent a devilish one, mingling nature and supernature. Only very specific connections between nature and supernature were permitted: direct interventions by God, and the sacraments. Any imitations of these events amounted to sorcery, which is condemned in the Bible.42

Medicine, the Body and Politics The more dramatic possibilities of modern science become evident when Swift turns to medical research, and political research which turns out to overlap with its medical counterpart. As we have already suggested, 39 On Swift’s religious practices see Leo Damrosch, Jonathan Swift: His Life and His World (Yale University Press, 2013), pp. 268–9; Gardiner, “Primitive Church.” 40 On Swift’s call to avoid metaphysics in religion, see also Glendinning, pp. 183, 189. 41 Article XXVIII of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer seems to include a blatant

contradiction as to whether transubstantiation is accepted or not. 42 Strauss mentions the fairly common view that modern science, in its desire to make human life both longer and more comfortable, is somehow rooted in the Bible. Then he says that for some time the new science was driven by an elite who knew they were opposed by “the people” who were, “to begin with, rather distrustful of the new gifts from the new sort of sorcerers, for they remembered the commandment, ‘Thou shalt not suffer a sorcerer to live’”; Strauss (1995), 20. See also Gardiner (2004). Strauss may be referring to Exodus 22:18, but there are many such statements in the Bible.

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medical research proper seems in Swift’s presentation to be almost unbelievably crude.43 As in other cases, Swift does not mention the real progress in anatomy and certain kinds of medical treatment in his lifetime. If we focus on the argument among Christian churches, it seems fair to say the medieval Church impeded anything like medical progress with a sense that taboos would be violated if experiments into “nature,” allegedly mixed somehow with supernature, were carried out. Of course for people in the West the Hippocratic Oath has in a way never been forgotten; “first do no harm” may suggest a moral imperative not to tamper too much.44 Modern Europe seems to have faced many centuries when previous progress was lost, and new approaches were discouraged.45 It would be hard to make real progress, for example, without some use of human dissection.46 We can say with some exaggeration that dramatic progress in medical care began around 1900. Instead of simply harping on actual failures, or exaggerating the extent of the failures of the Projectors of his time, Swift presents us with a fanciful view of some dramatic results that might result from modern medicine someday. What is the best that we might expect from modern, experimental medical practice? We can learn more by considering the immortal Struldbruggs (III.10), probably the most bizarre characters in the third voyage, coming up shortly after Gulliver’s visits with the scientists. The Struldbruggs, unfortunately, do not demonstrate immortal youth, as Gulliver hopes at first, but immortal old age.47 Having been born at different times, they are of somewhat different ages, but they have become more or less indistinguishable as the aging process has come to a halt. They have lives that are horrible both for themselves and others. They suffer the normal infirmities of extreme old age, along

43 III.5, 202; IV.6, 284–6. 44 Porter, p. 62. 45 Porter suggests that ancient Greece and Rome developed a very promising tradition of medical thought and practice, but the death of Galen (AD 129–c. 216?) “brought that tradition to a halt”; 82. 46 In order to show that the (Roman Catholic) Church did not prohibit human dissection, Porter cites ecclesiastical support for the practice in 1482 (p. 111); this leaves us with the possibility that there was some hesitation to endorse this practice for almost 1500 years—three-quarters of the Christian era. See pp. 56, 132. 47 In Boyle’s list of 24 projects for science to work on, #1 is the “prolongation of life,” and #2 is the “recovery of youth”.

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with an understandable bitterness at their fate, and they are full of malice and envy toward others. “They are despised and hated by all sorts of people.” The only Struldbruggs who are relatively cheerful or calm are the ones who suffer dementia; they no longer remember the things that might destroy their peace of mind.48 Surely this is a plausible picture of the best that modern medicine is likely to achieve—if it conquers death without actually conquering all physical ailments, and does nothing for the human soul which only becomes more vicious in this enforced endless decrepitude.49 Perhaps it is only this unlikely combination of accomplishments that can make medical practice unpopular. What may come about is not so much dramatic cures, nor even treatments that help the great majority of patients lead good lives. Instead, medicine might extend lives on average—not forever, but long enough that a large number of very elderly people will live in a miserable way for years.50 Swift does not describe the cruel experiments that would be required to give eternal life to old and frail people; perhaps they are unimaginable.51 As with the Projectors in general, however, there is a clear sense that an apparently humane effort to help people leads to a nightmare. The goal of prolonging life may be more realistic than the goal of ending human

48 Both in Boyle’s list of 24 potential scientific projects, and in the manifesto of the Royal Society, there is a suggestion that either life will become objectively more comfortable, or there will be more and better drugs available—with the suggestion that objective comfort might not matter. 49 In some ways the success of modern medicine leads to new fears. The fear that medical technology will keep too many people alive seems to underlie movements for euthanasia or medically-assisted suicide; so to speak no one wishes to die after a long period “on machines,” whether aware or not. If one fears human beings who display a combination of chronic disease and an obsessive selfishness, one result may be the popularity of the zombie movies and TV shows. 50 Swift wrote at least once, in a letter to a friend: “Health is worth preserving, though life is not”; Damrosch 233. 51 Here is where one might imagine a dialogue between Swift and Mary Shelley, author of “Frankenstein”: if death is seen as the great threat to be conquered, new technologies may be applied in order to extend life, almost regardless of the quality of life that is likely to result. Of course Dr. Frankenstein hopes to bring about a better class of human being—a great mind in a great body.

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suffering. For Swift’s poor Struldbruggs, death is apparently impossible— they cannot commit suicide even if they want to; their life is so miserable, they cannot even escape from the misery.52 The success of modern medicine is likely to establish a race between the overcoming of old fears (or newly exaggerated ones) and the advent of new ones. Of course such a concern is far from academic today. Especially with the baby boom, we are beginning to see a period of a high proportion of elderly people, many of them in less than robust health. One might wonder whether a focus on bodies, which are always irreducibly personal, is likely to support or nurture a dedication to any truly common good.53 When we consider these passages in connection with others where scientists are shown to be impiously trying to reproduce sacraments and miracles, we can say the same scientists are longing to bring about immortality, even if it is not as desirable as the traditional accounts of heaven. The immortality of the aged Struldbruggs is not a reward or punishment for past deeds; it is the punishment of having a human mind and body, and somehow being forced to live forever with a decrepit version of human life.54 What might make Gulliver, or any of us, sympathetic to the modern science of the Projectors is the promise of a human life that is both longer and more comfortable; to say the least, the life of the Struldbruggs is a ridiculous failure on the latter point.55 52 As Gulliver says, non-Struldbrugg humans are known to fight and plead for even one more day of life, which explains how medical practitioners have us where they want us. 53 Socrates in Plato’s Republic suggests that the just city must have a clear preference for medical arts that are likely to be ineffective over those that might be effective; 405c408e. To say the least, it is not clear that Socrates opposes the deliberate killing of patients, if only by neglect—not to confirm the practitioner’s predictions, as in Swift, but to ensure as much as possible that only people fit enough to serve the city remain alive. To be preoccupied with health and sickness is identified as a terrible way of life, both for the city and for the individual. See also 461e-462e: the goal of justice is a community of pleasure and pain, with citizens as much as possible feeling the same pleasures and pains at the same time, as if they share one body. 54 Bloom makes the ingenious suggestion that the Struldbruggs can be seen as the oldest Christian churches; born at different times, but all eventually being equally decrepit, speaking different ancient languages (Latin, Greek, Syriac, Old Slavonic and others) so that they are incomprehensible to each other as well as to others. There may be a hope for the Anglican Church that it can achieve regular or ongoing renewal without departing too much from tradition. 55 Nichols (1165) follows the thread of Gulliver’s own medical practice, and then some of his findings: the Struldbruggs make Gulliver accept his own mortality, and give up his

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For Swift, medical care is an example of how technology can enjoy public support even it fails in some significant way. It might be worse if technology actually works—we might think that no matter how much we neglect our health, everything can be fixed; and it tends to undermine any kind of public-spiritedness. Swift does show us a modern answer to the question: How exactly will you improve the quality of human life, assuming you find ways to extend it, beyond simply making life more comfortable for those who do not (yet) suffer from Struldbruggian illnesses? The answer seems to lie with a kind of modern political science that overlaps with experimental medical science. Perhaps the over-arching concern of much of the Travels is the tendency of human beings not only toward selfishness, but divisiveness, partisanship and fanaticism—different kinds of entropy, we might say, away from devotion to a community or common good. In this light, it is significant that the work of the political Projectors (II.6) overlaps with medicine: if one could identify the chemical or physical causes of political problems, then in the modern view some kind of projector could cure more or less everything. During his visits with Projectors in the third voyage, Gulliver discovers some people who may actually deserve the distinction of “political scientists.” There was a most ingenious Doctor who seemed to be perfectly versed in the whole Nature and System of Government. This illustrious Person had very usefully employed his Studies in finding out effectual Remedies for all Diseases and Corruptions, to which the several Kinds of publick Administration are subject by the Vices or Infirmities of those who govern, as well as by the Licentiousness of those who are to obey. For Instance: Whereas all Writers and Reasoners have agreed, that there is a strict universal Resemblance between the natural and the political Body; can there be anything more evident, than that the Health of both must be preserved, and the Diseases cured by the same Prescriptions? (III.6, 209–10)

Medicine, it seems, ought to be the master art or science, supervising politics. “It is allowed, that Senates and great Councils are often troubled with redundant, ebullient, and other peccant Humours; with many Diseases of the Head, and more of the Heart; with strong Convulsions

medical practice. Later his reflections on the Houyhnhnms “lead him to reject medicine completely.”

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[etc.]….” The proposed solution is to have a Physician attend every meeting of these dignitaries, take the “Pulses” of every august individual, and then, after some deliberation, working with Apothecaries, “administer to each of them Lenitives … Palliatives, Laxatives …. [etc.].” Despite the reference to diseases of the head, these treatments all affect the body. Even if all this medical treatment helps the bodies of such people as Senators, how does it help the political process itself? That, it turns out, is the point. The Project might “beget Unanimity, shorten Debates, open a few Mouths which are now closed, and close many more which are open; curb the Petulancy of the Young, and correct the Positiveness of the Old; rouze the Stupid, and damp the Pert” (210–11). It is desirable to cure bodily ailments—not solely or even primarily to make life longer and more comfortable, but to bring about something like good citizenship and public-spirited statesmanship. It seems that problems such as fanaticism and a refusal to listen cannot be expected to respond to reason in the sense of reasoning with people— arguably, that has already been proven to be a failure. Instead, scientific reason can suggest realistic cures—as long as we all accept that the fundamental problems are always with the body rather than anything else. The most extreme problem may be “when parties in a State are violent,” and this may call for extreme solutions. The Method is this. You take an Hundred Leaders of each Party; you dispose them into Couples of such whose Heads are nearest of a Size; then let two nice Operators saw off the Occiput [back part of the skull] of each Couple at the same Time, in such a Manner that the Brain may be equally divided. Let the Occiputs thus cut off be interchanged, applying each to the Head of his opposite Party-man. It seems indeed to be a Work that requireth some Exactness; but the Professor assured us, that if it were dexterously performed, the Cure would be infallible. For he argued thus; that the two half Brains being left to debate the Matter between themselves within the Space of one Scull, would soon come to a good Understanding … (211–12)

This might seem to mean resolving political arguments by discussion, albeit with both sides trapped within one skull. Another interpretation is that the fanatics are forced to drop their political arguments, reasonable or not, and come to an “understanding” in order to survive—meaning, in the case of the newly constructed person, to avoid suicide. Bodily security and survival counts for more than being “correct” in terms of some

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debate. At best, if a resolution of debates by reason is possible, it seems only to be possible in a fantastic situation created by drastic surgery on the body.56 Another Professor says “plots and conspiracies against the Government” can be detected by a careful study of all factors relevant to the stools of potential rebels, including diet, times of eating, “with which Hand they wiped their Posteriors,” the color of the stool and so on. It is implied that laxatives, once again, are critical, because “Men are never so serious, thoughtful, and intent, as when they are at Stool”; the briefer and more comfortable the bowel movements of the population, it would seem, the fewer and less intense will be any political uprisings (213). The seriousness and thoughtfulness of people who are interested in politics are bad things—likely to make trouble for others. The whole question of resolving political issues by winning debates, persuading rational people, or offering better or worse reasons—even presenting aspirational, inspiring and therefore persuasive world views—seems to be not so much resolved as ignored. Indeed we are led to believe it is desirable to keep any process of deliberation as short as possible.57 Politics is a proven failure, and Christianity has apparently not helped. In fact, why should religious factions not be given the same medical and surgical treatments as political fanatics? Why not combine some kind of Christianity with modern science in the same skull? The less literal version of this solution would be to persuade people to hold contradictory views, even ways of life, in their heads simultaneously in order to maintain an uneasy peace. Swift suggests that it will be typical of moderns to cease to believe that “the Word” has ever become flesh, or will do so in the future in a strictly miraculous way. It becomes necessary for science at its most gruesome to manipulate flesh in order to make the expression of desirable, peaceful words more common. Even people who do not undergo surgery, or extreme

56 Part of Robert Hooke’s research at the Royal Society was to show that memory was a purely physical phenomenon, related to the structure of the brain. 57 The same Doctor proposes bodily blows to improve the memory of Ministers after they have been told something like the truth (211)—i.e., the memory of bodily pain will hold them to the truth when there are various temptations to lie or give in to bribes or other improper or irrational inducements. Another proposal is that every member of a great Council should be required to vote exactly contrary to his own arguments; if his arguments are entirely self-serving if not completely misinformed, then a vote in the opposite direction will no doubt serve the public. A politician’s deliberative process is likely to be a waste of time, or worse.

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measures to extend life, can make good-faith efforts to reconcile contradictory approaches to the post-Medieval European world in their own brains, souls, or skulls. This would not be an attempt to achieve truth or even coherence, but simply to contribute to a political solution to political problems. The notion that all ailments, including political disagreements, are really bodily ailments, and that the body rules the soul—if there can even be said to be a soul—connects the Travels to other works of Swift. Crazed “projectors,” beginning with an intellectual project that may seem promising, eventually conclude that human ills that traditionally would have been seen as related to the soul, to the mind (honest disagreements based on reason) or to one’s proper or improper connections with a wider community of human beings and divinities, are entirely traceable to some malfunction of the body, and ought to be treated accordingly.58 In Tale of a Tub, when a political leader becomes a kind of mad, reckless or ruthless conqueror, Swift’s narrator suggests that this may be because of some unusual shifting around of semen. As he goes on, it seems impossible to attribute any specific pathology in human thought and behavior to one specific chemical or bio-chemical dysfunction. There are unknown “vapours” at work, and the best evidence of their existence may be the irrationality and unpredictability of human behavior. The extremes of behavior are somehow not only unpleasant, but disruptive and perhaps dangerous, and unexpected—like a serious illness. Philosophers or “Innovators in the Empire of Reason” expect to get everyone to agree with their whimsical ideas; once again the narrator suggests the cause of the crazed ambition, although perhaps not of the ideas themselves, is “vapours, ascending from the lower Faculties to over-shadow the brain.” Autopsy reveals that the inside of a human body looks worse than the outside; anyone who fixes the inside, rather than somewhat cynically pointing out “what we are really like” would be a great benefactor. Another solution, implying giving up on a real or lasting solution, is to match a so-called lunatic with a career in which his idiosyncrasies will be honored, such as politics or certain kinds of clergy. Perhaps the underlying thought in this series of suggestions—themselves apparently the effluents of a maddened brain—is that the so-called ideas and ambitions of human beings are so random, so unlike the more or less plausible rationales that 58 Tale of a Tub IX, “Discourse on Madness.” See also A Discourse Concerning the Mechanical Operation of the Spirit (1704) and Kearney 2005.

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might be cooked up in their defense, that it simply seems prudent to attribute them to bodily functions and dysfunctions. Unfortunately, at the stage in scientific progress at which Swift’s projector finds himself, it is not only difficult to match one cause with one disastrous effect; it seems nearly certain that there are only a small or finite number of possible causes, whereas the number of effects—the types of human behavior that must be regarded as crazy if not dangerous—is more or less infinite, as well as diverse. A strict atomist who believes all human behavior can be understood as a matter of physics may have difficulty moving from the simplicity of atoms to the complexity of human thoughts, dreams, ambitions, religious revelations and behavior. Also in Tale of a Tub, Swift seems to satirize the views of Epicurus as reported by Lucretius on this issue. Do the different and contrasting views and ambitions of human beings, which presumably have various sources, somehow come together in a “fortuitous concourse,” allowing knowledge of objective reality, in the way that the random movement of seeds or atoms apparently give way to a nature that is structured, and organized into species?59 This discrepancy between the diversity of human “problems,” and the limited number of likely explanations at the level of atoms, is still evident today. Psychiatry relies heavily on drugs and to some extent electroconvulsive “shock” therapy (ECT), even though there may be no good explanation as to how such things work at all, much less over the long term.60

59 Swift is credited by the OED with the first use in English of the word “clinamen,” from Lucretius’ Latin: the “unpredictable swerve of atoms,” without which they would simply continue to fall without touching each other. Swift’s projector in Tale of a Tub:

Epicurus modestly hoped that one time or other, a certain fortuitous concourse of all men’s opinions—after perpetual justlings, the sharp with the smooth, the light and the heavy, the round and the square—would, by certain clinamina, unite in the notions of atoms and void, as these did in the originals of all things. (“Discourse on Madness”) See more below on Lucretius and the beginnings of worlds, including distinct species. 60 See the troubled history of psychiatry in the New Yorker; May 20, 2019. https:// newyorker.com/magazine/2019/05/27/the-troubled-history-of-psychiatry. It has been pointed out that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders a few decades ago was all about Freud, and now it is all about drugs. Psychiatrists who prescribe ECT insist that it works in the medium term, and short-term negative effects recede; if there are negative long-term effects, that simply points to the continuation of disease, and the need for more treatment. Critics say there is no good study showing that placebo is less

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Swift fears that scientists will have their way despite their failures. Scientists emerge as the leaders of a new movement. There is a sense of priestly or saintly asceticism, acquired in the “airy region,” undeniably tied to some notion of making progress for the entire human race.61 If modern science somehow reaches the point where people live forever, but except for this dramatic development, new technology is a failure, then we will live in a kind of horrifying doppelgänger of the Middle Ages dominated by the Church. It may be that the astronomy and mathematics practiced by the Flying Islanders would not be enough to draw people away from the old faith(s); a technological approach to improving human life, and promising immortality, would have much more of an effect.62 Relief from toil and misery will be promised—for some time in the indefinite future. Whereas the Church taught that paradise was only available in the afterlife, in a world different from this one, the moderns seem to insist that everything must happen on earth, with our actual bodies. There is a higher, somewhat ethereal aristocracy, working on abstruse doctrines about reality, having very little contact with common people—a bit like the older theologians in Rome and at the universities; then there are secular priests, delivering rituals and promises of future benefits, to individuals and indirectly to communities, more or less every day. The hope of personal immortality, a paradise defined primarily in terms of freedom from bodily cares, somehow keeps people going. In some ways modern science opposes the previous medieval world of theology and faith; but in some ways it uses the language and method of the old faith to establish the new one. In both systems, the individual is asked to submit to massive forces which are contacted by, possibly (one hopes) controlled by, a special breed of “priests.” This seems to leave most individuals small, weak and isolated. Yet it is the fate of the individual—the soul in the old system, possibly someday reunited with the body, the body “alone” in the new system—that counts. Swift leaves the strong impression that the tendency

effective than ECT. An article in the British Medical Journal on the controversy here. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.k5233. 61 Gardiner, “Swift Prophet”: “Swift is nudging his readers to observe that those who reject Church and sacrament [including Anglican] will embrace such a priest and sacrament as this [the one of the mathematical projector].” 62 Strauss on Lucretius: “Ignorance of the causes of the motions of the heavenly bodies is not the sole or sufficient cause of men’s believing in angry gods. (Hence astronomy is not sufficient for liberating men from the fear of the gods)”; Strauss (1995,) 131.

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of modern thought to undermine public-spiritedness and thoughtful citizenship can be traced back to the medieval and earlier Christianity to which modernity is sometimes thought to be proudly opposed.

The Need to Return to the Ancients Swift clearly shows his understanding of much of what we mean by “modernity.” There is a new commitment to science, which can generally be referred to as “physics” or a study of nature, in opposition to medieval thought which was closely associated with Aristotle. To some extent this is a return to the ancients, if only to consider why the ancients did not make more progress in what we call technology, or in supporting hopes for the somewhat coincidental, almost magical agreement between progress in science and a decent society. Then there is reformed Christianity in opposition to the medieval Church, with even the Roman Catholic Church becoming “reformed” to some degree, sooner or later. This kind of progress is connected with the pursuit of science in the sense that religion is expected to get out of the way of scientific progress (along with the money-making of entrepreneurs, who may discover that new “machines” can be highly profitable). The desire to have dramatic improvements in our condition, here on earth, while likely to lead to conflict with Rome in Swift’s day, is apparently consistent with the Reformed churches.63 In fact the successes of modern science are likely to cause the old churches to reform in order to keep up.64 To borrow Hegelian language, Swift may even point us toward a “synthesis.”65 Such a problematic synthesis might somehow combine mystical or teleological human science, and

63 The original building at the Methodist Victoria College/University at the University of Toronto, “Old Vic,” built in 1891–2, includes a chapel with five large stained glass panels. One panel is a coat of arms; the other four are pictures of Martin Luther (1483– 1546), John Milton (1608–1674), Isaac Newton (1643–1727), and John Wesley (1703– 1791), with a famous quotation from each. https://www.flickr.com/photos/gustavoth omastheatre/4426653132/in/photostream/. 64 Swift’s friend Alexander Pope, a Roman Catholic, proposed an inscription for Newton’s tomb that was not used: “Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night; God said, ‘Let Newton be!’ and all was light.” 65 Lamoine: Swift emphasizes the “necessity of religion,” but does not vouch for the truth of any one religion. George Lamoine, “Notes on Religion in Gulliver’s Travels,” Caliban, Vol 10, 1973, pp. 23–33.

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non-teleological natural science.66 Was Protestantism more favorable than the medieval Church to modern science with its “technical” leaders, but also to entrepreneurship and even “modern nationalism” with its own leaders, from the beginning?67 Were Protestant leaders on the lookout for weaknesses in the position of the old Church, and opportunities to show some successes, something even like miracles? Once the new faith and the new science were both freed from the old Church, did they simply find a happy agreement in giving power to the laity—or to new leaders who claim to speak for the laity?68 Gulliver, although he chooses not to stay among the scientists, seems to find their work, and perhaps the work of modern theologians, generally exciting and progressive; Swift lets us see that he has more doubts than Gulliver does.69 It is possible that Swift’s heroes are Anglicans of some kind, not completely unlike himself.70 Swift may come down to us as a Christian Aristophanes, giving expression to rational doubts about the old faith, but using jokes to suggest that complete abandonment of such a faith is ridiculous and dangerous.71 It is a nice touch to suggest that the medieval Roman Catholic Church had departed too much from tradition, hence was not conservative enough. Condra, who agrees with Cunningham that Swift is directing the reader to the right kind of Christianity, reminds us that the King of Brobdingnag in the second voyage encourages growing two blades of grass instead of one. He presumably would resist any new method that would cause large-scale destruction 66 Strauss, Natural Right and History (1953/1971), “Introduction,” pp. 7–8. Paraphrasing Kearney: Swift apparently believes a strictly scientific approach is appropriate to the study of the material world, but not to the human soul; 2010, “Introduction” xiv. 67 See Max Weber’s famous argument about Protestantism and capitalism. Napoleon is an example of someone who used modern nationalism to destroy many aspects of older thought, including the internationalism of the Roman Catholic Church, but progressives can see this is a stepping stone to the new internationalism, including the EU. 68 See on the scientific and religious revolutions of 500 years ago, and how they were both stimulated by the printing press: Wooton, pp. 454–5. https://doi.org/10.1038/ 550454a. 69 Gulliver admits that he had been a “Sort of Projector” in his youth, and the projects of political projectors seem to have real appeal to him; III.4, end; III.6. 70 Kiernan, explaining why Swift proved very adept at outlining two opposing views of a scientific issue, then not really settling on one side or the other: Swift “subordinated his science to his religion.”; p. 722. 71 See Ambler and Pangle, “Introduction,” pp. 1–27.

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or poverty in the short term, for results that are hypothetical at best. He would have the “common sense” to resist the Projectors. A similar hero in the third voyage is Lord Munodi, an aristocratic gentleman and landowner; he has actually made some effort to resist the Projectors, saying he would prefer to live “without innovation,” but he is being forced out of business.72 Lord Munodi is not clearly identified as a Christian, and the king of giants is clearly not one; they seem to be based more on Aristotle’s great-souled man than on anyone inspired by the Bible. The king of the giants is a winner, one of the elite in a regime in which he flourishes; Munodi, alas, is a loser in a modern regime. The gentleman may have a remarkable ability to remain very much himself in very different regimes and generally during changes of fortune. It may simply be part of the package, as it were, that one knows how to go down with the ship with some grace. It may be part of being a gentleman that one does not react to mass movements until it is too late. One can imagine a gentlemanly reader of the Travels, struck or even slightly shocked by modern science and modern religion, left with a residue of both. It is natural for a gentleman to trust the experts in specific fields of study, in the hope that they will not pass the boundaries of what might seem natural or decent curiosity. A decent gentleman can honestly present himself as an amateur in both science and religion, and this may help him avoid questions about some of the contradictions that come to sight. Up to a point the gentleman may be more reliable, because less extreme, than an expert. Swift allows us to see that the gentleman will need some intellectual firepower to address modernity in any adequate way. Swift never offers a detailed description of religion or theology in the Travels, and he barely touches on “physics” after the discussion of the Projectors. Nevertheless, he seems to appeal to, and encourage, a thirst for something different from what is characteristically modern, and the ancients, to whom neither modern scientists nor modern theologians seem to give significant thought, are the most promising source of different ideas and approaches to human life. Somewhat surprisingly, the ancients put in a literally heroic appearance somewhat later in the third voyage. They appear in a kind of afterlife, but one that is more connected to Plutarch’s Lives than to the Bible.

72 Condra, pp. 121–5.

CHAPTER 4

A Realistic Utopia, and Human Passions

Before we turn to Gulliver’s conversations with the dead, which mainly focus on the ancients, and then the rational horses of the fourth voyage, we need to look at one more aspect of “the moderns” in Swift’s presentation. Gulliver’s Travels seems to give us less hope than Plato’s Republic or Aristotle’s Politics that a utopia is possible. There never seems to be the same kind of hopefulness that if we put our noses to the grindstone, and at least tentatively sign up for boot camp, we can make the goal of justice more available, one step at a time. Swift has his jokes, which generally entail a kind of belittling of all of humanity, and of the possibility that such creatures can achieve morality or justice. In the end, Gulliver has some hope of exhorting his fellow Brits to be better, and in this he may somewhat resemble Socrates. On the other hand, he never describes a just regime, other than in brief discussions of the Houyhnhnms, and to a lesser extent the Brobdingnagians. Socrates may hint that only a godlike or super-human being would ever be a philosopher king; Swift presents his utopia as a land of rational horses. If a kind of public-spiritedness is the goal—a willingness to sacrifice something that is good for oneself, or seems good, in order to achieve something for the community— there is little sign of Gulliver himself achieving this in any way beyond publishing his book. The failure of all of his adventures, and his failure to convince anyone at home, all seem to support the notion that justice © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_4

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is unattainable. We know that Swift took some part in public life, and seems to have had some hope of making things better in Ireland. There is a disconnection between the Swift of Gulliver’s Travels and the Dean.

Old Lilliput It may be typical of Swift’s irony that there is a more realistic utopia, almost buried in the pages of the Travels. It appears in the first voyage, where one might think there is little hope of reform among the little people, who clearly represent the people of England and Britain in Swift’s time. As Asimov points out, there are “both dystopic and utopic aspects to Lilliputian society and Swift uses both to satirize his England.”1 It is fair to say the Lilliput of self-interested honor-seeking, endless flattering of the Emperor, the aggravation of bitter partisanship about the eating of eggs and the height of one’s heels, and insistence on a foolish and destructive war with Blefuscu, are all part of a dystopia, and represent England more or less as Swift finds it. There is also a kind of utopia in the first voyage, however, presented as old Lilliput, or Lilliput as it was once, and might be again. According to Bloom, the utopian discussion of laws here is not an awkward later addition, nor an anticipation of the “real” utopias in the second and fourth voyages. “These institutions are undoubtedly an improvement of Lilliput’s actual government …. But they are just as undoubtedly a compromise with the best institutions, based on the real practices and principles of eighteenth-century England. Swift … knows that root and branch changes are impossible ….”2 We have discussed how Gardiner among others sees suggestions about “old Lilliput” evoking an older version of Christianity, more settled and widely accepted than later ones. Yet when we look more closely, there are actually two versions of “old” Lilliput. One has old-fashioned Christian practices, and freedom from both religious and political sectarianism. Gardiner is no doubt correct that this at least roughly matches older England before the Protestant Reformation—possibly to some extent before the Roman Catholic Church made certain changes that might,

1 Asimov #5, p. 51. 2 Bloom (1990), 43–4.

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so to speak, have provoked a reaction or reformation.3 There is also a lengthy discussion of old laws in Lilliput, however, and these seem to be very different. These “better” laws do not really refer to the past; they are a model for how a wiser Gulliver or wiser Bolingbroke might try to reform England or Britain. They make no reference to Christianity, churches, any Christian practices or the Bible, and the laws actually reflect a view of human life that is somewhat antithetical to Christianity. When Gulliver turns to a description of what we might call aspects of Lilliputian society, he first briefly mentions the learning of the Lilliputians and describes their burial practices (I.6, 60–1). He then turns to “some laws and customs very peculiar … contrary to those of own dear Country.” We learn that there are some matchings of actions and either penalties or rewards: the death penalty both for informing falsely against an innocent person, and for fraud; and worldly rewards for good behavior over a period of time. In distributing offices there is a preference for people who are decent, even if they are in some ways ignorant, instead of for the wise who may be more tempted by corruption. There is some kind of enforcement of a belief in divine providence—with no reference to any specific religion (61–3).4 After a brief interruption, in which Gulliver admits the laws he is praising do not apply to Lilliput “now,” as he is observing the place, but to some time in the past, we are told that ingratitude is a capital crime, and there are some paragraphs on family life and the raising of children (64–7). Perhaps the most notable feature of education for the young is that girls are given (almost) the same education as boys. In the interruption between the first and second set of good laws, Gulliver says all these passages refer to “the original Institutions” of Lilliput, “and not the most scandalous Corruptions into which these People are fallen by the degenerate Nature of Man.” How did the Lilliputians decline or revert from a more noble society to something vicious that conforms to human nature? Swift makes some attempt to link Christian old England, where the “big ender” approach to the liturgy went without question, with what we might call non-Christian “old” England, where there seems to be no consideration of such matters. 3 The big former temple where Gulliver sleeps belongs to the old days; there was formerly a uniformity of “Big Ender” liturgical practice; and there are odd burial practices related to belief in a Resurrection. 4 Bloom: “The specific content of the belief [in divine providence] is not made precise. It is consistent with a plurality of sects”; 43–4.

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He says in both cases a decline had been brought about by a specific king—and it even sounds like the same king—the grandfather of the “present” king or emperor.5 If “present day Lilliput” corresponds to the England of Swift’s time, then the Emperor is more or less George I.6 The reference to the “small end” practice being established by this king’s grandfather and great-grandfather is difficult to connect with historical individuals; commentators have generally agreed that it was Henry VIII, not an ancestor of George I, who overturned the authority of the Pope, and to some extent “accidentally” brought about a widespread rejection of Catholic teachings, including on transubstantiation.7 Luther had made the attempt to reject transubstantiation while trying to establish a substitute that would provide at least some comfort to ex-Catholics, and this effort was taken up by some Anglicans. Henry VIII’s father, Henry VII, had little to do with such matters.8 Edward VI, the son of Henry VII, was so to speak more of a Protestant. George I’s famous great-grandfather was James I, the first Stewart king of England, who became king there after Henry VIII’s daughter Elizabeth I, and after being King of Scotland for more than thirty years. James was the father of George’s maternal grandmother. He used laws to enforce participation in Anglican rites, but he was focused more on disciplining Protestants who were (so to speak) to the left of the established Church than he was on Roman Catholics; he did not specifically outlaw practices consistent with a belief in transubstantiation, although this may have one of the “non-traditional ceremonies” he personally opposed.9 If James is the “great grandfather” responsible for establishing the small enders, then perhaps the “grandfather” who really started this process was Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, James’ oldest son, who died at 18 before he could become king. (This Henry

5 See I.4 51, I.6 63. 6 As Asimov says: the “physical description of the Emperor of Lilliput is altogether

different from that of George I …. That difference would help Swift maintain that no resemblance was intended ….” (#4, p. 18). 7 Wikipedia: “King Henry VIII of England, though breaking with the Pope, kept many

essentials of Catholic doctrine, including transubstantiation. This was enshrined in the Six Articles of 1539, and the death penalty specifically prescribed for any who denied transubstantiation.” 8 Henry VII presided over the burning of twelve heretics who espoused the views of John Wycliffe (1320 s–1384), including the denial of transubstantiation. 9 See Kerrigan 93–4.

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was not in fact George I’s grandfather). Henry was deliberately raised as a “fierce proponent of Protestantism,” as was Edward VI after Henry VIII.10 “James dismantled [his son] Henry’s legacy as far as he could, moving away from the radical and puritan Protestantism of his son.”11 There may not be a good match between actual kings of England, on the one hand, and the grandfather and great-grandfather who brought about the establishment of the small end doctrine—a variant of Christianity—on the other. As we have mentioned before, Swift is not necessarily forced to match his stories to specific historical details. When we come to the “old laws,” however, which do not seem to be Christian, the grandfather reference makes more sense. There may be no exact match to the “grandfather,” but there probably is one to the great-grandfather, James I. In relating these and the following Laws, I would only be understood to mean the original Institutions, and not the most scandalous Corruptions into which these People are fallen by the degenerate Nature of Man. For as to that infamous Practice of acquiring great Employments by dancing on the Ropes, or Badges of Favour and Distinction by leaping over Sticks, and creeping under them; the Reader is to observe, that they were first introduced by the Grandfather of the Emperor now reigning; and grew to the present Height, by the gradual Increase of Party and Faction. (I.6, 63)12

Here Gulliver reminds us of his earlier descriptions of the ridiculous, servile tricks that courtiers would perform in order to win distinctions. Gulliver observes candidates for “great employments” performing a kind of dance on a high wire; the test was to keep one’s footing in an exposed position, with the political wind—the favor of the monarch or other powerful people—constantly shifting. “The implication is that qualifications for office are by no means related to intelligence, honor, industry,

10 Ackroyd 32. 11 “How Henry Stuart Became the King Who Never Was.” https://www.bbc.com/

news/uk-scotland-42082710. 12 Here Asimov does not do his usual digging as to who and what is being referred to; of the original institutions as opposed to practices introduced later he says only that Swift often looks back to a golden age, which Asimov is convinced never existed. See #11, p. 53.

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and virtue—but to the ability to please in trivial ways.”13 The “badges of favour” are colored ribbons, representing various knightly orders, and to win such favors, candidates must either leap over or crawl under a stick held, and constantly moved, by the Emperor. “That is, [what counts is] excelling at unprincipled changes of belief and sycophantic currying of favor.”14 James I handed out honors, including knighthoods, very freely, beginning even before he arrived in London for his coronation. He was so generous with titles that he was accused of improvidence. The reign of Elizabeth witnessed the creation of 878 knights; in the first four months of the king’s rule, some 906 new men were awarded that honour. The queen had knighted those whom she considered to be of genuine merit or importance; James merely considered knighthood to be a mark of status. … Other titles could be purchased with cash. The diminution in the importance of honour marks one of the first changes to the old Tudor system.15

If Swift does have James I in mind, this would be one of his quiet indications that the reign of Elizabeth was a kind of golden age for England.16 By now we could describe this as conventional opinion, but it goes somewhat contrary to Gardiner’s idea that Swift was a partisan of an older, more Catholic England.17 Swift may deliberately spread confusion as to whether desirable practices belong to the past of Lilliput, or to a possible

13 Asimov #1, p. 28. 14 Asimov #10, p. 30, and generally 27–30; Travels I.3, 38–40. 15 Ackroyd 2–3. See references to selling honors at the highest possible price, including

putting them out for bids, 34. 16 In addressing the king of the giants about his homeland, Gulliver provides a kind of geographic and constitutional overview, and then a history of “about” the past hundred years—which would go back to the end of Elizabeth’s reign. See II.6, 140; Asimov #10, p. 119. 17 There are hints that one part of the move to a national church—making the King or Queen supreme—was a decline from Swift’s perspective, and Henry VIII may be important here. It is personal service to the Emperor that counts the most in the new Lilliput. Also the Empress seems to reflect public opinion in Lilliput when she regards the (new) palace as much more of a “sacred” location than the temple in which Gulliver is allowed to sleep; Gardiner (2004).

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utopian future.18 In general Swift probably wanted to make fairly radical teachings seem salutary by wrapping them in some of the trappings of tradition.

Swift’s Realistic Utopia Is there anything Christian about the good, “old” laws (I.6, 61–63)? One would have to say no. We can focus first on the law that establishes generous privileges and payments as a reward for observing the law for a six-year period.19 One could conceivably “win the prize” many times in a lifetime. There seems to be an assumption that people in general have a constant yearning to break the law. A kind of cash reward, paid after a fairly short period of time so that the “winner” neither has to wait for old age, nor mainly hopes for an inheritance for someone else to enjoy, is part of the answer. Clearly, there is a determination to count on the mere appearance of virtue as opposed to the reality. Then there are penalties which we might consider unusual. Swift’s realistic utopia includes the death penalty for fraud. [The ideal Lilliputians] look upon Fraud as a greater Crime than Theft, and therefore seldom fail to punish it with Death: For they alledge, that Care and Vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a Man’s Goods from Thieves; but Honesty hath no Fence against superior Cunning: And since it is necessary that there should be a perpetual Intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon Credit; where Fraud is permitted … the Knave gets the Advantage. (61–2)

One goal for this society is “a perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon credit”; one would think any kind of sumptuary law, limiting the wealth anyone can acquire, would be ruled out, and laws against usury would be questionable as long as transactions are not actually fraudulent. Taxes in general would be regarded with suspicion insofar as a government that is anything like a welfare state would be inclined to 18 Gulliver “says that disbelief in divine providence disqualifies a man for public office in Lilliput, but then corrects himself and says that Lilliput has fallen into ‘the most scandalous Corruptions,’ so that now rope-dancing, not faith in providence, is the test for public office. Tellingly, this new test came in under the same great-grandfather who made the new law for breaking eggs”; Gardiner (2004). 19 Seventy-three moons; six years and one month.

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regard the people as passive recipients of benefits rather than active participants in a market. Swift makes the point that fraud undermines the basis for commerce, even more than theft does; in order for commerce to be truly free, participants must be able to trust each other; the punishment, apparently, must be death. Contracts are so to speak sacred. There is a problem from the point of view of criminology: if the death penalty is applied in some cases, supposedly to uphold trust, in the absence of any positive effort to teach morality, the prospect of death might simply be one more problem for determined fraudsters to face. In fact is fraud not difficult to prove? If smart people commit fraud, and less smart people are the likely victims, does this not suggest that fraudsters may be roughly as successful in court as they are in shady business deals? With the threat of the death penalty, will smart fraudsters not hire smart lawyers in order to continue their deceitful ways? Oddly enough, there is another provision of the “old” Lilliput’s legal code that seems intended to keep cases out of court. All Crimes against the State, are punished here with the utmost Severity; but if the Person accused make his Innocence plainly to appear upon his Tryal, the Accuser is immediately put to an ignominious Death; and out of his Goods or Lands, the innocent person is quadruply recompensed for the Loss of his Time, for the Danger he underwent, for the Hardship of his Imprisonment, and for all the Charges he hath been at in making his Defence. Or, if that Fund be deficient, it is largely supplyed by the Crown. The Emperor doth also confer on him some publick Mark of his Favour; and Proclamation is made of his Innocence through the whole City.

“Crimes against the State” sounds like treason and similar crimes, but it might also mean crimes in general. In that case, to avoid putting people wrongly accused of fraud and other crimes to death, witnesses bearing false witness will be executed and their victims will receive substantial compensation (cash again). There are presumably more battles between lawyers envisaged here. In Gulliver’s portrayals of the Britain of his time, lawyers come in for criticism that is at least severe as what is extended to doctors. At best lawyers “improve” a system of justice by ensuring checkpoints are installed where the intervention of lawyers is required to proceed. Gulliver/Swift claims that lawyers, given such openings, magnify and prolong their opportunities for profit. They reject opportunities for solutions that accord with common sense notions of justice in favor of

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something more complicated and time-consuming, and in general act for the interests of lawyers in general, including themselves, rather than for anyone else (IV.5, 278–6,282).20 Once again there is an issue of trust; how can one determine whether a witness is telling the truth? The Lilliputians do not seem to expect any aspect of education or upbringing to bring about truthful citizens. To some extent, of course, there are echoes of the Bible here. In the detailed list of laws from God, going far beyond the Ten Commandments, the injunction against stealing is joined by one against cheating or deceiving “a fellow-countryman”; the Ninth Commandment is that one must not bear false witness against another person; this makes it the fifth out of six commandments that relate to our treatment of other human beings as opposed to God. Applications of capital punishment to specific transgressions are what we might call “liberal” in the Old Testament.21 Arguably the commandment against false witness follows (as perhaps all the “human” ones do) from one part of the Great Commandment, “love thy neighbor as thyself,” which Jesus seems to have identified as the one essential law in the Old Testament.22 The Lilliputians do not seem to expect anyone to love anyone else, and there is no evidence they will provide Biblical teachings to children; the point is to simulate a respect for each other, in order to avoid severe earthly punishments, and in some cases to enjoy substantial earthly rewards. Is this enough to make up for a lack of real, heartfelt love of truth, and concern for the well-being of others?

20 Socrates warns in the Republic (405a–b) that if a society requires lawyers, it is already too late to achieve justice. There is too much open distrust, so it is always wise to expect the worst from other people, to anticipate injustice as it were, with a temptation to be the first to strike. 21 According to the Old Testament, there are perhaps ten practices related to “religion” that are capital crimes, and another twenty that have to do with human interaction. A charge can never be established on the testimony of only one witness; if among the witnesses, a malicious witness is found by judges to have borne false witness, he must receive the penalty he intended for his victim: death in the case of a capital crime; Deuteronomy 19: 15–21. This is one of the places where the Bible says “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” There may be more involved in getting a conviction in the Bible than in Lilliput, and in practice the death penalty may be more freely applied in the latter. 22 See See Exodus 20, Leviticus 19:11, Deuteronomy 5; on love of thy neighbor see Leviticus 19:9–18, referred to by Jesus in Matthew 22, Mark 12 and Luke 10.

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One theme for which Swift might have found Biblical support is the proper attitude of children to their parents. Again the Lilliputians seem to be free of any Biblical influence. … the Lilliputians will needs have it, that Men and Women are joined together like other Animals, by the Motives of Concupiscence; and that their Tenderness towards their Young, proceedeth from the like natural Principle: For which Reason they will never allow, that a Child is under any Obligation to his Father for begetting him, or to his Mother for bringing him into the World; which, considering the Miseries of human Life, was neither a Benefit in itself, nor intended so by his Parents, whose Thoughts in their Love-encounters were otherwise employed. (I.6, 64)

The Bible, of course, teaches believers to “honour thy father and mother.” Obligations are owed to human fathers as a kind of reminder or guideline to the obligations that are owed to God the Father.23 Swift seems to refer directly instead to the language of John Locke, who deliberately shifts the family to a set of agreements among individuals, each acting for their own benefit. Anticipating recent feminist thought, Locke gleefully points out that the patriarchal Christian authorities emphasize obligations to fathers much more than to mothers, whereas in Scripture it seems there are equal obligations to both. Locke specifically challenges the notion that adult males derive some kind of authority over children by virtue of being (biological) fathers: “What Father of a Thousand, when he begets a Child, thinks farther then the satisfying his present Appetite? … And indeed those who desire and design Children, are but the occasions of their being, and when they design and wish to beget them, do little more toward their making, than Ducalion and his Wife in the Fable did toward the making of Mankind, by throwing Pebbles over their Heads.”24 This leaves the impression that children are on their own; if they owe nothing to either parent, there is also no sign that the parents owe anything to a child. In the Bible, the union of man and wife is understood to be based on far more than “concupiscence,” even when it comes to the thoughts

23 See Foster. 24 First Treatise #54.

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and feelings of the couple themselves.25 They are expected to see themselves as a natural couple, the whole which is greater than the sum of its parts, following a divine purpose. God has a plan for human beings that has more to do with what human thoughts ought to be than what they might happen to be. In the first “origin” story at the beginning of Genesis, human beings collectively (not only one couple) seem to emerge as naturally as anything else, and they are exhorted to “go forth and multiply” and populate the earth; sex for procreation, and one would say only for procreation, is ordained by God.26 In the second story, there are no actual children of Adam and Eve until after the Fall. They may have had a kind of sex in joy and freedom before the Fall, with their relationship to any children somehow mysterious; after the Fall all children are born in sin, “with the help of the Lord,” and of course one of the first two siblings murders the other.27 Family members may not love each other, but they are stuck with each other as part of God’s plan. The New Testament presents a potentially different picture of family life when Jesus calls on believers to be prepared to abandon family members, when necessary, for the sake of the true faith. A kind of monastic life, with “common messes” stressing the unity of the community of people with a vocation that takes priority over any “outside” commitments, may be the highest kind of Christian life. Yet for those without such a vocation, there may be no higher standard of daily, sometimes grinding commitment, a shadow or intimation of the dutiful obedience that God expects and commands, than life within the family. The great picture or embodiment of family life, of course, particularly for older Christian faiths, is “the Holy Family.” Human life has its miseries, mainly because of the fallen state of man, but human beings are expected to be grateful for what is good in nature, accepting of it as a gift from God, despite the difficulties that arise. The Lilliputians now appear to be completely lacking in any Christian sense of the sinfulness of human beings, their need for redemption, and the

25 Exodus 20: 1–21; Deuteronomy 5: 1–23. 26 Genesis 1.27–8; 9:7. 27 Genesis 3.5–22, 4.1–12.Among the questions that arise if one concludes that no children were born to Adam and Eve until after the Fall: where did the wife of Cain (Gen. 4.17), Adam and Eve’s first born after the Fall, come from? A possibly related question: where did the “sons of the gods,” who suddenly appear (Genesis 6) and find (fallen) human women attractive, come from?

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urgency of interpreting all human institutions, including the family, in the light of these truths as revealed by God. We have suggested that the great opponent of Swift when it comes to modern science is Machiavelli. Part of modern thought is that the human ability to achieve human benefits, in this life, was always submerged or suppressed, partly by a general defeatism—a belief in the power of gods, fortune, or nature—and partly by elites who benefitted from keeping the non-elites in their places. Belief in some mysterious power, whether specifically religious or not, which must be obeyed, would help the elites even if they did not believe in their own teachings. Machiavelli works to help us free ourselves from any notion of a “transgression,” other than a failure to seek the benefit of someone, even if it is only ourselves. In this part of his argument it seems to be a real, objective human benefit, or at least what is perceived as a benefit, that is critical, and old authorities including the Catholic Church can be opposed on this basis. Hobbes and Locke among others introduced liberal political thought with a specific understanding of politics and government, and to some extent specific political arrangements, that are more likely to achieve a widespread human benefit than one could have expected from anything in the past. As Swift implies on behalf of the Lilliputians: the more individuals are encouraged to seek their own economic benefit, the more economic growth as a whole there is likely to be. In the famous fifth chapter of the Second Treatise, Locke spends much of his time on the issue of land, and the proposition that there need be no limit to the acquisition of land and the fruits of the land as long as there is “as much and as good left in common,” so that everyone has roughly the same head start. Historically this became an argument for changing “common” land into private land, so that it can be used for a measurable economic benefit. Locke very briefly introduces money, which of course is not limited in its possible total amount in anything like the same way land is.28 There is a natural right or justice to be pursued, but it does not belong to a community such as a city; it belongs to individuals. The only purpose of government is to protect individuals who have natural rights; and the only moral justification of a government is that it uses force to protect those rights.

28 There is also an “agricultural” argument for the way Europeans took land from indigenous people. If the land was not farmed for someone’s clear benefit, then it was wasted.

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Locke is confident that human beings are born with a “natural freedom” (First Treatise #67); the only arguments to the contrary that he considers are based on the Bible, and he claims to have refuted those arguments in the First Treatise. Man has always had a right to selfpreservation, regardless of any words in Scripture (#86). Locke sees marriage as a contract between two equal individuals, probably terminable within a specific period; women should have a way of getting some assets when a marriage dissolves. Rational individuals will make rational plans as to how many children they can afford, and how best to arrange for their education. Of course caregivers other than biological parents are perfectly capable of making such arrangements—if the mother, for example, chooses to “expose” a child, as she apparently has a right to do. If one thinks only of one’s own benefit as a “parent,” it might seem foolish to care for children when it will be some time before they can reciprocate, and care for “parents” who may be old or infirm. In the case of very young children, Locke refers to “tenderness” on the part of “parents,” and he seems in this context to mean primarily biological parents—something of a departure from parenthood by contract, and one that provides no answer for the care of other helpless human beings. Young children are characteristically attractive, and likely to provoke optimistic thoughts about the future, in ways that are not true of other helpless people. Locke suggests strongly that children can begin working, possibly for pay, at an early age—and thereby join a commercial society based on work and self-reliance. No “parent” has any right to take a child’s pay check, but of course there may be some consideration for room and board. There is always an implication that children will be sufficiently grateful for what is done for them, and sufficiently eager for what they can expect by way of inheritance, to pay some kind of homage to “parents” that will be of some real use in their old age, even if it falls short of what parents sometimes hope for.29 At what may be his deepest, Locke

29 The power of the husband is founded on “contract”; #98. A child may owe “honour” to biological parents, but in some cases only very little, and possibly owes no other kind of duty or subjection, which is owed if to anyone, to an adult who actually cares for the child (#100; cf. II.65–6). In the Second Treatise, every human being is famously equal, entitled to assert rights, in the state of nature. Ch. 6: there is no paternal power as often understood; at most there is parental power. A child only owes a parent anything in proportion to the care and cost of education received (67–8). The power of inheritance comes up in II.72, marriage contracts at II.81.

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provides a kind of Socratic examination of the Old Testament, and particularly of the Ten Commandments. Where the Commandments as written are not reasonable, or they have been interpreted in a way that makes them unreasonable, Locke suggests what he considers—what he believes he demonstrates to be—a reasonable alternative. While barely alluding to some of these details, Swift seems to write in a Lockian spirit.30 After the brief comment on parents and children, Gulliver continues: “Parents are the last of all others to be trusted with the Education of their own Children.” Education is mandatory, compulsory fees are collected based on income, and children move to some kind of common nursery practically at birth. A strict Lockian approach may be too hit or miss: a parent or pair of parents may or may not feel tenderness for a child; even if they do, they may or may not see to the child’s proper development. The first goal is to train them in “some rudiments of docility” by about twenty months of age; once that is established, as it were, they are trained “for such a Condition of Life as befits the Rank of their Parents, and their own Capacities as well as Inclinations.”31 Males of noble or eminent birth are trained in a number of virtues, including “Religion, and Love of their Country”; none of the specifically Christian virtues—faith, hope and charity—are mentioned (64–5). They stay in school until age 15 “which answers to one and twenty with us.” Boys who are “designed for Trades, are put out Apprentices at seven Years old,” very much in the Lockian spirit. Some of the parents whose children are able to attend good schools are relatively poor; nevertheless, they have to pay for their children’s education. “For the Lilliputians think nothing can be more unjust, than that People, in Subservience to their own Appetites, should bring Children into the World, and leave the Burthen of supporting them on the Publick.” There is certainly no thought that each child is a gift, or that having many children shows an acceptance of both God’s love and his justice. In the daily lives of children at school, there is an obvious concern about sexual improprieties and other kinds of misbehavior. The boys are apparently never alone, and never without the company of “a Professor, 30 Bloom (1990): “There is much of John Locke in what Gulliver relates”; 44. Nichols probably has the not-clearly-Christian part of “old Lilliput” in mind when she says “Lilliput is based on Lockian commercial principles”; 1161. 31 Once the aristocratic male children are away at school, their parents only visit twice a year, limited kissing is allowed, but no whispering, fondling expressions, toys or candy (65). The connection between children and their parents is acknowledged, but minimized.

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or one of his Deputies; whereby they avoid those early bad Impressions of Folly and Vice to which our Children are subject.” Girls are dressed by a female servant when they are young, “but always in the Presence of a Professor or Deputy”; boys have male servants for this task, but no other adult accompaniment. There is a distinct concern about female servants in girls’ schools; if these women “ever presume to entertain the Girls with frightful or foolish Stories, or the common Follies practiced by Chamber-Maids among us; they are publickly whipped thrice about the City, imprisoned for a year, and banished for Life to the most desolate Part of the Country” (66). We might say there is more of a welfare state here, even a “nanny state,” than Locke might be comfortable with, especially for children in school. The old and diseased among the “cottagers and labourers,” who are excluded from school and the trades, are supported by hospitals: “For begging is a Trade unknown in this Empire” (66–7). This might sound like Christian charity, but it seems more likely to be a matter of public hygiene, along with a Lockian acknowledgment that if the old and frail are not cared for in some common facility, they are unlikely to be cared for at all. Those who are able to do what is respectable, are required to do so with a clear threat of harsh punishment if they do not; it is only those who are truly unable who receive a kind of charity. Also, of course, money is needed to pay the people who obey the laws consistently. In general, we might say the “old” laws of Lilliput accept a certain amount of human vice driven by passion, and then try to direct it for public benefit. People who are constantly tempted to disobey the law are given substantial rewards, financial and otherwise, for somehow obeying the law for a few years. People who fail are often punished by death—so both extreme fear and a kind of hope fused with greed are motivations that are employed by the law to achieve a superficial, rather than heart-felt, obedience. We can say the law assumes any belief in divine providence will make little difference unless it is constantly reinforced by earthly rewards and punishments. (It seems to be taken for granted that the death penalty applies to murder and other crimes, in addition to what are usually lesser crimes, if crimes at all). There is a clear contrast with the New Testament, perhaps more than with the Old. The Bible quotes Jesus on the old law and the new law; the old law ruled out adultery, to take only one example, in a way that is not completely different from what we find in Aristotle’s writings. Jesus says it is a sin for a man even to lust after a woman in

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his heart, without so to speak doing anything about it.32 The proper Christian attitude begins from an awareness of sin that will be difficult to erase so that one can be saved; divine intervention will probably be required, and a concerted, sustained effort to have good thoughts, in addition to, and probably more important than achieving good actions, seems necessary. None of this is reflected in the “old” laws of Lilliput. The Lilliputians in their realistic utopia do not seek to be ruled by experts of any kind, to say nothing of philosophic rulers; rather to the contrary, they emphasize moral decency over intelligence in their choice of people to lead them. In chusing Persons for all Employment, they have more Regard to good Morals than to great Abilities: For, since Government is necessary to Mankind, they believe that the common Size of human Understandings, is fitted to some Station or other; and that Providence never intended to make the Management of public Affairs a Mystery, to be comprehended only by a few Persons of sublime Genius, of which there seldom are three born in an Age. But, they suppose Truth, Justice, Temperance, and the like, to be in every man’s Power; the Practice of which Virtues, assisted by Experience and a good Intention, would qualify any Man for the Service of his Country, except where a Course of Study is required. But they thought the Want of Moral Virtues was so far from being supplied by superior Endowments of the Mind, that Employments could never be put into such dangerous Hands as those of Persons so qualified; and at least, that the Mistakes committed by ignorance in a virtuous Disposition, would never be of such fatal Consequence to the Publick Weal, as the Practices of a Man, whose Inclinations led him to be corrupt, and had great Abilities to manage, to multiply, and defend his Corruptions. (62–3)

The encouragement of people of dull honesty over people of intelligence and skill makes sense given the massive likelihood that bright and able people might be corruptible, and prone to joining a conspiracy of the corrupt. Better, it seems, to have jobs done poorly or slowly than to rely on experts; the presentation of scientists in the third voyage of the Travels, and of doctors and lawyers in various passages, supports this suggestion. Asimov expresses concern about this “egalitarianism carried to an uncomfortable degree,” and “anti-intellectualism.”33 He seems to confuse a 32 Matthew 5.17–47; “there must be no limit to your goodness.” 33 Asimov #8 and #9, p. 52.

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pure democracy, with officials chosen by lot, with partisan patronage— a winning party’s people in, regardless of merit, the losing party’s people out. Swift does not say the little people look for partisan passion; they look for a passion for virtue. For Asimov, this raises grave difficulties when it comes to enforcement of this alleged rule. “As Swift points out earlier, it is much more difficult to defend one’s self against fraud than against theft, so that fraud is the greater crime. Well, it is a lot easier to pretend to be moral than to pretend to be intelligent so that one runs a much greater risk assuming a man to be moral than assuming him to be intelligent.” Swift’s solution may be to balance the unskilled amateurs and a certain kind of trained person. Swift may favor giving considerable power to a legislature of amateurs in order to require experts to maintain at least a semblance of genuine public service.

The Upper Classes and Liberal Education There is obviously one thing in this model Lilliput that is very important, but not discussed in detail by Swift or Gulliver: the curriculum at the elite schools, for people “of Noble or Eminent Birth,” people “of Quality,” up to age 15 in the case of boys and 12 in the case of girls. We are given a bit of detail about the boys: their clothes and food are “plain and simple,” and they seem to converse only among themselves, their professors, and people who are deputies to the professors. A rigid hierarchy of class is maintained, especially once the seven-year-olds who are headed off to be apprentices leave school. The children of quality must remind us a bit of the Houyhnhnms in the fourth voyage. There are two hours a day of “bodily exercises” (with less “robust” exercises for the girls), and otherwise hours of “Business,” eating and sleeping. One cannot help but be reminded of the famous “public” schools of Britain, where the upper classes pay high fees (usually with no government to charge a sliding scale based on the parents’ income) so that their children can occupy those classes as well as their parents, or better. It is not said here that the graduates are expected to hold any kind of paid job when they graduate, so they may preside over a kind of commercial republic without taking an entrepreneurial or business-like part in it. It is difficult to believe they are to be found wrangling in court as to who is a cheat, who is a traitor, who is a liar, and who deserves to be executed if they are found guilty of these crimes.

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The implied separation between the upper classes, who presumably enjoy some kind of leisure, and the working/money-making/litigating classes, is emphasized even more when Swift offers one more eccentric application of the death penalty. Ingratitude is among them a capital Crime, as we read it to have been in some other Countries: For they reason thus; that whoever makes ill Returns to his Benefactor, must needs be a common Enemy to the rest of Mankind, from whom he hath received no Obligation; and therefore such a Man is not fit to live. (63–4)

Swift refers to a specific “Benefactor” to whom one owes gratitude. Perhaps Swift thinks citizens will owe gratitude not to the laws or the community as a whole, but to particular individuals who have provided benefits much more directly. We are discussing only a few lines of the text of the Travels, but the eccentricity of the thought here is striking. Capital punishment for ingratitude? Along with capital punishment for any false accusation, which might include an accusation of ingratitude? Showing gratitude for a clear benefit given may be the easiest or most visible kind of justice—so much so that one might ask: if you are not capable of gratitude to a friend, when something good has been given to you, you can presumably not be trusted to do any good to anyone at all, unless you somehow find it to your own advantage to do so. Lawmakers must be interested in these matters because it is important to know whether anyone has any true motive for justice, if this involves a choice as to what is good for oneself, or not. The way citizens are treated may hinge on the answer to this question. On the other hand, gratitude and ingratitude seem to be private matters, at least as much as fraud and the family which also come up in connection with “old Lilliput.” How can the law possibly deal with private relationships, somehow weighing what has been given, and what is (therefore) owed? Does the apparently realistic utopia become extremely unrealistic at this point? There is a Jacobean play (written during the reign of James 1, 1603– 25), of which Swift was probably aware, which focusses on a law which provides capital punishment for ingratitude.34 A father and son, who are

34 The Laws of Candy, probably written in the 1619–23 period. First published in the Beaumont and Fletcher folio of 1627, but thanks to discoveries beginning in the twentieth century, no longer thought to be authored by either John Fletcher or Francis

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both active in a decisive battle, compete for the distinction of greatest servant of the city. The soldiers at large vote for the son, and the father is outraged, even when the son asks for a statue honoring his father. Because the father went into debt to finance the troops, he seems to be forced to live in poverty; if he had won the competition, he might have asked for cash. After a few plot twists, the father goes before the Senate to accuse his son of ingratitude, knowing the penalty is death (One might have thought he would accuse the city of ingratitude). A princess makes the same accusation against the father; she had paid his debts, and asked only that father and son be reconciled. The son makes the same accusation against the princess because she had turned against the father, contrary to the son’s wishes. The father recants when he realizes that the country has been brought to the brink of ruin by these circular accusations, beginning with his; all the leaders are under sentence of death. The characters are concerned about honors and even money that only the city can give, but until the father makes a move, they put their private relationships first. Purely private relationships, in which benefits and harms are constantly weighed, have the potential to destroy any sense of community, and any ability of leaders to govern. Swift might point out that if we cannot count on a participant to stop the game of musical electric chairs, a law providing the death penalty for false accusations might be just the thing to prevent this kind of snowstorm of accusations of ingratitude. Gratitude seems to be an example of reciprocity—returning like for like—and therefore of justice; but law may be a crude instrument to apply in order to bring more gratitude into the world.35 Aristotle says in the Ethics that reciprocity is important, but what is called for may vary not only according to what is given, but also to the relative ranks of the people involved. “In many cases reciprocity is at variance with [simple] justice.” If an official strikes a lay person, it is not right for the latter to strike back; on the other hand, in the reverse situation, the official is right both to strike back and to seek further punishment. Rank can provide a reason Beaumont. John Dryden [d. 1700] in “Essay on Dramatic Poesy,” probably written in 1666, has a character say that Beaumont and Fletcher’s plays “are now the most pleasant and frequent entertainments of the Stage; two of theirs being acted through the year for one of Shakespeare’s or Jonson’s: the reason is, because there is a certain gayety in their Comedies, and Pathos in their more serious Plays, which suits generally with all men’s humors.” 35 On Aristotle’s treatment of ingratitude in the NE, see Lorraine Pangle, Chapter 6: “Quarrels, Conflicting Claims, and Dissolutions.”

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to make a “return” less or more severe. In defense of the laws of Athens or any community, we might say there is no equivalence between the city harming an individual, and a mere individual harming a city. The ability to deliver “returns,” good or bad, to another person, is essential to a community of interaction, and to a polis; it is a mark of a free person as opposed to a slave. It is “exchange” (metadosis) which binds people together. This is why we set up a shrine of the Graces [kharites ] in a public place [as an obstacle or impediment], to remind men to return a kindness (antapodosis). For that is a special characteristic of grace [kharitos ], since it is a duty not only to repay a service done one, but another time to take the initiative in doing a service oneself. (NE V.5, 1132b21–1133a5)

Here again we find the thought that a more helpful contribution to a political community is to give in an anticipatory way, as it were hoping to set an example, rather than to always wait for good things for which one might reciprocate. We need to be reminded of such matters: the love of justice is not particularly strong; nor is the tendency to show proper gratitude. A habit of “giving” of oneself in an anticipatory way may be easier, in some ways, than weighing whether to be grateful in each situation, but this habit can also be difficult. Of course there is a possibility of reciprocal harm as well as reciprocal good, and the delivery of appropriate harm may be more a matter for the law than for private revenge.36 The law establishing capital punishment for ingratitude seems to be one more thing that could have citizens constantly in court, enriching lawyers. If Swift’s “little utopia” is as realistic as we have suggested, one would expect gratitude, along with a gracious anticipatory gift-giving, between people who are equals, and accept their equality; they do not harbor resentments, or manufacture grievances. This may be more typical of graduates of schools with a gentlemanly liberal arts curriculum than of others in the society. Such equals can be gracious and grateful to each other; anything like this is unequal or unfair between unequal classes. What would the gentlemanly liberal arts curriculum consist of? It would 36 NE V. 5. At the beginning of this chapter, Aristotle says people “want the justice of Rhadamanthus”—strict retribution in terms of penalties or pains, as if reciprocity were the same as justice. The city and its laws can inflict a penalty in an impersonal way; they are not “hurt” in the way an individual is. Rhadamanthus and Minos were said to be two of the three judges of the dead in Hades.

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no doubt resemble the curriculum of Trinity in Dublin, from where Swift graduated, and that of Cambridge when Gulliver attended there beginning at age 14. Great books by ancient authors would be the core of such a curriculum. Another question Swift does not clearly raise or answer is: given that there will be an “elite” who are liberally educated, what role do they play in government? If there is a lower house of parliament made up of dull but honest amateurs, of various walks of life, is there an upper house made of up the (often rich) liberally educated? Do such educated people owe their education or their lives to the community, so that they have an obligation to serve, perhaps out of gratitude? Or might they conclude that the community does not understand true education, and would only be able to tolerate it, without really cultivating it, by some kind of accident. (Hence, perhaps, the silence about curriculum in the realistic utopia). If this is true, the educated might owe the community little or nothing—even if tuition fees are subsidized by some public agency in case of need. Socrates suggests that a young philosopher is obligated to take a turn at ruling, but only in a situation where there is already a philosophic ruler, providing for a truly philosophic education (519d–520d).37 Even in this “ideal” situation, philosophers would apparently see public service as a burden to be avoided as much as possible; and it is likely that the ideal situation has never occurred. It is possible that people with a liberal education have a consistent role in government that is somewhat concealed, as in More’s Utopia.38 Even if this is the case, citizens may be taught that a liberal education is desirable as an end in itself, and the educated person need not answer to anyone as to how exactly she or he is going to make the world a better place. It may be better for the liberally educated to be regarded with indifference rather than hatred or distrust; and it may be better that they leave the community at large alone rather than do actual harm to it.

37 In Plato’s Crito, Socrates has the laws of Athens say Socrates owes them everything; his parents would not have met or had sexual intercourse had it not been for the laws (50c-e). This is surely a somewhat tendentious argument which Socrates would probably not offer in his own name; the laws do not claim to know much about the education of the young. 38 See More (1975, p. 52, and generally 43–71).

CHAPTER 5

Heroic Ancients

No one in Gulliver’s Travels ever expresses any interest or belief in an afterlife of rewards and punishments for good or bad actions or habits. The rational horses seem to have a vague idea of an afterlife in which one lives with one’s ancestors.1 The Lilliputians, meaning primarily the “vulgar,” have maintained an eccentric belief that bodies must be buried in a certain way with a view to an upcoming resurrection; we are left to infer that this has to do with some kind of Christianity.2 There is a kind of “little utopia” that may be possible for Lilliput, presented in the guise of “old Lilliput,” in which the laws seem to depend on a belief in “divine providence.” In practice, however, the laws are supported by powerful incentives in this world: harsh punishments for disobedience, a somewhat lavish cash reward for a long life of obedience.3 Swift presents us with a kind of picture of an afterlife during Gulliver’s third voyage, but this afterlife seems to make no reference to the Bible or Christianity. In a way Swift’s afterlife, where Gulliver speaks with the dead, is a place where justice is done, as with the Christian afterlife, but here this seems 1 IV.9, 309–10. 2 I.6, 61, Gardiner (2004). The description of this practice (bodies upside down) barely

matches any known practice by any large group of Christians. 3 I.6, 61–64; divine providence 63.

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to relate entirely to one’s reputation, above all for public-spiritedness, and whether such a reputation is deserved or not. There are no rewards and punishments based on a Christian understanding of virtues and vices, nor even a debate about such matters. The afterlife in the Travels is a source of education about the one life on earth we are most certain to have. Swift’s afterlife is an important part of his preference for the ancients as an alternative to the moderns and, as we can see quietly but unmistakably, to the Christian understanding as well.

Speaking With the Dead Gulliver’s discovery of an afterlife in the third voyage is part of an extended presentation of what we might call “modern Europe.” The third voyage overlaps the first in some ways; the third voyage is unique in that we are confronted with both “intellectual virtue,” with certain virtues taken to extremes, and modern science. Gulliver arrives at the famous Flying Island of Laputa, and the land of Balnibarbi below (III.2–6). In both places, we find experiments that are consistent with the work of the Royal Society in Swift’s and Gulliver’s time. The theme of “modern science” may or may not continue for the rest of the third voyage—the only one in which Gulliver travels to several somewhat different places, and there are many different people or beings. Politics and religion make their appearance, reminding us of the first voyage, and this time there is clearly an “Ireland.”4 Unlike some of the other people Gulliver visits, no one in these places forces him either to stay or leave, yet he somewhat restlessly keeps asking to see more places, and he eventually chooses to return home. Whereas at the beginning of this voyage we find human beings who are determined to conquer nature, as the voyage goes on we seem to find human or other beings who have succeeded in doing so. The Struldbruggs have somehow found a way to live forever, albeit as miserable elderly people—or are forced to accept such a fate (III.10). Even before the immortal Struldbruggs, with whom Gulliver does not communicate, Gulliver encounters someone who enables him to communicate

4 The war waged by the scientists against the people “below,” giving rise to a rebellion by a specific city which resembles Dublin, may indicate that the Old Catholic vs. Protestant conflict is of decreasing significance “at home.”

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with the dead. This turns out to be a very promising part of Gulliver’s education.5 The first “country” Gulliver comes to after the land of the Projectors is Glubbdubdrib (III.7–8). The ruling tribe are all magicians, and the “prince or governor” is able to call forth the dead and make them perform as servants for 24 hours. It is surely bizarre, and unique to Swift, that the Governor only calls up the dead, including some very distinguished luminaries, in order to use them for one day as servants—cleaning houses, serving food and so on. When he wishes, he can make the “ghosts” or “spirits” disappear with a snap of his fingers. In some ways he has solved the “servant problem”: he does not need to recruit, train (apparently) or feed them—they do exactly as they are told, and make no trouble. Perhaps this is Swift’s suggestion about how most of us would like to use history if we could get away with it: make it serve our causes or personal purposes, our ancestors and past leaders always heroes, their actions falsified to fit a narrative, our opponents distorted in an opposite way. It may be typical of moderns that while they make assertions about their superiority to people in the past, they do not respect such people enough even to learn what one can learn from them. On the other hand, the great opportunity that arises for Gulliver is that he can learn true history, with no distortion whatsoever. The dead, when they are called upon, answer questions freely, and apparently tell the strict truth as far as they know it; among other things, issues that have puzzled historians can be cleared up.6 Gulliver is not only able to sort out more reliable written accounts from less reliable ones; he can go beyond written accounts and gain reliable eye-witness testimony. Strictly speaking, Gulliver does not go to where the dead are; such a journey, sometimes called a “katabasis ” from ancient Greek, is likely to be seen as frightening in more ways than one. One might come to fear one’s own fate in the afterlife, whether one deserves a specific

5 Every one of Gulliver’s major adventures depends on an accident of some kind. In the third voyage, Gulliver wants to go home as soon as he has finished with the Laputans and Projectors; the journey is long and has to be carried out in stages. Only because of these delays does he spend time in Glubbdubrib (where one can visit the dead), Luggnagg (where the cruel king is also ruler of the Struldbruggs) and (briefly) Japan. 6 Gulliver is told that the dead “would certainly tell me Truth; for Lying was a Talent of no Use in the lower World” (218).

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fate or not.7 Odysseus’ visit to Hades in the Odyssey is only one famous “katabasis ”; he also takes part in a “nekyia” or “calling up and questioning of the dead”—necromancy, which is what we see in the Travels.8 The dead come to where Gulliver is, and answer his questions. Almost none of them express any regret about how they lived their lives, so they can hardly be said to be warning Gulliver to change his ways, other than by the example they set. Gulliver first visits for ten days, apparently telling of his earlier travels in increments. After this part of the visit, the Governor actually orders Gulliver to question the dead. … his Highness the Governor ordered me to call up whatever Persons I would chuse to name, and in whatever Numbers among all the Dead from the Beginning of the World to the present Time, and command them to answer any Questions I should think fit to ask…. (III.7, 218)

Perhaps it has become clear that Gulliver is more of a student—a learner— than other visitors to this land, and more than the Governor himself. Gulliver has largely gotten over his emotion in the presence of the dead (the ghosts made his “flesh creep”—probably the first published use of that expression), so that his curiosity is taking over.9 This is one part of the Travels in which it seems Gulliver’s desire to learn becomes more

7 The undeserved fate might be more frightening if it is completely beyond one’s control. Traditionally the place where the dead reside was seen as “beneath” the living world, hence one “went down” to get there. 8 The nekyia may have been new with the Odyssey—perhaps no one was previously presented as speaking to, and in this way learning from, the dead. Gulliver as far as we can tell is the first person to converse in detail with the dead in Swift’s cosmos. After Homer, eventually the meanings of katabasis and nekyia became blurred. 9 See “curiosity” III.7, 218; “insatiable Desire … to see the world in every Period of Antiquity,” 220; “Desire to see those Antients, who were most renowned for Wit and Learning” III.8, 221; a desire to hear presentations by Descartes and Gassendi (mainly to hear Aristotle’s response), 222; a somewhat less passionate or optimistic interest in “the modern Dead,” 223; disgust with “modern History,” 224; in a kind of desperation, a “desire that some English Yeomen of the old Stamp, might be summoned to appear”; 227.

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important than other motives.10 The Governor must have had some experience with conversing with the dead, rather than simply making them serve, but we learn nothing of how those conversations—or conversations between anyone other than Gulliver and the dead—might have gone. There seems to be no attempt on the Governor’s part to accumulate the knowledge that the dead might have to share. The Governor does not propose any specific topics, and it takes time for a dominant topic to emerge as Gulliver converses with some of the dead. He says his “first Inclination was to be entertained with Scenes of Pomp and Magnificence”; it is not clear he is even asking for speeches. It is possible his overall impression of both Laputa and Balnibarbi with their modern science was of a complete lack of splendor—a kind of grunginess or depressing greyness in human lives. We soon learn that Alexander the Great wants to correct the record: “he was not poisoned, but dyed of a Fever by excessive Drinking”11 ; Hannibal similarly assures Gulliver “he had not a Drop of Vinegar in his Camp.”12 There is no explanation of why these details matter, but we can 10 See I.1, 16 (failing business); I.8, “my insatiable Desire of seeing foreign Countries would suffer me to continue no longer”; II.1, “Having been condemned by Nature and Fortune to an active and restless Life … I again left my native Country”; II.8, “… my evil Destiny so ordered, that [my wife] had not Power to hinder me [from leaving]”; III.1, “the Thirst I had of seeing the World, notwithstanding my past Misfortunes, continuing as violent as ever.” There is no strong statement about Gulliver’s curiosity at the end of the third voyage, or the beginning of the fourth. 11 219. Why would authors make this particular mistake? For those who see Alexander as a hero, his being the victim of assassination or murder is better than death by alcohol poisoning. The story even suggests that he would have accomplished even greater things had it not been for the machinations of others. Alexander is apparently forced to tell the disreputable truth. Asimov has a long note: Even though death at an early age was common, especially if pre-modern physicians had intervened in an illness, it was common to ascribe such a death to poisoning (#9, p. 184). Rather than the workings of God and nature, about which one could do nothing, this would be a kind of secret human intervention about which it might be possible to do something. 12 Remarkably, there were suggestions that Hannibal had used vinegar to split or dissolve limestone rocks during the crossing of the Alps (Asimov #10, 184). Swift rejects what might be called the alchemical or proto-scientific explanation for Hannibal’s success. The use of chemistry might have made Hannibal more effective, but also less heroic in a traditional sense; more of a modern. Asimov notes that “next to Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan, [Hannibal] was the most consummate warrior in history”; he adds that a comparison with the Duke of Marlborough would be meaningful. Especially once he changed from Whig to Tory, Swift attacked Marlborough for putting his personal honors and wealth ahead of his country.

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gather that these great leaders have some idea how they have been treated in history books, and they correct what authors have said.13 They seek justice when it comes to their accomplishments and reputations. Finally Gulliver gets some of the spectacle he was seeking: Caesar and Pompey “at the Head of their Troops,” “the former in his last great Triumph.” Gulliver seems interested only in ancients, not moderns; this is where splendor is to be found, and eventually a focus on ancients will raise more questions about justice and reputation. After a few famous names, there is a different reference to moderns as opposed to ancients: I desired that the Senate of Rome might appear before me in one large Chamber, and a modern Representative, in Counterview, in another. The first seemed to be an Assembly of Heroes and Demy-Gods; the other a Knot of Pedlars, Pickpockets, Highwaymen and Bullies. (219)

As far as justice and reputation are concerned, an ancient assembly deserves high praise; a modern one, nothing but contempt. Where does Gulliver get such notions, simply by looking at two groups of dead people? Does it have something to do with his education as we have seen it so far? It seems rather that this falls into the category of what was, or had recently been, conventional opinion—indeed, an opinion which is likely to be fairly common among people with some education in history. One can easily imagine that Gulliver’s thoughts reflect his reading of “the best authors, ancient and modern,” alluded to in the opening pages of the Travels. There is a reminder by Swift that books of history might present us with great and inspiring examples—both undermining our belief that we live in the best times so far, and giving us something to aspire to.14 The ancients focused on war and made heroes of people who excelled, set a noble example, or indeed saved their cities by force of arms. For the

13 Asimov’s note ends: “One of Swift’s purposes in this passage is to show that history cannot be believed.” 14 Asimov firmly refuses to accept that older is better; in the belief that such a view is a mere prejudice, he comes close to the reverse prejudice which Swift so often opposes. Among other things, he says the “real” Roman senate lacked pity, and was perhaps only admirable for “a stubborn resolution in the face of looming disaster.” Pity, of course, is a Christian virtue which Romans could hardly be expected to emphasize; and “stubborn resolution in the face of looming disaster” may be a sign of great virtue. “It is astonishing that Swift, in a section devoted to showing the unreliability of history, should fall such a victim to the lying propaganda of Roman encomiasts”; #15, p. 185.

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moderns, “pedlar”—if not some of the other terms used here—is high praise: a man of commerce and peace, simply trying to make a living more or less honestly. At least as long as you live in a rural area where you keep seeing the same people, which was certainly common in Swift’s time, there is little incentive to be dishonest.15 Of course honest pedlars might be at the mercy of “pickpockets, highwaymen and bullies,” who are hoping to achieve the material gain without the long hours of effort. There is a small-scale war by criminals against their fellow-citizens rather than the kind of war that makes for grand, even historic reputations. The scientists we see in the third voyage will never constitute a majority of the population, and if they need support from taxpayers, they are going to need pedlars who keep the peace more than warriors who break it.16 Gulliver may have been convinced by the earlier parts of the third voyage that there is something noble that is missing in the modern picture of life at what might seem its best. As to why the ancients might have been more heroic or in some ways better than us, one answer might be that the smallness of cities, combined with a rough equality in technology and even population, meant that battles were both frequent and inconclusive. The qualities of warlike skill and valor, combined with public-spiritedness, were highly likely to be valued.17 A bit later Gulliver gets to speak with three modern Kings, who all say that “they did never once prefer any Person of Merit, unless by Mistake or Treachery of some Minister in whom they confided: … and they shewed with great Strength of Reason, that the Royal Throne could not be supported without Corruption; because, that positive, confident, restive Temper, which Virtue infused

15 Insofar as business depends on reputation or marketing, Benjamin Franklin reminds us that “honesty is the best policy”; that is, it is a policy. 16 The Flying Island is used to extort tax revenue from the people below; III.3, 188–

191. 17 Hassner on Hegel:

Virtue itself, in the sense of subjective moral reflection or in the sense of virtue’s determining a particular individual character, has a place in the daily life of modern societies founded on systematization and objective universality, only in extraordinary circumstances and conflicts of duties. In primitive and ancient states, heroic virtue had its place because there was room for the action of exceptional individuals. Today, once the modern state has been constituted, the rational system replaces them; (745). Countries and machines get bigger, people arguably get smaller.

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into Man, was a perpetual Clog to public Business” (III.8, 224–5). Whatever their vices, the Romans were known to prefer leaders of outstanding virtue over mediocrities who simply wanted to keep the peace and get business transacted. For the most part they seemed to recognize that great virtuous persons would have great ambition, above all for great honors, which unlike material benefits, cannot be shared. Taking all of this into account, Swift’s contrast between an ancient and a modern assembly may stand. The brief comments on Caesar and Pompey prepare us for Caesar and Brutus. The great dictator and his leading assassin have become friends, to some extent mutual admirers, in the afterlife. I was struck with a profound Veneration at the Sight of Brutus; and could easily discover the most consummate Virtue, the greatest Intrepidity, and Firmness of Mind, the truest Love of his Country, and general Benevolence for Mankind in every Lineament of his Countenance. I observed with much Pleasure that these two Persons were in good Intelligence with each other; and Caesar freely confessed to me, that the greatest Actions of his own Life were not equal by many Degrees to the Glory of taking it away. (III.7, 219–20)

Caesar himself suggests that the killing of Caesar was an act of surpassing greatness—surpassing his own historic deeds. Perhaps the suggestion that every member of the Roman Assembly was a hero and a demi-god was an exaggeration; the praise of Brutus is in a way more measured, but all the more impressive for that. Of course Gulliver suggests once again that he can see the worth of people at a glance. One can easily imagine as before that his thoughts reflect his reading. There is surely a tendency to think that with all of Julius Caesar’s military and political accomplishments, there is something to the charge that he violated the Constitution of Rome in becoming dictator, and put his personal glory ahead of the good of the city. Brutus, on the other hand, is likely to be celebrated as a different but even more remarkable person—a morally superior person, a savior of the Republic (for a brief time), a Stoic, a thinker—succeeding on a more elevated plane such that glory might come later, but it can be seen as greater or more lasting.18

18 Asimov says again that Swift goes wrong in following (some) historians in his praise of Brutus. Swift may intend to put Brutus before the Duke of Marlborough, or even to

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Brutus and Others: Heroes and Citizenship Whatever exactly the reasons for his importance to Swift or Gulliver, Brutus speaks at more length than any dead person so far. He turns out to spend much of his time not with Caesar or other contemporaries, but with five people who according to Gulliver are, with Brutus himself, the best of the best. In some cases in the Travels Swift steers Gulliver and the reader toward the best or highest community or regime; here we are asked to consider the greatest individuals. This is one of the most-quoted passages in the Travels. I had the Honour to have much Conversation with Brutus; and was told that his Ancestor Junius, Socrates, Epaminondas, Cato the Younger, Sir Thomas More, and himself, were perpetually together: A Sextumvirate to which all the Ages of the World cannot add a Seventh. (220)

Brutus seems to confirm Gulliver’s assumption that it is more promising to look for great people among the ancients than among moderns (to say nothing of medievals), but there is no support here for the notion that the whole Roman Assembly was heroic. We are asked to focus more realistically on a few leaders; even among them, there is a stress on virtue that includes, but goes beyond, political or military virtue. What do these six have in common? We can say briefly that they took some part in “politics,” or the active life of their communities, and suffered for it. The Brutus who is speaking struggled with his conscience or his well-known Stoic principles in deciding what to do about Caesar’s dominance, and arguably sacrificed his career and reputation in service to the city. His famous ancestor Junius was one of the founders of the Roman republic, helping to overthrow the last king and serving as consul. When his own sons were convicted of conspiring against the new republic, he ordered them executed. Leaving Socrates aside for the moment, Epaminondas was a Theban general in the time just after the famous “Peloponnesian” war between Athens and Sparta. In a way he won every battle, achieving freedom for Thebes and the Beoetians, subduing Sparta and freeing Spartan (Greek) slaves, but lost the war in the sense that the Greek cities collectively became weaker through these wars, so that they were easy

present himself as Brutus, “bringing about the recall and disgrace of Marlborough with his satiric broadsides”; #17, 185–6.

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pickings for Philip of Macedon, Alexander’s father. “He was an honest man and, as often happens as a consequence of honesty, he died poor.”19 Cato the Younger was known for his commitment to specific moral teachings in addition to political and military success; he “fought in Africa against Caesar and committed suicide when the battle was lost” (Asimov). That leaves Thomas More, who again we can deal with separately. Five of the six are ancient Greeks and Romans—but not necessarily the most famous in either case. Swift’s list of six is not completely idiosyncratic, but it is unusual for a learned person of his time. If we turn to Plutarch’s Lives, it is instructive to see overlaps and differences with the Travels. Brutus’s ancestor is only mentioned briefly by Plutarch, in unfavorable contrast with his descendant Brutus; he does not get a parallel Greek life. Brutus is paired with Dion of Syracuse, tyrant and student of Plato; Caesar is paired with Alexander, Pompey with Agesilaus, Cato the Younger with Phocion. None of these Greek “partners” makes it into Swift’s top six. On the Greek side, Epaminondas is paired by Plutarch with Scipio Africanus or Aemilianus, who does not make Swift’s list. It would be conventional to praise the great Greek law-givers, a few of whom are in Plutarch, including Lycurgus of Sparta; Pericles who provided democratic Athens with wise leadership and presided over a golden age of Greek culture and letters; and statesmen/generals including Themistocles. Neither these Greeks nor their Roman pairs are in Swift. Why not Alcibiades on the Greek side, who is paired with Coriolanus? On the Roman side, why not Cicero, who led the fight against a prospective dictatorship of Cataline, before Caesar, liked to be known as the “savior of the Constitution,” and also left behind an impressive body of philosophic works? Cicero suffered for his public service, arguably like the “big six,” and indeed he died violently when he was on the losing side in a civil war. Pericles and others may have achieved prudence—the ability to care both for oneself and for the community—and lived to a ripe age. Prudence may be too boring for writers who are looking for heroes.20 While we are addressing lists of names, wondering who is included, who is missing, and why, this might be the time to note that Swift and Gulliver do not praise any women by name, except Glumdalclitch, the young companion who helps with little

19 Along with following quotations: Asimov #19, 186. 20 See Aristotle NE VI.5.5, VI.8.

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Gulliver’s daily needs when he lives among giants. This in itself presents a contrast with the works of Plutarch in particular. Unlike Homer and Socrates, Swift does not suggest he has encountered any wise women from whom he could learn.21 Both Socrates and More might seem out of place in Gulliver’s or Swift’s list. (In the list in the text, Socrates is the third of the first three; More is the third of the second three). They are the only two thinkers/writers on the list and like Brutus, they are more likely to be heroes to intellectuals than is Julius Caesar or other great generals and conquerors. Both were executed under the laws of their time (or in More’s case, by a lawless king), yet part of their fame is that they performed real service to the political community, and made at least some effort to avoid the confrontation that led to their death. To a considerable extent they combined a kind of moral heroism, intellectual weight and public service. Neither the execution of Socrates nor that of More could have been a great surprise. Each of them lived in such a way that they might have gotten into serious trouble with the authorities at any time. While not exactly counseling law-breaking, or a complete retreat from the life of the community, both encouraged thinking for oneself, going back and forth between some kind of first principles or basic questions, and the decisions one faces here and now. The Athenians, citizens of what was in some ways the most enlightened city in the world at the time, recognized Socrates’ superiority, and seem to have experienced guilt even while they killed him.22 More, of course, was executed on the orders of Henry VIII, his erstwhile employer, on the ground that More insisted Henry was violating specific points of Roman Catholic doctrine that Christians had a duty to uphold—most notably, the supremacy of the Pope over kings and other sovereigns. More was arguably trying to function as a faithful attorney to the King—showing him how he could get what he most wanted—an acknowledgment of Anne Boleyn as Queen (although More did not recognize the annulment of Henry’s first marriage, or “the spiritual validity of the king’s second marriage”), and succession to the 21 On women in Plutarch’s Lives see Buszard. See Plato Menexenus (Aspasia, companion of Pericles) and Symposium (Diotima, a possibly mythical woman). 22 Apology 36a; cf. 33d–34b, 38b. Of the “big six,” Socrates seems to be the one along with Brutus whom Asimov is convinced needs to be taken down a peg; there is even a suggestion that Socrates, far from being “Christ-like,” deserved to be executed for his support for antidemocratic trouble-makers; #19, p.186.

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throne for Anne’s and Henry’s children (meaning, as it turned out, Elizabeth I)—as long as he didn’t claim too much. The supremacy of the Pope would have to be accepted. More is even more of an anomaly in the list of six than Socrates; chronologically he is a modern, whereas the others are all ancients; and there seems to be no good reason to doubt that he was a Christian. Swift praised More very highly in the pamphlet Concerning the Universal Hatred Which Prevails Against the Clergy, in stark contrast to his condemnation of Henry VIII. “Among all the princes who ever reigned in the world, there was never so infernal a beast as Henry VIII in every vice of the most odious kind, without any one appearance of virtue.” Among Henry’s “detestible crimes,” he “cut off the head of Thomas More, a person of the greatest virtue this kingdom ever produced.”23 In both of these praises of More, there is no actual reference to More’s Christian views—and no clear answer to the vexed question of whether Henry VIII, founder of the Anglican communion in which Swift was a priest, was a heretic. (Swift does accuse Henry of “sacrilege”). In the afterlife to which Gulliver gains access via Glubbdubrib, More is the only dead Christian or saint who speaks or appears; as we shall discuss, there is nothing Christian about the glimpses we get of the afterlife. It seems possible that Swift almost surgically excludes anything about Christianity from his praise of More.24 More is a great man, a great public servant who was prepared to sacrifice both for his country and for his principles, and he therefore belongs in the Sextumvirate. He is a kind of honorary ancient— placing him among people who of course never heard of Christianity.25 Another possible anomaly raised by the Sextumvirate is the possible nameless “seventh”; Gulliver tells us that “all the Ages of the World cannot add a Seventh.” Asimov ingeniously suggests that if Swift had lived a few more decades, George Washington would be a good candidate for the

23 Quoted in Traugott. 24 This may be an example of Gardiner’s point that Gulliver seldom finds Christianity

because he seldom looks for it—it’s often as if he has never heard of it. 25 Pangle and Ahrensdorf on More:

“Sir Thomas More, we are tempted to say, watched with critical Platonic eyes the nascent beginnings of or preparations for modernity and chose to die a martyr in the fight against it. By thus taking his stand, the Platonist saint prepared us to appreciate more fully how radical is the break effected by Machiavelli in his philosophic founding of modernity” (124).

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seventh; “not so much for having won the independence of his country, but for not having taken advantage of his deed to make himself king.”26 Of course in another note Asimov flirts with the suggestion that Swift in attacking the Duke of Marlborough identifies with Brutus who more literally attacked Caesar.27 Could Swift not be the seventh? If so, this would remind us again of writers and thinkers who take only a limited role in political or active life, as opposed to great individuals who are primarily men of action. Gulliver makes no further comment on the Sextumvirate after commenting on the possibility of a “Seventh.” In the last paragraph of Chapter 7 he notes that he eventually saw, but apparently did not converse with, “vast Numbers of illustrious Persons,” particularly “the Destroyers of Tyrants and Usurpers, and the Restorers of Liberty to oppressed and injured Nations.” This description is only vaguely a good fit with the Sextumvirate—they were failures at overcoming tyrants and restoring liberty, more than they were successes; and we are not given any examples. Did this investigation confirm his preconceptions as to who was praiseworthy and who was not? Gulliver now seems to be a defender of liberty and justice, and he seems to think it is only among the ancients that he must look for great examples: he has called them up from “every Period of Antiquity.”28 For now we will move beyond a discussion of Homer and Aristotle, and then Aristotle and Descartes. After those discussions, focused on writers and thinkers, there is a return to considering virtuous people as opposed to vicious ones. In the last pages on Glubbdubdrib and conversations with the dead, we find mainly nameless moderns. There are generalizations to the effect that people are more vicious than Gulliver expected, he can now trace where various kinds of viciousness entered a family tree, and to some degree people were better in the past than they are “now.” There is one passage which returns us to famous ancients, however, with named individuals both real and (probably) imagined. Surprisingly, this passage emphasizes that famous ancients

26 #20, 186. 27 For the Drapier’s Letters Swift signed himself “M.B., Drapier.” Damrosch: “The

initials may have been an allusion to Marcus Brutus.” 28 Gardiner suggests a contradiction: in the second voyage Gulliver tries to convince the King of the Giants to try the use of gunpowder in order to become all-powerful; how can he now be for liberty and justice?; Gardiner (2004).

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could be as vicious as any moderns, and in some cases have wrongly been given credit by historians. Gulliver has made great progress in using the testimony of actual participants in, or witnesses to, events in order to see the falseness of books of history. I had often read of some great Services done to Princes and States, and desired to see the Persons by whom those Services were performed. Upon Enquiry I was told, that their Names were to be found on no Record, except a few of them whom History hath represented as the vilest Rogues and Traitors. As to the rest, I had never once heard of them. They all appeared with dejected Looks, and in the meanest Habit; most of them telling me they died in Poverty and Disgrace, and the rest on a Scaffold or a Gibbet.

This prepares us for a story about a Roman ship’s commander who tells Gulliver he served well in the important battle of Actium, alongside his son who was killed. This was the battle in which the rule of the emperor Augustus was secured against the great Marc Antony, one-time supporter of Julius Caesar, then co-ruler with Octavian/Augustus in a “Triumvirate.” When the captain, after the battle was over, asked for the command of a “greater Ship,” this was refused, and the post was given to “a Boy who had never seen the Sea, the son of a Libertina, who waited on one of the Emperor’s Mistresses.” There is at least a hint of a parallel between two fathers and two sons; the Emperor (Octavian, who took the title “Augustus” when the war was over) seems to have favored his illegitimate son. The obscure father remains, appropriately, nameless. The conclusion seems to confirm that someone very powerful took revenge against the more obscure captain. Returning back to his own Vessel, he was charged with Neglect of Duty, and the Ship given to a favourite Page of Publicola the Vice-Admiral; whereupon he retired to a poor Farm, at a great Distance from Rome, and there ended his Life. I was so curious to know the Truth of this Story, that I desired Agrippa might be called, who was Admiral in the Fight [superior to the nameless captain]. He appeared, and confirmed the whole account, but with much more Advantage to the Captain, whose Modesty had extenuated or concealed a great Part of his Merit. (226)

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It turns out the ghosts have to tell the truth, but not necessarily the whole truth; the virtuous might be modest. Once again a sought-for position went to a favorite, with no consideration of merit; “favourite Page” may imply a lover. Historians tell us that when the outcome of the sea battle at Actium was still in doubt, Cleopatra (Queen of Egypt, and Antony’s longtime love) made the decision to escape either temporarily for strategic reasons or in order to save the treasury. Antony soon followed her, perhaps not realizing what she was doing, and widespread panic among his forces soon followed. Another account suggests that Cleopatra and Antony had planned together to leave before it was too late. Swift seems to have added the story that the nameless captain made the greatest difference to this battle by being personally responsible for the destruction of three ships. “Publicola” may be a character Swift added “to give the tale circumstantial verity.”29 Besides a sustained preference for ancients over moderns, it seems Gulliver is learning—or Swift is giving him the opportunity to learn— to replace a kind of boyish hero-worship with a more sober or mature consideration of what makes a person praiseworthy. Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, his successor Octavian, and Mark Antony are all somewhat diminished by Swift’s presentation; Brutus and other members of the Sextumvirate, along with Cato the Younger and less famous people, are elevated. Generally speaking, the text of Gulliver’s Travels comes down on an anti-imperial rather than a pro-imperial side.30 An empire can gather wealth in the capital city, and this may result in many of the trappings of “civilization,” including science.31 On the other hand this 29 Asimov #34, 192. As is often the case, it is likely that Swift had a contemporary story in mind in addition to an ancient or timeless one: the treatment of Charles Mordaunt, who was an earl and an admiral; Asimov #35, 192. 30 Damrosch says Swift came to agree with the Tories in their hatred of “the fiscal-

military state”; they objected to Marlborough not so much because of his decisions or judgment, but because his career depended on a hateful scheme of financing and empire. Swift “would always fiercely condemn the entire policy of British imperialism”; 170–1. 31 The whole of Swift’s revised account of Actium, according to Asimov, “is very unlikely, actually. Augustus was a firm ruler, as decent and virtuous as a ruler can be expected to be, and he surrounded himself with capable men”; #35, 192. It seems fair to say Asimov is pro-empire—pro-Julius Caesar, pro-Augustus, pro-Alexander the Great— and he is irritated at Swift being pretty clearly on the “anti” side in each case. Asimov is clearly pro-Caesar and anti-Brutus; see again #17, 185. This may fit with the dispute about being pro- or anti-modern physics, and in this way various chapters of the third voyage may be tied together.

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supports a corrupt teaching that it is power that matters, and there is likely to be a contest among those who wish to assert arbitrary control over both the capital and the empire. A crowded, rich capital city may see a decline of various kinds in the quality of life of many people—exemplified in some cases by the actual spread of disease. The decline Swift sees in the Europe of his time may be related to empire. Gulliver does not stick consistently with a suggestion that there has been a kind of steady decline in the quality of human beings, reaching bottom (so far) in his or Swift’s time. At one point he says a decline is notable over a period of about two or three hundred years (III.8, 223); later he says the previous one hundred years show a decline, particularly in the way “the pox” or venereal disease (syphilis) has destroyed people’s appearances, and caused early death (224, 227). It was widely understood that some of the epidemics that plagued Europe had resulted from travel to, and contact with, many foreign lands.32 Swift focusses much more on virtues of the soul than on bodily disease. In his utopias based on both the reality of ancient cities and the books of ancient political philosophers, Swift shows a strong preference for a small independent community, probably not conspicuously wealthy, which is dedicated to decision-making based on deliberation by equal citizens. Modern science, as presented in the third voyage, may flourish in what we have come to know as liberal democracy, but it will also offer temptations to would-be tyrants. The greatest individuals, it seems, are participants in this kind of conversation. It seems safe to say that according to Swift, truly admirable people are never particularly common; in one way or another they may have been more common among the ancients. This prepares us for the Houyhnhnms or rational horses of the fourth voyage, who must be based on some combination of actual ancient cities and books such as Plato’s Republic.33

32 See the arrival of the plague in Athens according to Thucydides; it was most likely brought from a distant land like Egypt by Athenian ships (II.48, 52–54, I.104–5). 33 Reiss sees some of what is going on here.

On his second voyage Gulliver is the defender of mankind, on his third the objective observer, and on his fourth the vehement attacker. However lacking this [Glubbdubrib] episode may be in dramatic interest, it is, nevertheless, the pivotal point of the Travels in terms of Gulliver’s psychological development. What he learns here makes possible that extreme abhorrence of humanity which so dominates his personality on the fourth voyage (228).

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Aristotle vs. The Moderns Going back a bit: at the beginning of Chapter 8 of the third voyage, Gulliver is still sticking with the ancients, but now he is interested in those “who were most renowned for Wit and Learning.”34 Perhaps he has exhausted the category of heroes of liberty. Homer and Aristotle are called up—not on their own, but with all of their Commentators, whose numbers are vast. This is a passage to appeal to anyone who has sat through a boring class led by a professor, or struggled with the assigned reading. I proposed that Homer and Aristotle might appear at the Head of all their Commentators; but these were so numerous, that some Hundreds were forced to attend in the Court and outward Rooms of the Palace. … I soon discovered that both [Homer and Aristotle] were perfect Strangers to the rest of the Company, and had never seen or heard of them before. And I had a Whisper from a Ghost, who shall be nameless, that these Commentators always kept in the most distant Quarters from their Principals in the lower World, through a Consciousness of Shame and Guilt, because they had so horribly misrepresented the Meaning of those Authors to Posterity. (III.8, 221)

Apparently, for anyone who knows anything about it, the greatness of the works of Homer and Aristotle, in contrast to the work of commentators, is obvious—at least as obvious as was the greatness of Brutus at a glance. It turns out the main claim to fame of the commentators is that they can explain the thought of great authors. The paradox is that we all seem to know it is the thought of the greats, not the thoughts of (let us say) scholars, that interest us; perhaps we are hoping that the commentators can provide short-cuts to the wisdom that really matters. Unfortunately, the work of all the commentators, according to Gulliver or Swift, is a disgrace; there is no real substitute for reading the somewhat difficult Reiss does not stress the repeated suggestions that people were better sometime in the past; in principle, as Patey (1995) suggests, this provides some hope that they may be better once again. If the English have really only declined dramatically in the past hundred years, and primarily because of the pox (III.8, 223–4), there would seem real hope of reversing at least some of the noted decline. 34 Once Homer appears, one might wonder why there is no mention of Chaucer and Shakespeare, arguably the greatest English poets. It may be that anyone who is correctly classified as a medieval or a modern is excluded.

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books on our own. Swift gives us a glimpse of the joy or exhilaration that might be available from doing the work involved, and making discoveries. Homer himself along with his commentators are dismissed quickly. Then we come to Aristotle. His commentators are even worse than Homer’s. In these contacts with the dead, Swift loves to point out cases where not only is it necessary to compare unreliable books to reliable ones, but also all books may be unreliable—it may be that the only way to “be sure” is to question a reliable person who knows something at first hand. In some cases, Gulliver confirms something that he learned from books.35 Unfortunately, we might say, the issues on which historians have been correct, or on which it is easy to check once you see people, are relatively unimportant. It almost seems that the more important an issue is—who deserves credit for a successful battle, or for saving a community or fighting for liberty itself, who deserves praise or blame for personal qualities rather than luck or vice that is successfully obscured—the more difficult it is to establish something close to the truth.36 Of course, it helps that the dead people Gulliver calls up are under some obligation to tell the truth as they know it. Obviously in the real world it is not possible to converse with dead people, nor to be confident that in such documents as their letters or memoirs they always tell the truth.37 The most intelligent response, on matters that Gulliver now seems to regard as most important—matters of justice, virtue, praise and blame, as well as the lasting worth of writings—seems to be to remain skeptical, and keep asking questions. If books in general are unreliable, there seem to be such

35 Spartan broth is indeed hard to stomach, especially if you are not used to it. There are some things it is not possible to confirm in a satisfying way; see III.8, 222. On the other hand, Gulliver discovers with complete confidence that Homer’s eyes “were the most quick and piercing I ever beheld.” Asimov says “Swift is as intent on exposing historians as liars as he was, earlier, on exposing scientists as fools. The one point on which all traditions concerning Homer agree was that he was blind”; #3, 188. 36 Swift notes that he is particularly “disgusted with modern history” (224). Asimov says the golden vision of the ancients is “the produce of … self-serving lies”; #23, 190. 37 When Swift/Gulliver stresses how the personal memoirs of people who were close to a leader, or part of important meetings, are remarkably contradictory and inconsistent, and therefore unusually unreliable rather than reliable (III.8, 224–5), Asimov says wisely: “When we think of all the inside stories told by people with actual roles in World War II incidents, in the Cuban crisis, in Watergate, and realize how mutually exclusive so many of the revelations are, we realize … that the past is as impenetrable as the future”; #26, 191.

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things as great books which are far above average in reliability, and this fact may guide Gulliver in the fourth voyage in particular. This helps us understand the exchange between Aristotle and Descartes, which seems to focus on physics, but actually opens a number of vital questions. I then desired the Governor to call up Descartes and Gassendi, with whom I prevailed to explain their systems to Aristotle. This great Philosopher freely acknowledged his Mistakes in natural Philosophy, because he proceeded in many things upon Conjecture, as all Men must do; and he found, that Gassendi, who had made the Doctrine of Epicurus as palatable as he could, and the Vortices of Descartes, were equally exploded. He predicted the same Fate to Attraction [gravity], whereof the present Learned are such zealous Asserters. He said, that new Systems of Nature were but new Fashions, which would vary in every Age; and even those who pretend to demonstrate them from Mathematical Principles, would flourish but a short period of Time, and be out of Vogue when that was determined. (III.8, 222)

Aristotle left behind books that seem to attempt a kind of comprehensive account of what was known at the time: above all physics, metaphysics, plants and animals, politics and ethics. When he claims, in a setting where all witnesses tell the truth as they know it, that all accounts of “Natural Philosophy” or “Systems of Nature” will prove to be conjectural sooner or later, and therefore subject to fashion, this claim seems to have some authority. As a truth-teller, like all the “ghosts,” he acknowledges his own mistakes in natural philosophy. Swift never describes any ancient approach to science or philosophy in any detail; he is more concerned to show what is wrong with the moderns. The main point here seems to be that the moderns exaggerate how much they can know, and indeed the certainty with which they are able to know anything. If they are mistaken in preferring a certain kind of physics on the ground that it delivers certainty, with the idea that it is reasonable for human beings to make politics and probably morality somehow fit this great truth, then they may be forced on their own terms to consider ancient approaches

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which they may seem to have had solid reasons to reject.38 Swift’s Aristotle may be right, and Asimov may be wrong, as to whether Newton’s understanding of gravity, and the old Epicurean view of “atomism,” as popularized or updated by Gassendi, can now fairly be described as “conjectural” or speculative, as compared to stating provable and verifiable fact or reality.39 Going beyond the question whether or not physics is conjectural, is everything we might claim to know conjectural? Political debates, including discussions of virtue, vice and heroism, might appear to involve an abandonment of a careful pursuit of the strict truth. They might nevertheless be an unusually promising pathway to the truth given that we are human beings, using articulate speech for a variety of purposes high and low.

Other Afterlives We have said that the afterlife in the Travels evokes no echo of the Bible or Christianity. Gardiner suggests that the exploration of the lives of the dead, made possible by “necromancy,” is all a great sin.40 Humans are promised that they can exert a power that is only available to God; even the attempt to exert such a power bespeaks the sin of pride, and if humans actually exercise such a power, this can only be the work of the Antichrist or the Devil. It is arguable that in the Bible the dead are dead until the Resurrection; that there is no communication between the dead and the living; and that at the Resurrection, the saved gain eternal

38 Swift points us toward a comparison between Aristotle’s comment in the third voyage and a view attributed to Socrates in the fourth: Gulliver explains that modern Europeans have disputes about “natural philosophy,” and the Master Houyhnhnm “would laugh that a Creature pretending to Reason, should value itself upon the Knowledge of other Peoples Conjectures, and in Things, where that Knowledge, if it were certain, could be of no Use. Wherein he agreed entirely with the Sentiments of Socrates ….”; IV.8, 310. 39 Asimov #8, #10, #11,189. 40 Gardiner (2004).

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life, the damned do not.41 On the other hand, Gardiner seems to overlook the fact that there are afterlives in literature, somewhat resembling the one in the Travels, some of which seem to be inspired by Christian sources, and others of which at least acknowledge the need for divine or supernatural wisdom. If we look for examples that are of some relevance, we might think of Dante’s Inferno, and especially the presentation of Limbo (Inferno, Canto IV).42 Limbo is the first of the nine circles of hell, where dead people live in a way that is relevant to their characteristic sin. The dead in Limbo are people who lived good lives, but lack the Christian faith through no fault of their own. Limbo seems substantially better than (the rest of) Hell, but it differs from Heaven.43 Dante moves in a way Gulliver does not on a literal katabasis —a trip downward to learn about the dead. Unlike Gulliver, Dante makes no attempt to question or converse with anyone in Limbo, as he does in the case of the “heretics,” somehow including Epicurean philosophers—the point seems to be simply to confirm who is there, and why.44 Apart from these differences, there is a striking similarity between Dante’s Limbo and Swift’s 41 In the Old Testament, any claim to be able to establish communication between the living and the dead is ipso facto a claim to be a medium or spiritualist, and such activities are to be punished severely. See Leviticus 19:31, 20:27, Deuteronomy 18: 10– 13, Isaiah 8:19–20. The New Testament confirms that only God should be consulted on spiritual matters. The story of Saul, Samuel and the Witch of Endor is the exception that proves the rule; if the dead can be brought back to life, it is only by God’s agency, and Saul is eventually punished for trying such a thing. Samuel 28: 1–25, 1 Chronicles 10: 13–14. See also https://www.amazingfacts.org/media-library/study-guide/e/4987/ t/are-the-dead-really-dead. 42 There was no complete translation of Dante’s Comedy into English until decades after Swift’s death, but the work was certainly well known—for example by Chaucer. The Comedy was unusual in being printed, in as many as ten editions, in the period before 1501—the earliest period of the printing press. Dante’s work achieved this distinction despite not being written in Latin, but in a dialect of Italian. The work was available in Swift’s time in both Latin and French. 43 Arguably the people in the “Vestibule,” strictly speaking outside Hell, are worse than the people in Limbo; movement between these two does not seem difficult. Dante is famous for presenting in detail the orthodox Roman Catholic view of things, but in many ways he questions it. 44 Sixth Circle (farther “down,” Canto X). This circle is a bit of a mystery. Ostensibly

occupied by “heretics,” there is no mention of Christian or pseudo-Christian heretics such as Arians or Monophysites. Instead we find Epicureans, and Florentines like Dante who may have taken different sides in the disputes of that city, but seem no more sinful than Dante. There is a kind of patriotism or public-spiritedness that is discouraged or undermined by the Church.

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afterlife. Especially notable in Dante’s Limbo is the presence there not only of Virgil and other great pagans, but also specifically of Aristotle, “master of those who know” (maestro di color che sanno) (4.131). One could learn a great deal in Limbo.45 This reminds us of a picture of the afterlife in Plato’s Apology of Socrates. The Athenian jury first finds Socrates guilty on a number of charges (35d); then chooses the sentence of death rather than the somewhat luxurious sentence proposed by the accused (38b). In his last speech in this dialogue Socrates delivers “oracles,” first to those who voted to condemn him, and then to those who voted for him (39c ff.). To the latter he says he is more convinced than ever that death is not bad—at least for him.46 It seems he has doubted for some time that anyone knows “whether death does not even happen to be the greatest of all goods for the human being” (29a–b; cf. 30c–d, 37b); since we are free, as it were, to speculate, we might as well imagine a death that is desirable rather than undesirable. Socrates admits to only two possibilities. One is that death is simply a more or less pleasant sleep, in which case it is like the best night of sleep we have ever had, and therefore somewhat better than our life as a whole. The other possibility is his own version of Hades (40e ff.). According to stories that are well known to the Greeks, famous judges—people who are famous for meting out justice to the just and the unjust—will be there, along with famous muses and poets, Homeric heroes and others. Some people may suffer in Hades, but not, apparently, Socrates: “To converse and to associate with them and to examine them there would be inconceivable happiness.” While Socrates claims to have no reliable information about life after death, he seems to share a concern with his “religious” audience that people ought to get the afterlife they deserve. He seems confident that he in particular deserves a good afterlife. Earlier in his trial, he bragged to the Athenian jurors that he was a hero in every sense known to them, and therefore he should be followed, celebrated and fêted rather than tried and executed. Like Gulliver at the end of the Travels, he focused on

45 Thomas Aquinas, whose reputation depends partly on his great commentaries on the works of Aristotle, apparently resides in the 4th circle of Paradise (Paradiso Canto 10). From Swift’s perspective, he may be among the leading examples of a commentator on Aristotle who remains apart from Aristotle for all eternity. 46 The arguments about the immortality of the soul in the Phaedo are if anything even more focused on reassuring loyal supporters of Socrates, and suggesting a good afterlife not so much for virtuous people in general, as for philosophers specifically.

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encouraging virtue, especially among the young, as many of his accusers claimed to do, but he did so much more consistently and seriously than anyone else (23e–26a). Any claims that he was impious or an atheist were nonsense, since the very activities which had made him famous were inspired by none other than the oracle at Delphi, and he was very open in saying he was guided in many important decisions by a demonic voice (20e ff., 26a–27e, 31c ff.). Any testimony that he taught physics to the young, and thus undermined theological teachings, could not be proved, at least by witnesses who were present at his trial (19c–d). If he questioned authority, it was only because he questioned whether anyone was sufficiently wise to wield the authority that the city claimed. He compares himself in the dialogue to Achilles, bravely facing death because he was following long-held convictions (28c–d).47 Even at the risk of angering the jurors, which obviously might be counter-productive if he was trying to win an acquittal, he says with no hesitation that he is braver and more virtuous than any of them, and wiser only in the sense that he knows when he does not know something—as well as, of course, when (apparently) none of them knew something. Somewhat more quietly, he makes it clear that he has always focused on doing what is good for himself.48 Perhaps he uniquely deserves a good afterlife, even a great one. This prepares us for the thought that in the afterlife, the people with great reputations will be cross-examined just as the Athenians have been when Socrates was alive. The Athenians did not necessarily like this very much; they sometimes felt like a horse that is repeatedly stung and kept awake, for no clear reason (30e–31a); and as we know, they were able to do something about it. There is no reason to think Socrates—unlike many of his interlocutors—would truly welcome an endless sleep; he is perhaps the ultimate apostle of wakefulness. The great thing for Socrates in the afterlife would be that he will be able to question anyone he wishes, in any way he wishes, for as long as he wishes; this time it will not be possible to execute him. There is at least a possibility that this will be a kind of heaven 47 Socrates manages during his trial to mention three battles in which he served Athens: Potidaea, Amphipolis and Delium; Plato Apology 28d–e. 48 Socrates was apparently always convinced that participating in vice was worse than

death (see above), but he is pleased that avoiding public service has allowed him to avoid death until now (31c–e, 32e). In addition to being “stationed” or “ordered” by the god, Socrates seems to have “stationed himself” (28d). He consistently seeks what is good for himself (37b–c), and of course the unexamined life is not worth living (37e–38a). It is pleasant to hear human beings being examined (23c, 33b–c).

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for Socrates, hell for everyone else.49 From Socrates’ perspective something like Dante’s Limbo has the advantage, perhaps even over Heaven, of opportunities for articulate speech with interesting people. Perhaps Swift with his afterlife is confirming that the dead do live somewhere which is a paradise for Socrates, if not for anyone else; or he may be agreeing with Socrates that for someone concerned with education and self-knowledge, this is the best possible afterlife one could imagine. (Of course there is a similarity between Socrates’ and Swift’s afterlife; the people chosen for cross-examination have no escape; Swift makes them literally prisoners, at one’s beck and call, and adds that they must tell the truth). There may be a kind of heaven, perhaps even a glimpse of the “isles of the blessed,” for everyone who studies human life seriously; everyone else presumably suffers a kind of ignorance that leaves them in a less happy condition—which it would be unreasonable to call punishment.50 Swift’s afterlife resembles Socrates’ in that there are no people one can confidently describe as Christians there, with the notable exception of Thomas More. We can find another non-Christian example which no doubt inspired Plato. The glimpse of the afterlife in Plato’s Apology alludes to Hades and Homer and reminds us of a specific part of Homer’s Odyssey. This work recounts the long, difficult, sometimes almost unbelievably pleasant journey of Greek hero Odysseus as he returns home from the Trojan War. Odysseus lived with the witch-goddess Circe for a year— agreeing to love her in return for having his men restored from swine into their human form. Odysseus is reluctant to leave, but he and his men eventually get free from circe on condition that they stop by Hades and ask for advice from the (dead) prophet Teiresias (X. 475 ff.). Odysseus is not necessarily strongly motivated to speak with the dead, any more than

49 Lucian has Menippus report:

Socrates still goes about proving everybody wrong, the same as ever; Palamedes, Odysseus, Nestor, and a few other conversational shades, keep him company. His legs, by the way, were still puffy and swollen from the poison. Good Diogenes pitches close to Sardanapalus, Midas, and other specimens of magnificence. The sound of their lamentations and better-day memories keeps [Socrates] in laughter and spirits; he is generally stretched on his back roaring out a noisy song which drowns lamentation; it annoys them, and they are looking out for a new pitch where he may not molest them. “Menippus, a Necromantic Experiment.” 50 Plato Republic 519c.

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Gulliver is when he first gets the chance. Once in Hades, Odysseus has other people he wishes to speak with (including, unlike with Gulliver, a number of women), and the heroes he knows from the Trojan War come forward (XI.385 ff.).51 In this context Odysseus encounters Achilles, who was famously killed in the late war, and the latter complains that he would rather be a serf or slave above ground than a king in the underworld (465–540). This conclusion substantially undermines the understanding of noble or sacrificial virtue that motivated Achilles for much of his life.52 The noble comes to sight as what is desirable for its own sake, differing from what is good in that there may be no answer to the question exactly why or how the noble is good in the sense of good for oneself, the doer of noble deeds. In the Iliad, very much the book of Achilles, Achilles engages in a bit of a Socratic dialogue on questions that are raised by noble virtue, such as: if virtue is a sacrifice of what is good, rather than an example of it, why is it rational to pursue it? One possible answer, to some extent obscured or concealed when people want to emphasize the sheer glowing beauty, the self-justification, of the noble, is that noble action will be rewarded with an appropriate afterlife—better than the one suffered or enjoyed by less noble people. Achilles apparently finds there is no such satisfying afterlife for him.53 We can infer that the afterlife is the same for him as for everyone else: grey, mundane, pedestrian, every day so to speak the same as every other day. This is plausibly a punishment, even a possible vision of hell (or life in the Soviet Union), but apparently the same for everyone in a way that brings would-be heroes down to size.54 For non-heroes this drab equality may be a relief, and may even appear to achieve justice; for heroes it is apparently a great disappointment.

51 Lucian’s Dialogue of the Dead has a great deal in common with Homer’s Hades, but very little in common with Swift’s afterlife. The only people who are in both Lucian’s and Swift’s “afterlife” are Homer, Alexander the Great and Hannibal. Despite some parallels, “the direct influence of Lucian [on Swift] is not very clear”; Eddy 419–20. See also Dupree 350–51, 360; Traugott 534. 52 See Lucian, “Dialogue of the Dead,” #26 (15), “Achilles and Antilochus.” 53 See Iliad IX, 307–420. 54 The dead maintain some of the same grievances they had in life, and they seek justice from Minos, who apparently administers justice somehow; we do not learn of any actual outcomes; Odyssey XI: 145 ff., especially 541–571.

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The Odyssey, which comes chronologically after the Iliad, may be from Homer’s point of view an ascent. There are only looks backward at Achilles and at the Greek victory at Troy, which was more the result of Odysseus’s cleverness—the Trojan Horse—than of Achilles’ bravery and skill in armed combat.55 The direction of the two Homeric classics may be away from hero-worship, and toward putting more of an emphasis on ordinary public-spiritedness—routinely thinking about the good of a community—along with rationality, including a calculating or means-ends rationality which is necessary to deal with emergencies. Achilles the hero withdraws from the war when he does not think he is getting his just desserts; eventually he returns to battle, with the debate about ways of life apparently making little difference to him until he is dead, when it is all too late. Odysseus, generally referred to by such terms as “wily,” like a coyote, may be more familiar with debates about the noble vs. the good—they may even have been fairly routine for him, unlike Achilles, since childhood.56 He serves the Greek cause without hesitation, but also without taking undue risks, and shows the Greeks how to win with the famous wooden horse. There may be a similar movement in the Travels. When Gulliver, toward the end of the Travels, wants to claim with some indignation that his work contains no lies, he compares himself to Sinon, and his promise to the Trojans that he is not a liar. This of course was a lie, since it was Sinon’s lies that enabled the “horse” to succeed, and Swift reminds us that it may be necessary to lie in order to achieve one’s goals.57 Perhaps persuasion of people who might resist your views requires the introduction of a seemingly plausible and palatable “Trojan Horse.”58 Gulliver is a kind of low-rent Odysseus, eventually after many adventures 55 Rather than winning a conventional battle, the Greeks overcame the Trojans by

sending a group of people in a vessel into foreign territory, where they were neither wanted nor expected. This anticipates the European imperialism of Swift’s time. 56 In Plato’s Republic we are told the just city requires that the guardians not be taught dialectic until they are 30 (537c ff.); there is good reason to believe this is much too late for a philosopher (536 c–d). 57 Dante puts Odysseus in one of the lowest circles of Hell as punishment for the Trojan Horse—specifically for lying. This is eccentric within Dante’s pages in various ways. Dante identifies both himself and Virgil as liars, and identifies to some extent with Ulysses/Odysseus; see Barolini 126–7. 58 Sinon, while he is not mentioned by Homer, managed to get the Trojan Horse inside Troy—an episode that is described in Homer’s Odyssey. We owe an account of Sinon’s role to Virgil. Travels IV.12, 328–9; Odyssey VIII, 482–520; Virgil Aeneid II.

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coming home to his wife; he does not seem reminiscent in any important way of Achilles.59 When he speaks with the dead, Gulliver admires Homer himself, but shows no interest in conversing with any Homeric hero; even Odysseus may be too heroic for him. Socrates, we might note, looks forward to speaking in the afterlife with Odysseus, but not Achilles. Gulliver does not mention his encounters with the dead when he is summarizing his travels later, but he seems to have learned something. It may be wise to be skeptical of hero-worship, and emphasize something like consistent service to a community instead.

59 Odysseus is very much his wife’s lover; Gulliver at the end apparently can’t stand the thought of sex with his wife. Traugott says “Swift parodies the fabulous adventure story, turning Ulysses into … Gulliver”; 559.

CHAPTER 6

Rational Horses and Humans

Cruel Humanitarians and Xenophobic Citizens The land of the Houyhnhnms or rational horses in the fourth voyage is somehow “the” utopia in the Travels, of which the land of the giants is a foreshadowing. Neither the giants nor the horses are based on any actual society in Swift’s time. Both are more or less from books1 ; and more or less Greek.2 If the giants remind us of Aristotle’s Ethics, the horses echo Aristotle’s Politics, Plato’s Republic and More’s Utopia, the latter the book in which the word “utopia” is coined, and which itself is inspired by the Platonic dialogue.3 For now we will give only a few indications to 1 One clue is that Gulliver travels on a ship called the Adventure at the beginning of these two voyages, and not the others. 2 See above on the giants and Aristotle’s Ethics. 3 Nichols presents a number of similarities between the Houyhnhnms and the citizens

of the just city in Book V of the Republic; Nichols (1981), pp. 1154–56, 1159. There are similarities in Gulliver to Aristotle’s best regime as well as to the just city in the Republic. In several respects, however, Swift is closer to Plato: above all, Houyhnhnms are like philosopher-kings, who never existed and probably never will exist, whereas Yahoos potentially cover the range of all actual human beings; Aristotle approaches a proposal for philosopher-kings by suggesting an entire city can somehow philosophize (Politics 1324a23–35, 1325b16–31). It is also notable that the land of the Houyhnhnms, unlike Aristotle’s best regime, has no trace of priests or a temple; see Republic 461a; Politics 1329a27–33, 1331a19 ff., 1335b15.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_6

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support these claims. One link between the two utopias is the apparent belief that human beings as Swift knew them, and to a great extent as we know them, deserve to be wiped off the face of the earth.4 What must be striking to the reader is the (almost) unquestioned commitment on the part of the Houyhnhnms to what is good for their community. It seems that for this to happen, individuals must have souls organized with reason ruling; they are then a microcosm of a community organized in the same way.5 The utopia seems to present not only justice, but also happiness. More seriously, perhaps, there is a focus in the two utopias on liberal education, at least for aristocrats, with an emphasis on poetry and (in the case of the giants) music.6 No one but the giants and horses seems to have poetry. The Flying Islanders love music, which they treat as related to mathematics, but their music is horrible. The Houyhnhnms may not have enough technology for musical instruments, or any need for music. It would be an understatement to say these are major themes in Plato’s Republic, and in the best regime in Aristotle’s Politics.7 The development and nurturing of music and/or poetry shows a commitment to the human soul in something like its full complexity. One paradox in the Republic is that the just city needs to wage almost constant war on Eros in the sense of purely private desire; but its authority must rest partly on a claim that it can make human beings happy, including the satisfaction of desires that would normally be described as erotic.8 Modern scientists of course develop the mind, and reason at least in an instrumental 4 See II.6, 145; IV.9, 305, 307. 5 In the Republic we are given reason to believe the philosopher is the unique type

of human being who has a soul organized with reason on top; only with a philosopher ruling is the city ruled by reason in the same way. The philosopher is also highly erotic, however—as much so as a tyrant. The more we conclude the philosopher is either ultrarational (not moved by honor or other goods the city can deliver) or ultra-erotic (searching for something the city is unlikely to provide), the less likely is “the best regime” of philosopher-king. 6 On poetry see II.7, 149; IV.9, 308, IV.10, 313. On music II.6, 137–8. 7 See Republic 376e–403c, 595a–608b, Politics VII.14–15, 17, VIII. See also Lord. 8 In the Republic the theme of Eros is attached to Glaucon. Glaucon and his brother

have both been praised for their service in war (368a); Glaucon is musical (398e–399d); connected to this fact, he loves boys with beautiful souls, even if their bodies are not perfect (402d–e); he thinks a guardian who is successful in war should be able to have sex with whomever he pleases (468b–c); in short he is an erotic man (474c–475a). He is identified by his brother Adiemantus as a timocratic man, and specifically a lover of victory, representative of the second best regime; Socrates responds that in several respects Glaucon

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sense; but these things in Swift’s presentation are disconnected from both the individual soul and from the community that can reflect and support a fully rational and passionate human being. People in the first and third voyages pursue their personal interests, or those of their faction or professional association, at the expense of any common or public benefit—even at the expense of their own happiness. The giants of the second voyage, on the other hand, seem utterly public-spirited, albeit not egalitarian. In the fourth voyage, Gulliver seems to find what he has been looking for, or what Swift has been trying to show us, from the beginning. When Gulliver seems to admire the political projectors of the Royal Society, both when he is with the giants (II.7, 148–9) and when he visits the projectors in the third voyage (III.6), he seems to denigrate things that should be admired—old-fashioned prudence and devotion to the common good— and admire things that should be denigrated—trying to solve political and moral issues by surgical, physical or chemical means. This shows that the moderns might “mean well” in the sense that they want to solve age-old human problems in dramatic new scientific ways, and this might be attractive to Gulliver until he talks to the dead, or at the latest when he meets the rational horses—even before he lives among them. Gulliver encounters the animals called Yahoos before he meets any rational horses. At first the Yahoos are apparently beasts or non-human animals, unattractive, inarticulate and disgusting, with a posture and attributes that seem inhuman; there is at least a note of surprise in the fact that they leave human or human-like footsteps. Gulliver says, for example, that if there were any pigs around, he would be able to show that Yahoos are the second-dirtiest animals at worst (IV.7, 296). Rational horses from their first appearance are very impressive. It is almost automatic that one would like to avoid being identified with the former group, and one would aspire to join the latter. The Houyhnhnm society is rigidly hierarchical, based on the abilities with which horses are born, with at least six classes identified by color; members of distinct groups were not “born with equal Talents of Mind, or a Capacity to improve them.” Gradually we learn that the Yahoos are not simply ignored by the horses, and kept at some distance in order, as it were, to preserve propriety; at least some Yahoos are enslaved by force and deliberately brutalized. The lowest-class horses do menial work, not that different from the population of Yahoo slaves; differs from such a man (548d–549a). Plato’s Symposium is by comparison a pro-erotic dialogue, consistently undermining the authority of the city.

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“they therefore continued always in the Condition of Servants, without ever aspiring to match out of their own Race, which in that Country would be reckoned monstrous and unnatural” (IV.6, 288). The Yahoos, if they are noticed at all, are beneath the rigid hierarchy of horses, as if there is a caste system and the Yahoos are of no caste or “untouchable.” The guiding principle is what is good for the community, not necessarily what is good for individuals. (There is no doubt a hope of avoiding conflict between the two kinds of good). Decisions are made by the deliberations of a substantial assembly or council of free and equal aristocratic horses. Sometimes there is some dissent—some desire by an individual to depart from what is deemed to be good for the group. In such an emergency, the Houyhnhnms have a way of exhorting each other to step back into line. As far as we can tell, they are all so conditioned to this life that exhortation is all that is needed; it is unusual to need to exhort an individual more than once.9 In Plato’s Republic everyone, at least in principle, is assigned a role based on the talents with which they are born. In order to achieve stability, the just city will probably have to be a caste system in which people are required (in at least some cases unjustly) to remain where they are born—or to be moved according to what the city needs.10 The lowest class is compared to pigs or sheep, the non-philosophic guardians are compared to dogs.11 It makes some sense that if philosophic guardians

9 We see very few examples of the group exhorting the individual. Might this become

necessary in the delicate business of moving “children” from where they are born to where they are needed (IV.8, 301–2, 303–4)? Could issues of race or caste, contrary to what Gulliver says, provide the occasion for some of these exhortations? See IV.9, 307, IV.10, 315 (where we discover that the Master has to be exhorted more than once before he agrees to send Gulliver away). The horses are apparently able to use a tone of voice which commands respect and obedience. This no doubt helps the upper class keep the lower classes in line without a great deal of exhortation; IV.1, 252; IV.2, 255. 10 See Strauss (1987), 49–50. Republic 370a–d, 374a ff. Soldiers, like shoemakers and farmers but in contrast to merchants and traders, seem to be craftsmen with a nature that fits them to a task. At first the natural gifts of soldiers seem to have little or nothing to do with knowledge or intellectual gifts other than acquired skill with weapons, recognition of friends as opposed to enemies, and a kind of stubbornness in sticking to one’s convictions. Of course nature does not provide exactly the skills or qualities that are needed, in exactly the proportions that are needed; Republic 413d–415c; 458d–461d; see Aristotle Politics I.5, 1254b 27 ff., 1256a39 ff., 1257b1 ff. 11 Aristotle allows us to hear some upper-class people, if not himself, refer to the vulgar people or the demos as “cattle”; democrats at least get an opportunity to defend

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could ever come about they might be horses—horses being in some ways the noblest beast of them all.12 The Yahoo slaves might seem to have no place in a utopia. We might think a regime of Socratic philosophers, designed to achieve justice, would not have slavery. We can note briefly that More’s Utopia, although this does not become clear immediately, includes a great deal of slavery, including forced labor as a punishment for crimes. To the extent that there are bestial or subhuman “human beings,” they are used as mercenaries in order to weaken neighboring societies in a very brutal way.13 The just city in the Republic generally metes out what would usually be considered harm to every other city, in order to keep itself safe. The pursuit of rational, even Machiavellian methods in foreign policy does not require the just city to achieve either great wealth or a large population; a small united group is more powerful in the decisive sense than a larger group that is divided, or can be divided, for example between rich and poor.14 Also in the Republic, as soon as Socrates moves from the best regime to the second best, there is a huge population of slaves; the timocrats treat their slaves more brutally than any other regime; and there is even a reference to natural slaves, as in Aristotle.15 The slaves must have come from somewhere, and there are indications that the craftsmen with desires, who are so to speak the only citizens before soldiers are introduced, suffer a steady decline in status as the work proceeds.16 In a slave society, there is not a great deal of

themselves. NE I.5, 1095b17–22 (the many choose to live like cattle, which of course is worse than simply being cattle); Politics III.10–11. 12 Ordinary people or the lower class as pigs at 372d, sheep at 416a. On spirited guardians as dogs see 375a–376c. On dogs and horses see 335b–c, 459a–b; dogs, horses and asses 563c; horses 413d. On horses as spirited animals with leadership qualities, see Xenophon, Art of Horsemanship IX. Nichols also cites D. Nichol Smith, “Jonathan Swift: Some Observations.” 13 On slaves see Utopia 43, the section of Book II called “Slaves,” and the discussion of foreign policy. The mercenaries are the Zapoletes, apparently based to some extent on the Swiss; 88–9. 14 373b–e, 422a–423a. The just city is not likely to be able to give up the use of brute

force, but “reason” and its own unity go a long way. See Travels IV.4, 270–1, IV.12, 331, Kelly 851–3. 15 547b–c, 548e–49a; natural slaves at 590c–d. See Aristotle Politics I.3–7. 16 Once there are three classes, the lowest, desiring class has to be watched (and ruled)

by the highest calculating class and the middle spirited class to make sure it does not take over. Members of the desiring class are apparently not expected to be moderate themselves

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attention given to the question whether the slaves deserve to be slaves; the main question is whether they are needed. Aristotle’s introduction of the notion of “natural” slaves, who in a way could hardly survive unless they were enslaved, opens the issue of justice, and why so many people are enslaved who are not natural slaves. On the other hand, he never proposes any reform in the direction of enslaving only natural slaves, to say nothing of abolishing slavery.17 Swift probably learned something from these earlier authors about a discreet or strategic way of presenting slavery in an apparently just regime. Gulliver, aspiring to be one of the Houyhnhnms and writing as if to impress them, is in no hurry to show us the brutal aspects of Yahoo life under the horses. Swift’s depiction of Islanders and Projectors in the third voyage, inspired to some extent by great modern thinkers, is a kind of propaganda against modern science in preparation for this strange utopia in the fourth voyage, which in turn owes something to classic texts. Post-medieval modern Europeans may face a choice between cruel humanitarian scientists and xenophobic virtuous citizens. The overwhelming difference between the two may be simply described as whether something like universal humanitarianism comes to sight as desirable or not. Modern science either assumes such a humanitarianism—the goal of improving the material conditions of human life, for more or less everyone, albeit mainly in the indefinite future—or works toward this goal by the way scientists proceed in following evidence, without respecting this or that community or (potentially) body of law. The Houyhnhnms share the perspective of Socrates, Plato and More, or a perspective for which those authors have enormous respect, by assuming (if they even think of such a thing) that universal humanitarianism is nonsense. The closest they come to what we might call humanitarianism is a “respect for life”; they are apparently hesitant to kill Yahoos, just as they apparently think any killing of a creature by any other creature is a kind of violation of the rational cosmos. (442a–b). In an individual, spiritedness can serve low passions if it does not serve reason; at the political level this means “the many” can be a problem when they make demands; (492a–493e, 514a ff., 564b ff.). 17 In Aristotle’s best regime there are slaves who are offered freedom as a reward

for good performance—indicating that they are not natural slaves; Politics 1327b7–15; 1329a26, 1330a25–33. As Pangle (2013) points out, while the best regime includes slaves it does not include a demos of free people who are likely to assert their rights. As slaves working on farms earn their freedom, there is likely to be a “potentially emergent, politicized demos ” (249).

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Nevertheless, they have slaughtered Yahoos before, and they regularly contemplate doing so again. A healthy life for a community, what the ancients would call a political life in which equals deliberate in order to arrive at decisions based on an understanding of what is good, seems to require a small, close-knit community.18 There is no way the intensity of focus, the sense of urgency and direct contact with difficult truths, can be sustained in some larger or more multicultural or international organization. In the first two voyages of the Travels, giants are bigger than little people primarily because they are more public-spirited in their daily habits and thinking than modern people; the latter are subjects in an empire, who are somewhat inclined to feel sorry for themselves. The rational horses seem even more intensely and radically dedicated to their community than the giants, so they are not only bigger than Gulliver, but also a different species. It is only the other side of the coin of intense concern for a small group to say that sustaining benefits for those who are in a community requires a certain harshness—indifference sometimes extending to a ruthless willingness to inflict harm—toward outsiders.19 At the same time, humanitarianism may go not only with a powerful emperor, but also with one who is arbitrary and cruel, albeit often acting in the name of love for humanity, with many pious assurances to that effect.20 As the Projectors work on more and more land, despoiling it and rendering it infertile, some kind of government is presumably expropriating this land in the name of a benefit in material life for people in the future. There are times in the Travels when Emperors or Kings announce or explain their cruel deeds with reference to the immense love they feel for their subjects—even for the immediate victims.21 Biblical religions, perhaps particularly Christianity and Islam, have been known to allow or even encourage fanaticism. Swift alludes to such a possibility in his brief

18 See Pangle (2013). 19 Pangle and Ahrensdorf, Ch. 2 and (on More and his opposition to Machiavelli) Ch.

4, 119–124. 20 In Orwell’s essay on the Travels, he stresses the humanitarian benefit of modern science without any sense that the logic of modern science points toward tyranny; Orwell’s 1984 is reminiscent of this aspect of the Travels. 21 See I.7, 77 (the Emperor of Lilliput), III.9, 229–30 (the King of Luggnagg). Gardiner (2004) points out that the latter like the former uses language that might be inspired by the Bible; is this a tactic of the Antichrist, or something one might expect of a recognizably Christian ruler?

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references to Dutch Calvinism, on the one hand, and the Inquisition on the other. Where deliberation among some kind of council, and indeed exhortation among free people, are absent, one is likely to find arbitrary decisions, some better than others, and a kind of slavery as opposed to freedom. Modern science and technology may be inconsistent with a true close-knit community of self-governing individuals. In the third voyage, ambitious scientists may make discoveries, bringing honor and profit to themselves; it seems it will be a coincidence if they benefit others, and the benefit will have to do with protecting bodies. The rational horses have virtually no technology, but are intensely public-spirited within their own ranks.

Houyhnhnms vs. Yahoos We have suggested that modern scientists are likely to be cruel to people in front of their eyes, with the idea of learning how to help people in general, particularly in the future. Houyhnhnms are capable of cruelty as well, and Gulliver seems to learn cruelty—inflicted on Yahoos, more or less his fellow humans—from them. Gulliver and Swift reveal details about the land of the Houyhnhnms in careful steps. The Yahoos are used for “draught and carriage,” as horses would be in England; this might mean they could be treated relatively well or relatively badly, but they would clearly be slaves.22 Early in his time among the horses, Gulliver sees three Yahoos tied to a beam in a building like a stable, “at some distance from the house.” We are told that the Yahoos that are needed “for present use” are kept in huts “not far from the House”; others run wild and fend for themselves.23 The Yahoos apparently have to be physically restrained if they are part of a household, and otherwise forced to stay in a wilderness where they have to forage for scarce food. Four times a year there is a festival at which “the Servants drive a Herd of Yahoos into the Field, laden with Hay, and Oats, and Milk for a Repast to the Houyhnhnms; after which, these Brutes are immediately driven back again, for fear of being noisome [smelly] to the Assembly.” The Yahoos have to be prevented from trampling oats and grass, and stealing milk by sucking

22 IV.9, 305–6. There are indications that working Yahoos are not cared for as well by the rational horses as normal horses are by the Yahoos in England; IV.4, 268–9. 23 See IV.2, 257; IV.8, 299–300.

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the teats of cows; the implication is that they are forbidden to eat the two Houyhnhnm foods (oats and milk) that Gulliver is able to eat so as (barely) to remain a member of the horse community.24 Apparently the Yahoos are not used for hard work in the fields, probably because the tools that are used there might also be potential weapons.25 Why is Gulliver so quick to accept all this? He seems to have no qualms about enslaving and brutalizing human-like creatures, even as he is gradually forced to admit that modern Europeans, including himself, are more Yahoo-like than they would like to admit. Gulliver may simply conclude that there was a war, and the horses won. It seems likely that the best group won, and this outcome does not provide any reason to feel sorry for those who were vanquished. After about three years in Houyhnhnm-land, Gulliver is suddenly told—and we suddenly learn— that the Houyhnhnms took a brutal action in the past that probably had the effect of denying reason to the Yahoos. At a point when the Yahoos became “so numerous as to overrun and infest the whole Nation,” the Houyhnhms “made a general Hunting,” reducing the Yahoo population to “two young ones” for each Houyhnhnm. Some attempt was then made to tame them (IV.9, 305–6). If the older Yahoos who were destroyed were those able to speak, whereas the younger ones who survived had not yet developed this capacity, then the Yahoos from the time of the “general Hunting” lacked the thing that according to Aristotle distinguishes human beings from brutes: reasoned speech.26 We are left to infer that the mass slaughter was probably an attempt to ensure there were no Yahoos with rational speech, as if to eliminate leaders who might threaten the rule of the horses; the slaughter would make the claim that slaves deserve to be slaves into a self-fulfilling prophecy.27 When we consider the harshness of the Houyhnhnm treatment of Yahoos, which contrasts with the impeccable justice they practice among themselves, we must be

24 IV.8, 303; IV.9, 302–305. Kelly “Swift’s Exploration,” 849–50. Even Houyhnhnms are almost entirely denied oats and milk until they are 18; presumably they are maintained on grass and water (IV.8, 302–3). If they fight over grass with each other and with Yahoos, this is reminiscent of young Spartans. 25 Who works the fields of oats and hay? At least for the reaping, for which the horses have crude flint tools that might be turned into weapons, it seems to be the lowest class of horses, not the Yahoos; IV.9, 308–9, IV.10, 317. 26 Politics 1253a1–18. 27 IV.3, 267; IV.8, 299; IV.9, 305–6. Gardiner (2004).

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struck again by reminders of the ancients. The “general hunting” or mass killing that eliminated older Yahoos, especially if it was intended to eliminate potential slave leaders and threats, bears some resemblance to an event in Sparta of which Thucydides tells us. The Spartans hold a competition for their helot slaves, the aboriginal population of the land around Sparta. There was a promise that successful competitors would win their freedom, but instead the Spartans decide at some point to use this contest as a way to identify those leading helots who must be killed for the safety of the Spartan regime. The assumption seems to be that a combination of reason and ambition, or love of honor, will make slavery unacceptable to slaves.28 In Sparta, as in ancient Greece in general, the need for slaves went without question, so the only question was how to manage slavery so as to benefit one’s regime as a whole. The admission of the shocking “general hunting” episode in the Travels is one indication that the rational horses, despite their hatred of saying “the thing that is not,” or lying, are not entirely honest with Gulliver or perhaps with themselves. As we will see, it becomes necessary to discount some statements by both Gulliver and his Houyhnhnm Master.29 If the Houyhnhnms were primarily concerned that the Yahoos had a bad and disgusting way of life, they might have made at least some effort to educate at least some of the most promising young Yahoos. They took an entirely different approach. The true and fairly open motive for the “general Hunting” was simply that there were too many Yahoos; this might have to do with a shortage of food as much as anything to do with politics, morality or a way of life. The more hidden motive may have been to cripple or disable the reason of Yahoos in order to make them more passive. It even seems possible that no Yahoos were enslaved until the general hunting; the decision to drastically reduce the population of Yahoos, and make it very unlikely that they could ever speak, may have been inseparable from the decision to enslave them. Whatever the plan, it was not entirely successful. The distribution of Yahoos after the general hunting, two for each rational horse, implies that the wild creatures were 28 See Thucydides IV.80; Orwin 83–4; Aristotle Politics 1269a34–b12. 29 “The history of the Yahoos in Houyhnhnmland is unclear because the reader must

try to discern the ‘facts’ behind the shields of two unreliable narrators: the horse Master, whose violent rhetoric concerning the Yahoos indicates a serious flaw in his race’s selfproclaimed virtue of calm rationality, and Gulliver, who obediently believes all that the Horse master tells him”; Kelly, “Swift’s Exploration,” 849.

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to become entirely domestic; instead it seems that many are wild, perhaps with the population increasing again, and they are not always carefully observed much less tamed.30 What is worse perhaps for the Houyhnhnms is that the Yahoos display enough spirit, if not reason, that they have to be physically restrained if they are close to the horses; they remain a threat to the safety of their masters, like the Spartan helots. This helps us to understand why Gulliver may not be entirely honest about his campaign to be accepted in this strange land. Gulliver is probably afraid for his life every day that he is there—even before he hears the story of the mass slaughter, or the fact that the only issue on which Houyhnhnms regularly disagree is whether to slaughter all the remaining Yahoos (IV.9, 305).31 The lengthy debate about whether Gulliver is a Yahoo, and whether his fellow Europeans are Yahoos, is not academic; it has life-and-death urgency for him.32 His admiration for the Houyhnhnms is mixed with a kind of shock, and a very natural concern about how he can fit in. This whole discussion reminds us not only of how human beings treat each other, but also of how beasts (non-human animals) treat each other, and above all of how human beings treat beasts. Of course horses subjugating humans is simply the reverse of modern Europe. Gulliver’s fourth voyage reminds some readers of the “Planet of the Apes” movies; a supposedly lower creature becoming intelligent, and getting its revenge on human beings who now seem paltry or worse by comparison. The wild Yahoos almost present a sliding scale when it comes to classifying them; at first appearing to be entirely bestial, and in fact the worst of all beasts, then gradually, as Gulliver learns more, taking on more human qualities. Cruelty to beasts is arguably, and according to a great deal of human experience, of a different order than cruelty to human beings. Humans tend to act as though they can do what they like with nonhuman animals: follow them for food; herd and otherwise domesticate them; use dogs to help with hunting; keep some animals as pets. The milk for which Houyhnhnms fight Yahoos is cows’ milk. It is unusual for 30 There must be some kind of freedom for Yahoos in which they can take part in

feasts and drunken orgies; see IV.7, 294–6. 31 An official Assembly of Houyhnhnms takes place every four years (IV.8, 303), so even the issue of eradicating the Yahoos does not seem particularly urgent. 32 Kelly also suggests Gulliver is sufficiently aware of his danger (presumably of being tied down or thrown to the wilderness with other non-tractable Yahoos) in the fourth voyage that his “awe” and “love” are mingled with fear; 842–3.

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any mammal to drink the milk of another mammal, and adults who do so are likely to get sick. To this day, lactase persistence, the ability of adult mammals to digest milk, is a uniquely human phenomenon, only shared by a minority of the human race. It can be traced back to the domestication of cattle. The milking of cattle was surely one of the biggest advances in the ability of human beings to get nourishment without almost continuous hunting and gathering.33 To take another example: not all groups of human beings have succeeded in domesticating horses, including riding them.34 This in itself is almost a species-changing event given the power, speed and ease of transportation it makes available; to this day the power of engines is measured in horsepower. (The domestication of elephants in Asia—but not in Africa—is also an impressive story). Does this change mean that those who lack horses, or who use them (when they are lucky) only for meat, are intellectually inferior? Are they by any chance morally or spiritually superior? Does eating meat in itself make us superior (gaining a larger number of calories, especially in the form of protein, than is likely to be possible with other food) or inferior?35 The Houyhnhnms have more or less plausible answers to such questions—but their answers are naturally based on their world, not ours.

33 For those who are lactose intolerant, raw milk is a much bigger problem than cheese and yoghurt, which have less lactose. If the reason people reach for raw milk is related to hunger or starvation, the reaction to lactose is more likely to be fatal. How much of this Swift might have guessed is a mystery. 34 We may wonder how a relatively small number of Swift’s horses could maintain

such complete control over a large number of human-like Yahoos. Swift hints at various answers: the wild Yahoos are lacking dexterity and other attributes of the humans we know, including long-term reasoning; the horses gain what the “humans” lose. It can never have been easy for “real” humans to tame or conquer “real” horses. When Gulliver imagines a war with a modern European power, he sees the horses “battering the warriors’ faces into mummy” (IV.12, 330–1); this would be a good guess as to how the horses in their own history had destroyed most of the Yahoos; see Oakleaf. 35 Doniger shows that according to the rules applying to Brahmins, the eating of meat was generally forbidden, but was mandatory for certain rituals. The ancient texts record the transition from the killing and eating of animals to the milking of (some of) them; 157–8.

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Plausible Cosmologies We never see the Houyhnhnms discuss political science in any detail, in the way ancient political philosophers are known to have done— with questions such as what regimes are likely or possible, what are their strengths and weaknesses. We do learn, however, their reasons for thinking that the way they treat the Yahoos is exactly appropriate. The Houyhnhnms apparently live in a cosmos that is generally rational and beautiful; the Yahoos have no real place there, they arrived by some terrible accident. It is only reasonable to try to restore the cosmos to its original perfection by eliminating the Yahoos. Such thoughts, of course, are not entirely foreign to various traditions in literature and religion, including the Bible, as we will discuss below. At least according to their own accounts, the Houyhnhnms did not come from elsewhere, take land away from the Yahoos, and then exploit them in various ways. On the contrary, they never sought any trouble with the Yahoos. Their problem is that the Yahoos are a blight in the cosmos as they know it. We can almost say it is the very existence of the Yahoos that in a way has forced the Houyhnhnms to come up with a detailed cosmology. Has living with these horrible creatures by any chance made the rational horses more observant and thoughtful? Before looking in detail at the cosmos of the Houyhnhnms, we might look at other attempts at cosmology in the Travels. If speaking with the dead is an example of the supernatural, then a cosmology or an account of the whole world and how it began might also be considered a presentation of the divine, including perhaps a divine plan. There are cosmologies in Gulliver’s Travels, but they are not Christian or Biblical. Setting aside Gulliver’s conversations with the dead, what we find on more than one occasion is not a reflection on any afterlife, but on the beginning, what might be called the creation, of the world as we know it, and how it has changed. Swift shows an understanding of the human desire to make some sense of nature as we experience it, more or less daily. The Lilliputians, despite their problems that become so evident to the reader, are inclined to think the world or creation they are familiar with is perfect. Gulliver’s arrival as a giant among them has threatened this view,

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which includes the notion that according to their histories, there have only ever been two (little) “Regions,” Lilliput and Blefuscu.36 For as to what we have heard you affirm, that there are other Kingdoms and States in the World, inhabited by human Creatures as large as your self, our Philosophers are in much Doubt; and would rather conjecture that you dropt from the moon, or one of the Stars; because it is certain, that an hundred Mortals of your Bulk, would, in a short Time, destroy all the Fruits and Cattle of his Majesty’s Dominions. (I.4, 50–1)

Their records make no mention of any world that is unfamiliar to them— particularly a world of giants. Such a world would be so dangerous to them, its existence would make no sense—would be contrary to the notion of a rational “creation” (with its “creatures”) and therefore to that of a rational and/or well-meaning creator.37 If life with its problems is as good as it can be, then the main thing to hope from an afterlife is a continuation of what one has already experienced. On the other hand, nature as we find it can seem harsh, unyielding, stingy and the source of tremendous, even overwhelming pain—almost as if giants might appear suddenly and threaten to destroy us. Does it not make sense that if there was a creator, presumably or hopefully rational, the original creation must have been somewhat better, from the human point of view, than what we find? This seems to be the view of at least some of the Brobdingnagian giants of the second voyage. Specifically, their belief is not that there are beings bigger than themselves “today,” but that there were bigger giants in the earliest times. Gulliver finds this teaching in a “little old Treatise,” somehow taught to children, and held “in little Esteem except among the Women and the Vulgar.” Human bodies, meaning in this case giant (for us) Brobdingnagian bodies, seem much too weak for the nature in which we find ourselves. This leads the author of the “Treatise” to make certain claims. He [said], that Nature was degenerated in these latter declining Ages of the World, and could now produce only small abortive Births in Comparison 36 Their records apparently go back six thousand moons, or 500 years (keeping up the proportion of 12 to 1); the great war between the empires has gone on for 36 moons, or three years—approximately the last three years of the reign of George I. 37 The wisest of the little people seem to be aware that they used to be generally “bigger,” and that their sectarianism has caused some decline.

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of those in ancient Times. He said, it was very reasonable to think, not only that the Species of Men were originally much larger, but also that there must have been Giants in former Ages; which, as it is asserted by History and Tradition, [is] confirmed by huge Bones and Sculls casually dug up in several Parts of the Kingdom…. He argued, that the very Laws of Nature absolutely required we should have been made in the Beginning, of a Size more large and robust, not so liable to Destruction from every little Accident …. (II.7, 150–1)

“We” were apparently made in the beginning, and part of the reasoning here concerns the Law of Nature in relation to a creation of the world. This is one of the points in the Travels where there is a text to consider, but we are given little guidance as to what the text might be. In this case, Gardiner concludes that Swift is trying with the living giants to remind us of “primitive” Christians, from the early centuries of the Christian era, before various sectarian disputes caused a decline.38 With the reference to very ancient times and fossils, it may be plausible to say there was originally a rational or reasonable Creation, such as we might hope for, and it was ended or altered by the Fall. On the other hand, there is a complete absence in the passage in the Travels of any reference to God, sin or a Fall. If anything, the little treatise for children is more reminiscent of Lucretius than it is of the Bible.39 Lucretius says that all matter consists of atoms, and it is in a way a natural or default condition of atoms to be in a kind of random condition, not forming specific shapes whether animal, vegetable or mineral. Given something like infinite time, however, he is confident that periodically “nature the creator” causes atoms to form specific things including living organisms—indeed complete worlds 38 Gardiner (2004). Once again there is a reference to the “vulgar”; Gardiner suggests that we are pointed to a reliable view, related to the Bible, rather than an unreliable one. In the first voyage, it is the vulgar who insist on an eccentric burial practice; on the flying island in the third voyage, only women and the vulgar talk sense. 39 Damrosch quotes a poem by Swift on the events of a day—perhaps a fairly typical

day: At seven, the Dean in nightgown dressed Goes round the house to wake the rest; At nine, grave Nim and George facetious Go to the Dean to read Lucretius. (301)

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such as the one we know. The passage that Swift might be referring to suggests that at the beginning of each and every world, including ours, everything is gigantic in comparison to what comes later. The aging and decline of a world are associated with the shrinking of specific things, including living organisms.40 Having considered the “little treatise,” the main lesson Gulliver (if not Swift) draws is that it is foolish and wrong to complain or “repine” about nature, as the author of the treatise seems to. The “Quarrels we raise with Nature,” according to Gulliver, “might be shewn as ill-grounded among us, as they are among that People [the Brobdingnagians]” (151). If Swift discourages all complaints about nature, presumably with the hope that we can reason about and to some degree accept it, then by implication he discourages a focus on the Fall as a promising examination of the human condition. Gulliver complains constantly about the dangers that afflict him in the land of the giants, simply because he is so small; these are in a way natural dangers. The view that is almost submerged among the giants, largely confined to women—the complaining about nature being too much for us—is for a while Gulliver’s view. To say the least, this view is mainstream among the modern scientists in the third voyage. The flying islanders escape from their human nature and its limitations as much as possible; the Projectors on earth have set out to conquer nature in order to make life comfortable for many people. It does not seem to matter to them whether nature was harsh “from the beginning,” or only after some specific point; their “cosmology” seems to be a matter of locating our planet in relation to the sun, moon and stars. Nature is found to be harsh, our unassisted bodies are found to be inadequate or in need of help, and something can and will be done about these things.41

40 See On the Nature of Things II. 1105 ff. Nature is referred to as the “creator and perfector” (or “author and ender”) of all things. It might be a mistake for the Brobdingnagians to teach Lucretius to little girls; see the behavior of the grown-up ladies (II.5, 128–9), and in ancient sources, the Spartan women, along with discussion below. Sir William Temple was known as an Epicurean, like Lucretius. 41 Lucretius wishes to help his readers to find pleasure rather than pain in nature, but not by transforming or attacking nature. Strauss:

[According to Lucretius] the frailty of human happiness cannot be overcome by any conquest of nature, by the subjection of the whole to human use, for this would require among other things the emancipation of the desires for unnecessary things and therefore the certainty of human misery, of the fate of Sisyphus.

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In the fourth voyage, the Houyhnhnms have a cosmology. Their focus is on a bad, disagreeable or threatening creature which threatens an otherwise perfect universe.42 All animal species on the land are supposedly harmless to each other except for the Yahoos, who are dangerous in various ways, including the fact that they are carnivores. The Yahoos closely resemble human beings as we know them. The main question of the fourth voyage, both ludicrous and dramatic, may be whether Gulliver, who is more or less a Yahoo, can find a way to fit into this rational and beautiful cosmos better than the wild Yahoos do. He observes with a kind of horror both the way wild Yahoos behave, and the observations that are made by Houyhnhnms—especially the one he always calls the Master. The Yahoos are hated by all other species, as if the others think or feel with one voice, in accord with the universe. The eating of meat is especially horrifying. “There was nothing that rendered the Yahoos more odious, than their undistinguishing Appetite to devour every thing that came in their Way, [including] the corrupted Flesh of Animals …” (IV.7, 294).43 The Yahoos’ disregard of other species is related to their hostility to each other. Their greed for food leads to fights even when there is plenty to go around. The “fiercest and most frequent Battles” are fought over “shining Stones,” which are of no value which the horses can detect (IV.7, 292–4). There is little sign of any reasoning among the Yahoos other than short-term calculations of gain. The Houyhnhnms probably have some experience of the fact that Yahoos will sometimes throw their own feces at each other in anger—even if usually in self-defense.44 The Yahoos have a “disposition to nastiness and dirt” (IV.7, 296). All things

[Lucretius’ “political philosophy” unlike Socratic political philosophy] does not deal with the question of the best regime: no regime deserves to be called good; philosophy cannot transform, or contribute toward transforming, political society; Strauss (1995), 131. 42 IV.9, 305–6; cf. IV.4, 271, IV. 7, 295–7. 43 The Yahoos are known to kill and eat cats which are kept by the Houyhnhnms; if

this is to deal with mice or rats, Yahoos are not the only carnivores; IV.9, 305. There are also birds of prey; IV.5, 277. Yahoos may eat carrion more often than they eat what they kill; they may not have the courage to try to kill anything that is close to their own size, or bigger. See IV.8, 299. 44 IV.1, 250–1 (Yahoos attacking Gulliver after he hits one of them, fairly harmlessly, with his sword), IV.7, 295, IV.8, 299 (young Yahoo being held prisoner by Gulliver “voided its filthy Excrements of a yellow liquid Substance, all over my Cloaths”).

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considered, it is unlikely that the Yahoos are an aboriginal species in this world. The reasoning seems to be that there is probably some overall plan to nature, whether or not there is an actual creator; a policy of no meat, no harm inflicted by one animal on another would make sense, and by comparison the presence of Yahoos makes no sense.45 One might guess that carnivorous or omnivorous Yahoos arrived after all other species, and were in a sense like sinners arrived in the Garden of Eden.46 Are the Houyhnhnms somehow unfallen, whereas the Yahoos are fallen?47 If Swift has the Biblical account in mind, he is surely correcting it. There is no clear reason why God in Genesis creates the world. If He is perfect, he presumably does not need the world or indeed lack for anything. Human beings are not only part of Creation, but also somehow the finishing touch, the culmination, in a way its peak. Before the Fall God walks and talks with Adam and Eve, as if in a kind of friendship. After the Fall this seems impossible; human beings are a proven failure, riven and born with indelible sin. Instead of asking why a rational creator would create human beings, Genesis seems to ask why a very specific God did so, and how he could have been so disappointed or mistaken—how his plan could have gone so awry. When the Houyhnhnms regularly deliberate about whether to destroy all Yahoos, they may resemble the God of the Old Testament, but the perfect cosmos to which they hope to return is not a Biblical one. The Houyhnhnms themselves take the place of Biblical humans, having dominion over what they see, renouncing meat, but with no relation to any Biblical God, and they seem to have no reason to be aware of original sin in themselves. The rational horses see the Yahoos as enemies, more than as useful slaves, but the Yahoos do not seem to disrupt the lives of the Houyhnhnms in any serious way. The horses live a simple life, in its austerity 45 The Houyhnhnms seem to “forget” that there are carnivores besides the Yahoos; the point may be that there are none, such as big cats, that could threaten the horses. It generally doesn’t matter what lesser creatures do to each other, except that what the Yahoos do is unacceptable. 46 According to the Bible, the Garden of Eden before the Fall included no carnivores at all; after the Fall, human beings seem to be the only species that is forbidden to eat meat; see Genesis 1:28–31; 2.8–16; 3.17–21. As for clothing, Adam and Eve seek clothing made from plants immediately after the Fall; God then provides clothing made from animal skins; Genesis 3.7, 21. 47 See Patey on Houyhnhnms as unfallen Biblical human beings, Yahoos (possibly “without Yahweh”) as fallen ones (the latter a suggestion opposite to Gardiner’s).

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and discipline similar to the life of prisoners or Scottish people, perhaps less luxurious than that of the Yahoos when the latter happen to have a feast, but this life has never been imposed on them; it has apparently been chosen freely by a community. Their diet seems to consist of grass or hay, with oats and milk as something of a luxury. The hardest manual work they do is probably harvesting crops, but there is no sign that the crops are cultivated; the horses are close to living off the bounty that nature provides with relative ease.48 Their community is reminiscent of the “healthy city” early in Plato’s Republic at least as much as the Bible. In the healthy city the people are vegetarian, eating the most austere food—unleavened bread made from barley and wheat—and there are no domestic animals at all. Even when “relishes,” or richer and more varied foods, are added, there is no consumption of meat, although cheese appears. This all changes when Glaucon insists that the city allow not only relishes but also luxuries including furniture. He does not mention meat, but when Socrates obliges by describing the “feverish” city, he eventually includes hunters, swineherds and the production of “many other fatted bests if someone will eat them.”49 Animals are only killed and eaten after people have “moved” from the healthy city to something more “advanced” or civilized. To say that both denizens of the healthy city and Houyhnhnms are lacking in technology is an understatement.50 Seen in this way, the Houyhnhnms are primitive and innocent—pre-political, with no sign of greed or other sources of conflict. We have suggested above that as we learn more about Houyhnhnm society, it turns out to have similarities to a more advanced community— indeed a just city—in the Republic. The horse community seems to be in accord with nature, again in contrast to the world of the Yahoos, but not simply by being primitive; there are specific practices that must have resulted from rational deliberation, and a certain habituation to acting

48 There are flint tools, useful for harvesting oats and hay, but the Houyhnhnms “know not the use of iron”; IV.9, 308–9, IV.10, 317. It is barely possible that Swift had some awareness of the division of human history into “stone ages” and “metal ages.” Damrosch suggests that there is no planting or cultivating of crops; the oats may all be wild, possibly with little or no selective breeding. 49 370d–e, 372a–c, 373b–c. 50 Without smiths, plows in the earliest stage of the healthy city in the Republic could

hardly be metal plows; 370c–e.

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virtuously rather than otherwise. A natural way of life, animals apparently not harming each other, can “just happen” to most species; it seems impossible for Yahoos, and it required some work and deliberation for the Houyhnhnms to achieve it (to the extent that they have done so). If we ask about medical care, it seems the Houyhnhnms do not simply “lack” such a technology; they choose to live in such a way that they do not need it, and are able to avoid the problems that are likely to arise from it. They have healthy diets; they probably have relatively pain-free lives, but they also live with pain more stoically or philosophically than modern people might.51 Even the drinking of cows’ milk is something that goes beyond the “merely” natural or primitive. There is no indication that the Yahoos would be at all grateful for a steady diet of oats, so milk may be, perhaps unfortunately, the one food that Yahoos and Houyhnhnms would fight over. Cheese may be too high-tech.52 Perhaps the one thing that brands Gulliver as a Yahoo throughout his time in Houyhnhnmland is the fact that he sneaks off to eat meat—in fact to kill and eat animals (IV.2, 260; IV.10, 318). There are even hints of cannibalism, as if a person who would do the other things Gulliver does, might do this.53 In the Republic, the introduction of luxuries requires the introduction of soldiers, and the education of soldier-guardians is intended to take them “back,” as much as possible, to the austere habits of the healthy city, with the difference that they will be actively loyal to a city, rather than coincidentally cooperative. There is a suggestion that they will take whatever they are given by non-guardians when it comes to food, and this is likely

51 The disappearance of the “healthy city,” and the rise of a feverish or unhealthy one which lends itself to a much richer debate about justice may mark the transition from “citizens” having some opportunity to live like Houyhnhnms, to actual human beings struggling to achieve some version of justice given a fairly rich array of human desires. As Bloom points out, Socrates suggests that poor health always results from poor habits; Bloom (1968), 362, commenting on Republic 404a–e. 52 On herbs, see IV.2, 260, IV.7, 294, IV.8, 299, IV.9, 308. 53 See IV.6, 285 (“dead Mens Flesh” as part of a purgative), IV.7, 296 (“sweet

quadraped”), IV.10, 318 (“boiled flesh”). IV.10, 318. In planning his forced departure, when he does not know how long he will have to survive on what he carries, Gulliver says he “laid in a Stock of boiled Flesh, of Rabbets and Fowls”; the comma might indicate that flesh other than that of rabbit and fowls is included. Which animals are beasts, and which are vermin that might be eaten? Perhaps once one crosses the line to eating meat, it is more difficult to make distinctions. Gulliver may be more ingenious or logical in his sins than the wild Yahoos, and therefore worse.

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to be some kind of vegetarian gruel.54 For the Houyhnhnms there are no dedicated soldiers, and indeed there is no memory of war other than the horses’ conflict with the Yahoos.55 By some combination of luck and effort, the Houyhnhnms have arrived at the point where Socrates hopes to arrive by a long and difficult discussion of the training of soldiers. Apart from ancient Greek examples, such as in Plato’s Republic and the history of Sparta, we might be reminded of the Brahmins of India. Swift’s mentor Sir William Temple, we may recall, seems to have been convinced that some of what we know as the wisdom of the Greeks, including an abstemious way of life on the part of an elite, may have been inspired by the Brahmins. Lycurgus, lawgiver of Sparta, is sometimes mentioned as one ancient Greek who may have traveled to India. We may add briefly that Hindus have specific ideas about an afterlife. A typical view may be that there is a nirvana, a place of peace, freedom from passion, and contemplation in comparison to life on earth, and that very few people have any realistic chance at arriving at an afterlife of this kind. What is more common is recycling from one kind of life on earth to another, some better, some worse. Being stuck in the cycles is probably the closest thing to hell in this worldview. There is some debate or ambiguity as to whether one gets the life one deserves while still caught in the cycles, but the veneration for Brahmins suggests that if they live by their laws, on dietary and other matters, they can achieve a kind of purity which anticipates nirvana, and prepares one for it.56 Whether one is reincarnated as a Brahmin may be largely luck; but if this happens, one’s chances of reaching nirvana probably improve. The Houyhnhnms have no thought of any gods above themselves, and their only thought of

54 416d–e. The word “sitos,” originally “wheat,” is often used generally for sustenance or food. 55 The giants in the second voyage keep up a trained militia, even though they barely have any memory of war, partly to maintain a somewhat uneasy peace among “King, Lords, and People.” They refuse to rely on mercenaries. See II.6, 143, II.7, 151–2. 56 On restrictive rules regarding food and other things for Brahmins: “The class of

prohibited food follows the general rule that good people have a narrower window of opportunity, of possibilities, than bad people; the higher you are, the less you can eat. (This applies to sex, too ….)”; Doniger 151. Doniger suggests that when Gulliver accepts a diet of oats and milk and (supposedly) gives up meat, he resembles a pious or devoted Hindu; 158.

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an afterlife is that they will somehow be in the company of their (needless to say, virtuous) ancestors.57 We might note briefly that the narrator in More’s Utopia insists that belief in an afterlife of rewards and punishments is essential to maintain law-abidingness; a similar thought appears, with a comical reminder of the possibility of reincarnation, late in Plato’s Republic.58 The Houyhnhnms are aware of the distinction between themselves and the “nature” that surrounds them, but they have no sense of any grievance, or any reason to complain about nature—except for the presence of Yahoos. They lack the “modern” sense that nature is grievously lacking from a human point of view—that life is both too short and too uncomfortable, that natural forces, a bit like a giant, might crush us at any time—and they have no interest in “technology” beyond the simplest. This of course raises the question whether they have desires of a range or depth that might make them recognizably human—whether they are sufficiently ambitious for a fuller happiness. The Yahoos seem human insofar as some things in their lives are like an itch that can never be satisfactorily scratched; they fight over precious metals, and hide and accumulate them; there are honor-lovers among them who seek some kind of superior position, even though it is almost certain to be short-lived, and end in a kind of disgusting ignominy. They present much more evidence of potentially wild sexual desires than the Houyhnhnms do. As a kind of escape, they go on drunken binges and receive treatment, remarkably enough, from Houyhnhnms. It is not clear they achieve any true selfawareness, and therefore any real awareness of problems of unhappiness that might actually be solved. They may be Hobbesians in that they are ruled by fear more than hope; they may be seeking some kind of government primarily because they fear and distrust each other. Gulliver soon seems to kid himself that he has freed himself from a stunted and frustrating Yahoo life, and to some important degree achieved a Houyhnhnm life. To defend these propositions, he has to persuade the Master Houyhnhnm that modern Europeans are better than one might expect, and that Gulliver himself is remarkably good—natural in the sense of having achieved something more than primitive, in fact virtuous—in comparison to other modern Europeans. He has a huge rhetorical problem. In order

57 IV.9, 309–10. 58 Utopia 66–7, 95, 102. Republic 614b ff.; cf. 330d–331b.

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to live up to Houyhnhnm standards, he must tell the truth—and he shares much more brutal and unsavory truths about his own people back home now than he has ever done before.59 The rational horses supposedly do not know what a lie is; when the Master, with some difficulty, realizes what Gulliver is referring to, he calls it “saying the thing that is not.” If the harsh truths about modern Europe apply to Gulliver himself, on the other hand, a case could be made that he deserves to be enslaved or killed.

Yahoos and Modern Europeans By his own admission, Gulliver is a modern European—something that is new to the cosmology of the Houyhnhnms. Are modern Europeans in general, or is Gulliver in particular, sufficiently superior to “wild” Yahoos so that Gulliver can be given a home in Houyhnhnm-land? This question seems to underlie the intense scrutiny which the Master Houyhnhnm applies to Gulliver’s detailed account of his home in Europe. Apparently, the Master Houyhnhnm is initially surprised that Gulliver is a Yahoo possessing some reason (or the “appearances” of reason); he is even surprised that such a thing is possible.60 At one point the Master says the European Yahoos described by Gulliver may only be “pretending” to reason, otherwise the “Corruption of that Faculty might be worse than Brutality itself”; a thought reminiscent of Aristotle’s statement that human beings, thanks to reason, might be the best or worst of animals.61 We can begin with politics, or the life of a community. The politics of the Houyhnhnms, bringing to life in some ways the idealized city in the Republic, is certainly in contrast to the wild Yahoos, and there is at least a possibility that Europeans are (somewhat) better than the latter. After the 59 Compare II.3, 114–15, II.6, 138–45, II.7, 146, IV.3–6, IV.7, 290–2. 60 IV.3, 262–4 (including “some glimmerings of reason”), 266–7, IV.4, 269, IV.7, 291

(“some small pittance of reason”). Gulliver possesses both “the faculty of speech” and “some rudiments of reason” (IV.6, 288, IV.10, 315), “some tincture of reason” (IV. 9, 307). The Master is prepared to consider the hypothesis that European Yahoos possess reason, but then he thinks of reasons why this would do them no good; IV.4, 270–1. 61 IV.5, 277–8; see also IV.7, 291–2, Politics 1253a30–33. Swift wrote in a letter to Alexander Pope that it was his friends, not Swift, who believed that man is a rational animal, animale rationale; Swift believed man was (only) potentially rational, rationis capax. See Patey (2010), p. 404, Stanlis 430. This is related to the question whether Swift was a misanthrope. See Speck 131–2, Stanlis 418–19. See also Glendinning 186.

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Master learns about “Learning, Government, Arts, Manufactures, and the like” among Gulliver’s people back home, he is inclined to say the Yahoos he knows have nothing to compare to any of these civilized accomplishments. It turns out, however, that there is some kind of government. The Master has heard (he has not seen it for himself) “that in most Herds there was a Sort of ruling Yahoo … who was always more deformed in Body, and mischievous in Disposition, than any of the rest.” The rulers are apparently not naturally superior, as in size or strength; their mischievousness may mean that they do not stand out for true service to the “herd.” … this Leader had usually a Favourite as like himself as he could get, whose Employment was to lick his master’s Feet and Posteriors, and drive the Female Yahoos to his Kennel; for which he was now and then rewarded with a Piece of Ass’s Flesh. This Favourite is hated by the whole Herd; and therefore to protect himself, keeps always near the person of his leader. He usually continues in Office till worse can be found; but the very Moment he is discarded, his Successor, at the Head of all the Yahoos in that District, Young and Old, Male and Female, come in a Body, and discharge their Excrements upon him from Head to Foot. But how far this might be applicable to our Courts and Favourites, and Ministers of State, my Master said I could best determine. (IV.7, 295)

Clearly, the Leader acts much like the British King or Queen with their Court; the fact that this is a hereditary position might explain how a person who was lacking in some ways could become a leader.62 The “favourite” would be a Minister such as Walpole, who is often the subject of Swift’s attacks.63 The point here is that the allegedly irrational Yahoos act in a way that is hard to differentiate from the actions of allegedly rational British dignitaries.64 Fighting over worthless pieces of metal, as well as over food, might remind us of economics in modern Europe; 62 There may be a case to be made for a constitutional head of state who is somewhat apart from partisan viciousness. The British or Japanese model (or Irish or Israeli) may be better than the American or French. 63 Walpole may be represented by the Treasurer Flimnap in the first voyage—originally not hostile to big Gulliver, but then increasingly concerned about the cost of keeping him, and convinced that Gulliver is having some kind of sex with his wife. See Asimov #2 p. 28. 64 Gulliver actually suggests that by pointing out the failure to choose the most worthy animal as leader, the Master insinuates that human understanding as represented by the British is “debased … below the Sagacity of a common Hound, who hath Judgment

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Gulliver says on this specific matter his fellow modern Europeans are undoubtedly Yahoos (IV.6, 282–3). In fact the wild Yahoos are sometimes superior to Europeans. Sometimes, for example, when two Yahoos fight over “shining stones,” a third Yahoo imposes a settlement that is “more equitable” than what one would expect in Europe (IV.7, 293–4).65 Politics, including in the negative sense of a community being unable to achieve any real unity, is related to war, and this becomes another point of comparison between Houyhnhnms and Europeans. The Master speaks as though he does not even know what war is (other than the wars among Yahoos, both vicious and apparently non-fatal [IV.7, 292– 3]). In his conversations with the Master, we can see Gulliver learning to speak the language of the Houyhnhnms. Even before the Master explains his observations about differences between Europeans and Yahoos, he wonders innocently “what were the usual Causes or Motives that made one Country go to War with another.” Gulliver provides several reasons or causes or war, not all of which are summarized in the Master’s later remarks. The third “cause” out of perhaps a dozen is: “Difference in Opinions hath cost many Millions of Lives.” For Instance, whether Flesh be Bread, or Bread be Flesh: Whether the Juice of a certain Berry be Blood or Wine: Whether Whistling be a Vice or a Virtue; Whether it be better to kiss a Post, or throw it into the Fire: What is the best colour for a Coat, whether Black, White, Red, or Grey; and whether it should be long or short, narrow or wide, dirty or clean; with many more. Neither are any Wars so furious and bloody, or of so long Continuance, as those occasioned by Difference in Opinion, especially if it be in things indifferent. (IV.5, 275)

The issues listed here are clearly matters of religious doctrine and liturgy— the “works” that are required, especially during a church service, in order to be considered a good Christian.66 All of them are described as “things enough to distinguish and follow the Cry of the ablest Dog in the Pack, without being ever mistaken.” 65 When we picture gangs of Yahoos, with gang leaders, we might think of ethnic ghettos dominated by lawless gangs, where at least some of the people think it is better to be led by gangs who are recognizably “our kind” than by outsiders who apparently live by laws. 66 Besides flesh/bread and blood/wine which have to do with transubstantiation, the examples are: “whether whistling be a vice or a virtue” (liturgical music), “whether it be

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indifferent,” disagreement about which nevertheless causes the worst of all wars between human beings.67 In his later summary (IV.7, 292–4), the Master says he once thought the Yahoos he observed made war for more or less one stupid reason; we will see more on this shortly. Now he learns from Gulliver that there is a great variety of stupid reasons for attacking one another. He sums them up as greed and vanity. He makes no comment on what Gulliver suggests is the ultimate example of insane humanity as opposed to the relatively placid or harmless Yahoos— namely Christian sectarianism. The cosmology of the Houyhnhnms is more rational than any that seems to be shared by modern Europeans, and this rationality can be tested by outcomes—by whether certain beliefs are salutary for a community or not. Christianity of course teaches love, but Swift makes it clear he doubts that Christianity had made violent sectarianism less likely rather than more. There are other passages in the Travels that bear on this point. Dutch Calvinists may be the most cruel characters in the Travels in that they are determined to change people’s opinions; they insist that all outsiders, even Christians, trample on the crucifix, with a threat of death for failure. In order to show freedom from “works,” and a reliance on “faith,” they insist on iconoclastically destroying the works of others. There is also a brief reference to the possibility that the Inquisition might suppress the Travels if they became aware of it.68 Here we are reminded again of the “Swift as pious Anglican” commentators. Is this just Gulliver talking, trying to reassure the rational horses that he is rational like them, unlike those monsters back home? Can we say with some confidence that this is not Swift talking? The earliest references in the Travels to the debate about “transubstantiation” had to do

better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire” (veneration of the Cross), and what is the best attribute, including color, for a coat (ecclesiastical vestments); thanks to Kearney. In Tale of a Tub, Peter who represents the Roman Catholic Church tries to tell Martin and John, the Lutheran and Calvinist leaders, that the bread he is offering is both mutton and claret. 67 Glendinning quotes the “furious and bloody wars” phrase, but not the actual references to flesh, bread and so on; 184–5. 68 The Dutch along with the Japanese appear in III.1, 168–9, III.11, 242–4. The latter

passages include stamping on the Crucifix. The Dutch seem to admit that they are hostile to Christians, as if they are not Christians themselves; the Emperor of Japan seems to assume that the Dutch are not Christians (243). Both at the beginning and the end of the third voyage, the Dutch are more bloodthirsty than their Japanese allies. The brief reference to the Inquisition is at IV.11, 325.

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with Big-Enders and Small-Enders in Lilliput. The sense was that this sectarianism was unfortunate, and prudence might have dictated staying with the Old Catholic ways, whether supported by Scripture or not. Here the suggestion is that to debate such matters at all is the height of human stupidity and fanaticism, and causes what amounts to mass murder. If there is something of confusion or contradiction here, it may at least be faithful to some of the official teachings of the Anglican Church. The Book of Common Prayer, which “remains officially the normative liturgy of the Church of England” includes the “39 Articles.” Article XXVIII reads: “the Bread which we break is a partaking of the Body of Christ; and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking of the Blood of Christ,” and continues: “Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.”69 The Lord’s Supper is also referred to as Holy Communion, and there are references in statements of Anglican belief to the Eucharist. Swift surely provides some support for trying to have it both ways, so that the Established Church can have some appeal to both Catholics and Protestants. Politics and even law apparently do not reveal any superiority of modern Europeans over wild Yahoos; war, which is practically unknown to the rational horses and brings fanaticism to the forefront in Europe, seems to bring out the worst of both politics and religion. Gulliver has to think of something else that might give him firm moral ground to stand on. One fact that seems to remain a complete mystery to the Houyhnhnms is that Gulliver, uniquely among all creatures in Houyhnhnmland, wears clothes at almost all times. If the Yahoos are in some ways the lowest creatures in the land, they seem to have a kind of automatic nudity in common with the highest creatures, the rational horses. Here again the Houyhnhnms may achieve a habit that is both natural and cultivated, as opposed to merely primitive, and they may judge Gulliver accordingly. There is “gymnastic”—literally nude exercise—in the Republic, but there is always an assumption, unlike with Swift’s Houyhnhnms, that clothes

69 In practice since the twentieth century the Book of Common Prayer has been replaced by a choice of services at the discretion of local parishes; the “39 Articles … have never been officially adopted as a formal confession of faith in any province of the Anglican Communion, but … serve as a window onto the theological concerns of the reformed English church.”

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are worn most of the time.70 The nudity of the Houyhnhnms may be another indication that they are idealized Greeks.71 If Gulliver were at home, wearing clothes would of course be a kind of law-abidingness. Before Gulliver came along, the Houyhnhnms thought the ugliness of Yahoo bodies was the somewhat secret, in a way understandable, cause of war among them; they hated each other’s grotesque appearance. The Master thinks this discovery helps him understand why Gulliver resorts to the ludicrous expedient of wearing clothes (IV.7, 292). Wearing clothes might be a well-meaning attempt to make wars less likely, but then it turns out that modern Europeans probably have more wars than any creature has ever had. Why wear clothes in Houyhnhnm-land, especially if one is trying to pass as a Houyhnhnm? Gulliver’s need for clothing causes him problems throughout the Travels, and in the fourth voyage it is a constant reminder that he is never likely to fit in.72 There is no woolbearing animal available, and no technology to make cloth, so he is forced to wear hides: from rabbits, from an exotic animal “the skin of which is covered with a fine down,” and for shoes, from Yahoos who are killed and skinned for this purpose (IV.10, 311). His alleged need for clothes makes him shameless and even in a way inhuman. Once he is forced to leave, the skins of Yahoos turn out to be essential in the making of a canoe and a sail.73 In these last examples, Gulliver may have the excuse that he is trying to save his life. Still, he acts, almost unthinkingly, like a modern European in a strange land, believing he has the right to take what he wants or needs, even to commit what must appear to be homicide. Another example is his secret eating of meat, mentioned above. He may interfere with other species more, hunt and kill them more, than any other Yahoo or creature, and this seems to confirm that he does 70 Denizens in the healthy city in the Republic have “clothing” (himation), presumably more refined than hides, from the earliest stage (369d–370a). It’s not clear what tools would be used to make this clothing. 71 See IV.3, 265. According to Thucydides (I.6), Greeks were distinguished from barbarians by the practice of nude wrestling, and by the wealthy dressing with a simplicity similar to the poor (as opposed to gaudy ostentation). Nude wrestling could be interpreted not as reverting to nature, but as a determination to study nature without shame. 72 See I.3, 43, I.5, 54, II.8, 161, III.2, 176–7. 73 See also IV.2, 260–1; IV.3, 265; IV.10, 317–18. Gulliver also uses “Yahoos Tallow”

to stop leaks in his boat. When Gulliver is describing clothing in modern Europe, he suggests it all comes from “the Hairs of certain Animals.” This seems to exclude linen and cotton.

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not belong in a rational cosmos. His education, which raises the possibility that he might imitate Houyhnhnms, seems to amount to little or nothing in these important aspects of daily life. Clothing in particular is presumably related to shame, and the feeling of a need to cover the body regardless let us say of weather conditions. The sexual organs, and the risk of sexual congress without specific rituals, seem to require conventions reinforced by shame in order to move beyond or up from what is primitive, and perhaps at least come within sight of civilization. Perhaps the topic of sex will give Gulliver a chance to show his superiority. The Houyhnhnms apparently only have sex for reproduction, like most animals, so this has become Gulliver’s standard. As in other matters, the rational horses have not simply stayed with some kind of primitive sex; they have chosen a combination of family life with considerable control over reproduction for the benefit of the community. The Yahoos are at the opposite extreme—in some ways worse than “other” wild animals. The Master has observed that “the She-Yahoo would admit the Male, while she was pregnant, and that the Hees would quarrel and fight with the Females as fiercely as with each other”; Yahoos do not accept or adapt to natural restraints, and this seems obviously true of Europeans as well. Gulliver is forced to admit to himself that the habits of the wild Yahoos in flirting and courtship show “the Rudiments of Lewdness, Coquetry, Censure, and Scandal,” particularly in “Womankind.” “Unnatural appetites” are indulged in Europe, but Gulliver is confident that “these politer Pleasures are entirely the Productions of Art and Reason, on our Side of the Globe.”74 Do Europeans possess “art and reason,” whereas the wild Yahoos lack these things? So it would seem, but these examples show the Europeans to be worse, and Gulliver is hesitant to mention them to the Master.75 Gulliver’s own sex life—or his participation in sexual activities—is a thread running through the Travels. He may not have told the Houyhnhnms about any shameful episodes in the first three voyages. As far as he tells us, he has no sex when he is away from

74 IV.7, 295–7; IV.8, 302. 75 Apparently the only sex among Yahoos that the Houyhnhnms have observed is

heterosexual. It may be suspicious that on Yahoos the male anus and the female pudendum look the same (IV.1, 249–50). Yahoos may enjoy anal sex, and Gulliver may be lying in order to be edifying. At Glubbdubdrib Gulliver learns that many titled families “owed their Greatness and Wealth to Sodomy or Incest,” or to “the prostituting of their own Wives and Daughters”; III.8.

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home in either the third or fourth voyage—the voyages in which intellectual virtue comes to the forefront. In the fourth voyage, while he is still living with the Houyhnhnms, a naked Gulliver is attacked by a (naked, as always) Yahoo girl, only eleven years old, who obviously sees him as a potential mate (IV.8, 300). Gulliver has been bathing so he is (we might say) temporarily naked, possibly trying to impress the Houyhnhnms with his cleanliness.76 We might be reminded that in the Republic, men and women are expected to exercise in the nude together to both demonstrate and reinforce a freedom from awareness of one’s own body. Gulliver may wish he could achieve a Houyhnhnm-like freedom from shame about his body, but he is not there yet. Gulliver admits to being embarrassed that the rational horses see all this. He says there now seems to be no denying that he is a Yahoo “in every limb and feature.” Gulliver has probably never succeeded in hiding from the Houyhnhnms in any important sense.77

76 Gulliver is praised by the Houyhnhnms for cleanliness (IV.6, 288); Swift was known to bathe much more frequently than was common for his time and place. 77 See IV.2, 257, IV.3, 264–5, IV.11, 319.

CHAPTER 7

European Imperialism and the Bible

Types of Animal and Human Being Swift allows us to share some shocks of which he had personal experience as a European of his time. One is the shock of re-discovering ancient thinkers, not simply as edifying ornaments which can be used to display one’s erudition, but as intellectual challenges to our assumptions, including modern assumptions. Another is the shock that many Europeans experienced as they explored the world and discovered, or added new observations about, a variety of both animal species and types of human being or human life. This is a kind of experience, if not exactly wisdom, that both the ancients and the authors of the Old Testament largely lacked. Before modern times there was surely a tendency to understate the variety in the world of both animal species and distinct human societies; of course what we might call prejudices were supported by a lack of hard information. If we are trying to guess which non-human animal bears the closest resemblance to the Yahoos, it is probably the chimpanzee, a highly hierarchical and communicative species, which has been known (like Yahoos) to throw its own feces at others, at least in captivity. If Houyhnhnms as the historical or imagined examples of the ancient city are the high point of human possibilities in the fourth voyage, chimpanzees may be the barely concealed low point. Observations about chimps and other apes were new in Swift’s time—with an apparent huge © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_7

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gap going back to ancient times since anyone had made such observations with any care.1 Swift’s description of Yahoos at their wildest reflects modern science as well as modern exploration of the world. Swift was probably aware that apes in general do not figure prominently in the Bible,2 nor in the works of Plato or Aristotle.3 Other than the Yahoos, who are surely more human than not, there are no apes or monkeys in Houyhnhnm-land. Aristotle distinguished monkeys from apes, which are more human-like, without necessarily being aware of many African species of either; it was unusual in ancient times, and for authors of the Old Testament, to make any such distinction in a way that would be recognized today. Gulliver briefly compares Yahoos to monkeys in the fourth voyage, and this might remind us of the episode of the monkey in the second voyage, when little Gulliver is living among the giants, subjected to constant dangers of various kinds.4 He is kidnapped by a female monkey who is much bigger than him. Seen from Gulliver’s perspective, she takes him high above the ground, subjecting him to many dangers along the way, and then chokes him with disgusting food that she might feed to her own young. Of course from the monkey’s perspective, she is doing what a mother does—rescuing a helpless small thing that looks like a monkey, taking it to some sketchy but familiar kind of safety, and feeding it the only food she knows. When Swift brings up non-human species, it is typical of him to suggest that the boundaries between one

1 The chimpanzee was discussed in some detail (under the terms “orang-outang” or “pygmie”) in a book by Edward Tyson published in 1699; Tyson began with “an extended analysis of Aristotle’s study of monkeys and apes”; Arnhart 468. 2 There are two references: 1 Kings 10:22, repeated at 2 Chronicles 9:21. Apes are among the incredible treasures brought from exotic lands by King Solomon; this may have been a reference to Old World monkeys, such as the Barbary macaque. 3 Unlike the Bible, Greek authors suggest we might learn something about human beings by studying apes (which in some cases means Old World monkeys such as baboons). See Plato Hippias Major 289a–b, citing Heraclitus. Aristotle does not consider apes a “political animal,” as he does bees, wasps, and cranes; but he does emphasize that they are some kind of intermediate species between human beings and quadrupeds—“halfway between a monkey and a human”; see History of Animals 502a17–b27, Parts of Animals 689b1–35, Arnhart 468. 4 II.5, 131–4; IV.8, 298. Thanks to Mansfield. As to the difference between carnivorous and non-carnivorous animals: Swift probably had no way of guessing at this, but it is now estimated that there are 89 species of primates that eat meat.

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species and another are fluid, and might be exaggerated or ignored by the species that is dominant at any given time.5 Darwinian evolution, and more recent genetic research, have made us all conscious of the similarity or closeness of all mammals, and especially of the closeness of apes to human beings. These observations have given new fuel to universal humanitarianism, and to ideas about treating nonhuman animals much as we treat human beings. Swift presumably had no notion of evolution, or one species turning into another; for him it was rather that there were many different species, some of them more alike than others. Having said that, it seems clear that the Yahoos have more or less evolved during their time in Houyhnhnm-land. Gulliver finds their “shape” to be “very singular and deformed,” and the hair on the bodies to be arranged differently than on the humans he knows (IV.1, 249). Physically they are tougher in some ways, with more useful claws and so on. Mentally they are severely stunted; morally they may avoid both some of the virtues and some of the vices of modern Europeans.6 Both their toughness and their apparent moral degradation may result from being deliberately starved, and struggling to eat whatever they can dig out of the ground.7 At one time they may have been as rational as Gulliver, if not the horses. Swift, like Rousseau after him and Aristotle before him, presumably wants to say the possession of articulate speech makes a decisive difference between human beings and every other animal, even those that seem human-like. The Yahoos in the Travels demonstrate what seems to be a genuine concern for each other, and a collective concern for their children.8 Swift reminds us of a possible observation that some human beings are more chimpanzee-like, others less. There is a tendency to say that human beings who display more long-term rationality, and impose at least some noticeable rules on the unruly, are somehow higher or more civilized. Rousseau famously questioned whether the more civilized is always better; there is barely a hint of such a thought in the Travels. At one point Rousseau even suggests that orangutans, who had been 5 See II.2, 103–5, II.3, 110–12. 6 Gardiner (2002) suggests that “Yahoo” might mean “with Yahweh”; the Yahoos are

presumably ex-Europeans who have lost any contact with Scripture or clergy, but who basically mean well. 7 IV.1, 250; IV.3, 265; IV.5, 276; IV.7, 291; Kelly 850. 8 In a way the Yahoos agree with the horses that children should be attached to a

community more than to individual parents. See IV.1, 250–1; IV.8, 298–9.

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observed to a limited extent, might actually be human beings who had settled into a life which was happy. The wild Yahoos may lack both the highs and the lows of modern Europeans; they may have a kind of passive innocence about them, difficult to distinguish from ignorance, and it may even be true that they have been victims of inter-species violence involving the Houyhnhnms far more than they have been perpetrators. If we can correct the proHouyhnhnm view held by Gulliver, we could say the Yahoos have been more sinned against than sinners.9 It may be impressive that no Yahoos apparently enslave other Yahoos, even if it is more accurate to say that any attempts in this direction fail.10 None of this seems to give them any kind of standing in comparison to the Houyhnhnms, even if Swift does not personally support all the acts of violence that the latter have inflicted on the former. We can see at least the possibility of an excuse for Gulliver in his cruelties to wild Yahoos; he may see them as wild animals, not humans, so his need for clothes and other things takes priority. If this is true, there is less of an excuse as time passes and Gulliver is forced to see modern Europeans including himself, his wife and his children as no better than, basically identical to, Yahoos. Moving up, as it were, to societies with a human use of tools, but still very limited “arts and sciences” in comparison to modern Europeans, we come to the possibility that Swift is very delicately referring to the so-called Indians of the Americas, and possibly those in the East Indies as well, along with sub-Saharan Africans, particularly as they have been enslaved by these same Europeans. “Savages” is a word used by both Swift and Rousseau; in Rousseau it can refer to desirable qualities, but for Gulliver, setting Swift himself aside for now, this is not the case. The word suggests creatures who are a step up from “brutes” or beasts— clearly human as opposed to not; but just as clearly there is an emphasis on what is lacking: some combination of buildings; written language or documents that are meant to last; complex tool-making and plastic arts; 9 Gardiner (2004), Kelly. From a modern person’s perspective, the most serious crime the Yahoos seem to have committed against the horses is to kill cats; IV.9, 305. In the wild, Yahoos scatter at the presence of one horse (IV.1, 251); horses never seem to fear Yahoos to anything like this extent. See also Gulliver’s various journeys to investigate the Yahoos, IV.8, 298. 10 The Yahoo-on-Yahoo “wars” are futile, apparently for a lack of effective weapons (IV.7, 292–3). The Yahoos have apparently not learned to kill with their bare hands or claws, as the horses do with their feet.

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possibly even articulate speech of any complex kind. One word for all this might be “civilization.” Anthony Stewart has pointed out that while Swift sometimes uses the word “savage” as if it might apply to all the Yahoos, there are passages that seem to evoke at least three kinds of “savage.”11 When Gulliver first observes wild Yahoos at some distance, he says “upon the whole,” he “never beheld … so disagreeable an Animal, or one against which I naturally conceived so strong an Antipathy.” His repugnance at this animal leaves him hoping he will find “the Cabbin of some Indian” (IV.1, 250). This follows from Gulliver’s expectation that he will meet some kind of “savages” (249).12 It seems only logical that the Yahoos are the creatures who have left “human tracks,” but Gulliver does not come to this conclusion. Of course these creatures have no clothing, and live outdoors with no structures of any kind to live in; they are apparently somehow lower than savages. It is only slightly later that Gulliver is compared to a Yahoo, side by side. Gulliver now admits that the Yahoo had “a perfect human figure,” but says the creature had a disfigured face as would be typical of some “savages,” but not all. Its face was “flat and broad, the nose depressed, the lips large, and the mouth wide,” as would apparently be seen among those “savages” among whom infants “lie groveling on the Earth,” or are carried on adults’ backs, with faces “nuzzled” against the mother’s or other adult’s shoulders (IV.2, 257). Already the wild Yahoos seem to have been promoted from strange inhuman creatures to human beings who are disfigured—not from birth, but by practices to which they are subjected in infancy. Stewart suggests that this passage compares the wild Yahoos to Africans in particular. A few lines earlier, Gulliver describes how he saw a few Yahoos, living in close proximity to Houyhnhms, tied to a beam. This brutal manifestation of slavery was not typical of the treatment by Europeans of non-Europeans all over the

11 Stewart 37. See the “savage people of America” at the beginning of IV. 2, the possibly various Indians referred to at IV.1, 248–9, IV.12, 255, and the “Natives” at IV.11, 321. The last seem to have both fire and bows and arrows, of which the Yahoos have none. 12 In II.8 there is a reference to the “savages” described by other authors; in IV.4

it is said the modern Europeans treat “our own Houyhnhnms” in a “savage” way; the Master concludes after learning about modern Europe that wild Yahoos had become more “savage” than they were when they first arrived in Houyhnhnm-land (IV.9); Captain Don Pedro, who rescues Gulliver and transports him to England, reasonably says his clothes made of Yahoo and animal skins are “savage dress.”

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world; it was typical of the treatment of Africans in particular.13 Gulliver may be adding to, and improving, his typology of human beings, with a clear ranking in his mind. If he is forced to admit that the Yahoos are human beings, they must be at the bottom of the scale as he knows it. Stewart reminds us that if Swift is aware of victims of British and European imperialism, his concern about such victims is highly selective. Africans are not referred to specifically, they are barely alluded to, and Swift maintains almost complete silence about the European traffic in African slaves, in which Britain of course participated for more than 200 years.14 The “business” was still small for Britain in Swift’s time, but Britain and her American colonies came to dominate the huge, industrialscale trafficking in later years.15 This may suggest that Swift agrees with Gulliver in ranking Africans at the bottom of some scale. One response is that Gulliver is under a rhetorical pressure of which we are regularly reminded. He is writing to show that he has learned how to be a Houyhnhnm, as if the rational horses are looking over his shoulder. In a way it is for their benefit that he first concludes the wild Yahoos are mere beasts, and then reluctantly admits they are human beings, and gradually, even more reluctantly, admits they are not very different from modern Europeans. At the same time, Gulliver is a naïve European, reflecting the views of people of his time and place. The Europeans tended to treat the people of South Asia, especially the 13 Stewart 37–8. 14 Stewart 38–41. Ian McBride has stressed that there is no indication in any of Swift’s

writings of concern about the massive trade in African slaves; condemnations of “slavery,” which are ubiquitous, usually refer to a European monarch or another patriarch, probably inspired by the Bible, denying liberty to subjects who have natural rights. In the British and American debate about slavery, Tories favored hereditary rights, including legislation that said a man who imported slaves in the New World was thereby entitled to land. Swift was almost an official spokesman for Tory causes, but barely mentioned the slave trade, and on liberty for Europeans he was on the side of Locke and free enterprise, not the Tories and heredity. 15 Shortly after Columbus’s journeys, the Spanish perceived a need for more laborers in the Americas; the indigenous population either was not sufficiently numerous from the beginning, was dying off, or was being spared for humanitarian reasons. Portugal had better access to Africa, and therefore to sources for African slaves. The Asiento de Negros referred to the right to ship African slaves to Spanish colonies in the Americas; the British held this right for a few decades beginning with the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. Before 1660, Virginia planters from England used indentured white servants more than they used African slaves. By 1700, 25 years before the Travels, slaves had almost entirely replaced indentured servants.

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Hindus, with some respect; the greatness of their literature and architecture presented an alternative to ancient Greece and Rome, and the discovery after Swift’s lifetime that Sanskrit is close to the root of all Indo-European languages suggested deep connections that had previously gone unexplored.16 Swift had at least some knowledge of such matters.17 Even before Rousseau’s defense or praise of the “noble savage,” Europeans had some tendency to respect the so-called Red Indians of the Americas. Somehow sub-Saharan Africans came to be considered “below” these other non-European groups. Either they were seen as somewhat like Yahoos or chimpanzees, and this was taken as an excuse or justification for slavery; or the Europeans found it all too easy to “buy” slaves on the coast of Africa, with other Africans of course the Yahoo-like sellers; or the economic arguments for slavery provided an incentive for Europeans to find exotic people somewhere who met their needs. (The indigenous people of the Americans were found repeatedly not to perform well as slaves). Even if there was sometimes a pure hatred of people who are “different,” or simple bigotry, it seems fair to say that this often came about after, and as a result of, some actual observations. Stewart looks for indications, in the thought of either Gulliver or Swift, that non-white peoples can all be suspected of being inferior, and therefore of somehow deserving to be subjugated if not enslaved. One kind of bigotry would suggest that non-white skin is “bad,” and the darker it is, the worse. Of course Stewart is aware that there is a passage toward the end of the Travels where we seem to hear Swift, through Gulliver, condemning European colonialism and imperialism. Gulliver explains how remote lands are changed by European conquest. …Pyrates … go on Shore to rob and plunder; they see an harmless People, are entertained with Kindness, they give the Country a new Name, they take formal Possession of it for the King, they set up a rotten Plank or a Stone for a Memorial, they murder two or three Dozen of the natives, 16 See the works of European missionaries including Abraham Rogerius or Abraham Roger (1609–1649), whose work on Brahminism in India was published in Leiden in 1651 and later translated into German (1663) and French (1670). See again above on how the Houyhnhnm rules about food and sex resemble those of the Brahmins. 17 See Swift’s “Mr. Collins’s Discourse of Freethinking” (1713), an alleged “translation” into plain English of a book by Anthony Collins on various “scriptures,” including that of the “Shaster” [Sanskrit “Shastra”] of the Brahmins of India. See Bohn’s Standard Library: The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift , Vol. III.

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bring away a Couple more by Force for a Sample, return home, and get their Pardon. Here commences a new Dominion acquired with a Title by Divine Right. Ships are sent with the first Opportunity; the Natives driven out or destroyed, their Princes tortured to discover their Gold; a free Licence given to all Acts of Inhumanity and Lust; the Earth reeking with the Blood of its Inhabitants: And this execrable Crew of Butchers employed in so pious an Expedition, is a modern Colony sent to convert and civilize an idolatrous and barbarous People. (IV.12, 332)

Piracy and butchery become divine right, and then a Christian mission of conversion is offered to the survivors. (Of course Gulliver makes a hypocritical exception for “the British Nation”). If Swift has some concern about cruelty to animals, he no doubt has somewhat more concern about the mistreatment of some human beings by others. This may also be as close as Swift comes to Rousseau’s suggestion that so-called savages might have better lives than so-called civilized people. If the things people are likely to want are in a rough balance with the things they are likely to get, this would achieve one kind of human happiness. Arguably it would have been better for Europeans to leave people alone rather than to disturb such happiness. The victims who are most evident in various writings of Swift’s, and who come up at least briefly in the Travels, are the Irish.18 Stewart repeats the suggestion of various scholars that the Yahoos in relation to the Houyhnhnms represent the Irish in relation to the British.19 By emphasizing the Irish as the objects of colonialist barbarities Rawson reproduces what was probably Swift’s attitude to colonialism. Eighteenthcentury Europeans were more likely to be outraged by colonialist horrors committed against other Europeans rather than against Africans. In a discourse where the African was not seen as human … a man so concerned with the liberty of one group of people—the Irish—need 18 If Gulliver’s judgments about the Yahoos in Houyhnhnm-land reflect Swift’s judgments about the Irish, there seems little hope for them; Gulliver’s fellow Europeans in general may offer slightly more hope. 19 See Kelly; Oakleaf 27–30. Kelly’s overall argument is that there is an analogy between

the Houyhnhnm-Yahoo relationship and the British-Irish. See Damrosch on the “Penal Code” denying Irish Catholics many opportunities, including education; 345–6. Swift was capable of using common English idiom by referring to the Irish Catholics as “slaves”; but as Damrosch says, “he was referring to servile behavior, not to innate inferiority”; 413–14.

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not have been concerned with the liberty of all subjected peoples. Moreover, it is not contradictory, within the workings of this discourse, to further dehumanize one group in order to appeal for the humanity of another. Therefore, it is possible that the Yahoos were to be perceived consciously by Swift’s European readers as the Irish, especially at the end of Book IV, when Swift provides a sweeping condemnation of colonialism. However, the acknowledgement of this possibility only makes [a] critique of Africanism stronger. The fact that the Irish have been written into the text, by [various scholars], reinforces the exclusion of the African from the same text. (40)

It is possible Swift meant that the Irish were more deserving of help than any non-white group—that there must be some share of white racial superiority, despite the discouraging appearances of the Irish. It is also possible Swift thought the Irish, like all modern Europeans, could easily be mistaken for the Yahoos; there is an implied exhortation to do better, regardless of whether there are other suffering people in the world or not. Another possibility is that Swift thought the Irish had failed to take advantage of opportunities to do better, so they were more to blame than other people who had no such opportunities.20 Stewart suggests that Swift shared the prejudices of many people in his time in preferring “Oriental” races to Africans. In support of this suggestion, there is a kind of significant praise of the Japanese in the Travels: they are allied with the Dutch, including Protestant missionaries, but they are much more reasonable and humane than their Dutch allies.21 There are brief words of praise or respect for the Chinese.22 Stewart suggests that the combination of hints to the effect that Africans may be the most savage of the savages, and the lack of any actual comment on Africans, constitutes a grave insult.

20 Speck (30–3, 40) points out that the narrator of Modest Proposal mentions, only to

dismiss, some limited and sensible reforms that might seem promising for Ireland. These are reforms that Swift among others had proposed, and the Irish had resisted; the Irish are to some extent the authors of their own misfortunes. 21 See the third voyage, especially the beginning and ending. 22 I.6, 60–1; II.3, 113; II.7, 149; IV.1, 253. The reference to Persians in II.3 suggests

that Orientals from the past may be superior to Occidentals of the present.

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People of the Book In a recent argument, Shanee Stepakoff suggests that Swift’s/Gulliver’s descriptions of the Yahoos match anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish tropes with which Swift would have been familiar. Like other authors we have mentioned, Stepakoff is aware of various candidates for Swift’s primary identification of Yahoos: the Sasquatch, people of African descent, the Irish, women and generic human beings. In her argument, the issue that comes to the surface is neither racism of this or that kind nor British or European imperialism, but Christian anti-Semitism. Some of the world’s peoples were “new” to Europeans beginning at about 1500 AD. The Jews, on the other hand, were of course a very old people, and had been a conspicuous minority in Europe for centuries. Just like “people of colour,” the Irish and the “gypsies,” they had often found that to be a conspicuous minority was all too often to be a despised minority, and often a persecuted one. The Crusades beginning about 1100, ostensibly dedicated to freeing the Holy Land from Muslims, turned quickly and often into a campaign to convert and/or kill Jews en masse. There were small Jewish communities in England from about 1100 until Edward I’s Edict of Expulsion in 1290, coinciding roughly with the last of the Crusades. There was then no known Jewish community in England until about 1656, during the rule of Oliver Cromwell, seventy five years before the publication of the Travels. In European countries where Jewish communities remained, ghettoization and persecution of Jews were by far the rule rather than the exception. Expulsions from various countries, including France, Germany and especially Spain—where Jews enjoyed a “golden age” under Muslim rule—resulted in a substantial Jewish population in Poland. We may well ask what Swift thought about the issues raised by this history. Swift may be offering a kind of concealed commentary on people whose lives are guided by the Bible. The very word “Yahoo” may be related to the Hebrew YHWH, the name of God; “hnea Yahoo” (a kind of illness from which Yahoos, but not Houyhnhnms, suffer) may mean “not God,” or “without God.”23 (It is also possible that “Yahoo” is the way the horses convey something about these other

23 See again Patey, Gardiner. YHWH is the shortened form (tetragrammaton) of “Yahweh,” the name of God in the Bible.

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creatures; the neighing sound “Houyhnhnm” is “us,” the mere stupid shout, “Yahoo” is “them.”24 ) There are details that are presented to us as objective, based on observations: Yahoos are bearded, goatlike, hairy, (some of them) redhaired, they have claws, “distorted and odious facial features,” offensive complexion and odor, smelling like a weasel or a fox; they are diseased and deformed. They probably do not walk upright in the way Gulliver does. They have personality traits and characteristic activities that are distasteful: they are dirty, they misuse and ingest excrement, they suck the teats of cows (something the Houyhnhnms treat as a crime25 ); they make unpleasant noises; they imitate other animals, including Gulliver (Gulliver says “like monkeys” IV.8); they are “detestable, odious, abominable and evil,” “troublesome, unteachable, untamable, restive.” They are greedy and power-hungry, with an especially strong appetite for shiny stones; they display cunning and deception, especially in hiding these stones. There are clear hints of usury and avarice. While there are male Yahoos, they do not act in a manly fashion; it is an understatement to say they do not put up much of a fight against their Houyhnhnm oppressors.26 It almost seems that all Yahoos have female bodies; the anus and pudenda are described as having similar hair, and there is no reference to male genitalia.27 Stepakoff suggests that “deformation” of their bodies may indicate circumcision, and if males are believed to menstruate, this may indicate the bleeding that results from the procedure.28 One common source for fear of Jews was a fear of forced circumcision. There is also a suggestion of excessive female lasciviousness or lustfulness when an 11year-old Yahoo girl attacks Gulliver with the obvious intention of having 24 “Barbarian” was originally a way for the Greeks to refer to someone who didn’t speak Greek, or another recognizable language: “they sound like bar bar bar.” The name “Berbers” for people in the Sahara has the same root, and this name inspired the term “Barbary pirates.” 25 The Houyhnhnms somehow have “earthen and wooden vessels” for drinking milk; the Yahoos lack even this much technology, yet they crave cows’ milk, so drinking from a cow’s udder seems the only expedient available to them; IV.2, 259. 26 The Houyhnhnms assume that the Yahoos are likely to rebel, but there is no indication that they have ever actually rebelled. IV.10, 315; Kelly 850. From a modern person’s perspective, the most serious crime the Yahoos seem to have committed against the horses is to kill cats; IV.9, 305. 27 IV.1, 248–50. 28 Stepakoff 147, 168–9.

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sex with him (IV.8, 300). The things that Houyhnhnms know, so to speak objectively, about Yahoos have inspired beliefs that may be partly mythical, and inform the policies they practice toward them. They treat Yahoos as if they are cursed, subhuman brutes, they are intruders or foreigners or interlopers, and the best policy is segregation from non-Yahoos with some slavery. There are serious debates about extermination, expulsion and sterilization for all Yahoos. For Swift, this would all have borne similarities to beliefs that were held about the Jews, and the way Jews had been treated in Europe. Stepakoff seems to assume that while the stereotypical depictions of Yahoos as ugly, bestial and evil could apply, justly or not, to many human and barely human types, and even perhaps to apes including chimpanzees, once we know the source is Christian, we can be sure Christian anti-Semitism is at work. The worst or ultimate anti-Semitic slurs come from a specific type or manifestation of anti-Semitism: hatred of the Jews for allegedly hating Christians, and committing crimes against them ranging from the unacceptably grasping and materialistic (usury and outright theft) to the horrific (the kidnapping, killing and eating of domestic animals or worse, Christian children, for a blood sacrifice). Yahoos are almost the only creatures in Houyhnhnm-land who eat meat (until Gulliver comes along), and they do not seem to cook the meat. An image comes to mind of eating bloody raw meat (usually carrion), and to some extent drinking the blood. If this is combined with “sucking the milk out of the teats of cattle” and the killing and eating of cats (IV.9, 305), Swift may be signaling to anti-Semitic readers, as it were, that they can feel at home with their fantasies. In considering harsh “penalties” for the Yahoos including extermination, the Houyhnhnms seem to hold to a doctrine of “collective guilt” such that individual guilt or responsibility is not established, or is of no relevance. This has often been typical of the way Christians have regarded Jews. It is not a stretch to say Stepakoff, like Stewart, attributes collective guilt to Houyhnhnms and would-be Houyhnhnms. As with Stewart’s argument about Africans, this discussion raises troubling questions about Swift’s project. As modern people, we expect some attachment to what we might call universal humanitarianism: all human beings deserve some basic respect, indeed they have rights—at least in an earlier form of liberalism, natural rights. The Houyhnhnms may have an excuse for not being “humanitarian”: they are not human. At best, we might say that Swift like Shakespeare is careful to include some jokes for people in “the pits,” which also get laughs from refined people,

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in order to ensure the popularity of his work. At worst, not only does Swift, the alleged hater of injustice, ignore or potentially inflame some of the worst hatreds and injustices in the world he knew, but he anticipates nightmares of the twentieth century, especially Nazism. One can imagine human beings arriving at a fairly crude understanding of the Travels and then starting to talk about a “master race.” Stepakoff expresses surprise that no scholar has previously made this connection between anti-Semitism and the Travels. Surely there is a leap here in the sense that nothing negative that is said about the Yahoos would apply to Jews, and only to Jews, whether in ugly stereotypes or not. If we consider the history of the word “Troglodyte” or cave-dweller (“cave man”), for example, it has generally served as a sort of generic category for wild, ugly, dangerous animals that may or may not be human.29 When Christians come to hate Jews, they may reach for every epithet and demeaning description they can think of, so very ancient fears and anger about “the strange people” may surface. As with Swift shifting between something like a chimpanzee, at what might be one extreme, and a modern European at the other, there is apparently a fluidity or plasticity in human possibilities. All human or almost-human types may simply be what they are, unless they are changed by circumstances they don’t control. On the other hand, the higher types, especially if they have reason, may be more responsible for their actions, and therefore more subject to praise and blame as compared to pleasure and disgust. It may be more automatic to control the lower types, including sometimes culling a herd, but with higher types it may be possible to educate them, and in some cases it may be more necessary to take drastic steps out of self-protection.30 Stepakoff seems to assume that European Christians might see Jews as comparable to savages—at least as bad in some ways, and more dangerous to Europeans insofar as they enjoy a certain proximity. Surely the hatefulness of anti-Semitism is different from, and goes beyond, this kind of contempt and fear. If Yahoos eat meat, so do most

29 In Montesquieu’s Persian Letters (1721), of which Swift was aware, there is one story about the Troglodytes (Letters #10–14). There are changes over generations so that they become more recognizably human, there is a kind of competition between the less virtuous and the more virtuous, and then there are ominous signs that the more virtuous are virtually certain to decline. 30 The Master says wild Yahoos are like birds of prey; what they do is in a way contrary to a non-violent cosmos, but they cannot be blamed for their actions; IV.5, 277.

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human beings including modern Europeans; does the difference between raw and cooked make all the difference? The Yahoos share a taste for cows’ milk with the Houyhnhnms; this seems to have nothing to do with blood sacrifice or cannibalism. Even if the nature of the “flesh” they eat is sometimes left unspecified, Gulliver never confirms that the wild Yahoos are cannibals.31 In fact, the one creature who can be most plausibly suspected of practicing cannibalism in the Travels is Gulliver. A religious requirement to eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ may raise problems both for the reason and the imagination, but this has nothing to do with the Yahoos. The worst practices of the Yahoos, including avarice and sexual practices that disregard natural restraints, are not only shared by modern Europeans in general, but are probably exceeded by them. Lori Perry has shown that some of the more serious charges that anti-Semites might level at Jews are alluded to in Swift’s famous Modest Proposal. The Projector or proposer in this treatise recommends, based primarily on economic calculations, that the problem of widespread starvation in Ireland be solved by a planned program of infanticide and cannibalism. The “moral posturing” of Christians is reversed. The bloodlust [commonly] attributed to Jews is deflected onto the Christians, who are presumably deranged enough to cheerfully butcher their own children, not for obligatory religious purposes but purely for profit. … In short, A Modest Proposal overlays the most pernicious myths ascribed to the Jews onto the Anglo-Christian population. The attack depends upon “what everyone knew about the Jews” to attack what everyone also knew, at least in Ireland, about a failed economic policy, based on venality and implied violence. (134)

Whatever evil practice one might ascribe to Jews, it is difficult not to imagine European Christians doing worse, especially under the influence of Projectors or modern scientists. Gulliver admits in the third voyage that he was a bit of a projector in his younger days, and he seems undeniably attracted to some cruel or crazy projector projects even at the time of his journeys. Are modern scientific projectors always heading down the road of inflicting cruelty on living people in order to benefit future people? 31 It has been found quite recently that chimpanzees, while generally vegetarian, will sometimes kill and eat a monkey and perhaps more rarely another chimp. The reason for the latter may be sexual competition rather than anything like a shortage of food. Swift would probably not be surprised at this finding, and he might have found it amusing.

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Is the idea of using economics as the ultimate measure always attractive, so that food sources that would usually be considered disgusting or forbidden come to sight instead as an economic windfall? The Projectors in the third voyage are working on recycling excrement as food (III.5, 200). In some ways, this may be a worse use of excrement than what the wild Yahoos get up to, and it may be a step on the way to the cannibalism of “Modest Proposal.” A bit like in the famous Frankenstein story, corpses may be of some use in treating the sick in modern medicine.32 Swift seems to anticipate that the moderns, influenced by increasingly powerful science, will struggle to think of reasons not to use human corpses in whatever way is useful or profitable—including as a source of food. Again, modern scientific Europeans, using their reason, may get up to worse things, amounting to an attack on all civilization, than what mere savages get up to. Swift may assign more responsibility and blame in the case of actions that are committed by people with education, acting deliberately, than in the case of people who are “merely” savage or bestial. The more one can be expected to have some notion of Houyhnhnm behavior, the less of an excuse there is for departing from it. The main direction of the thoughts and actions in Gulliver’s Travels is to warn modern Europeans, not the Jews or any minority who are oppressed by Europeans, that they have the choice to do better, and if they do not improve, a strong case can be made that they deserve to be exterminated. This does not strengthen the case that a run-of-the-mill Jew hater is ipso facto a member of a master race. Swift attacks the pride of European majorities; he does not reinforce or encourage it. To the extent that Swift has Jews in mind in the Travels, he may be thinking of the Old vs. the New Testament. The opening of the Old Testament obviously relates to the entire human race, but much of the text focusses on the Hebrews, who are apparently made to suffer, while being told in some detail what righteousness consists of, as a lesson for all of humanity. Orthodox Jews are known to practice a kind of asceticism and demanding literacy which are difficult to maintain; there is something of Houyhnhnms or Brahmins about them. Jews who keep the Bible in mind, or are convinced that God is always watching, will have reason to maintain a Houyhnhnm-like sense of themselves as a group, keeping a 32 See again IV.6, 285 (“dead Mens Flesh” as part of a purgative in modern medical practice); III.6 and discussion above in Chapter 3 (skulls cut up and re-fastened in order to solve political problems).

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distance from others while maintaining an obedience to rules that would probably be diluted in some ways if there was an attempt at cosmopolitanism. Their history of preserving their identity in the face of persecution has something in common with the Irish.33 It is not a stretch to say it is primarily the admirable qualities of Jews, not their alleged or mythical bad qualities, that attract the hatred of many Christians. Christians, on the other hand, basing their lives primarily on the New Testament, face an over-arching commandment not only to be cosmopolitan, but to practice a kind of universal humanitarianism that must be impossible. Jesus says of the Final Judgment of human beings: “Whatsoever you do to the least of them,” apparently including committing cruelty and/or injustice, “you do to me.” Every harm done to a human being, but especially to one who is already weak, poor, or suffering, is a harm done to God Himself. The point is made more sharply: “Whatsoever you fail to do,” meaning apparently even a failure to practice charity and love, “you fail to do to me.”34 Taken literally, this seems to mean it is always a sin to fail to care for another human being. It seems virtually impossible for any human being to truly love more than few dozen people at most; therefore every Christian, to say nothing of non-believers, spends every moment of existence as a failure and a sinner who deserves eternal damnation. A naïve person might think: if they can’t care for everyone on earth, Christians might at least care for the Jews, who have brought the world the Old Testament. Christian anti-Semites seem to say: we simply can’t forgive the Jews for failing to convert to Christianity—for returning God’s offer of love and eternal salvation with ingratitude. For Swift, the hatred between different groups of Christians, including the old crackdown on major heresies including Arianism, is striking, and always in a way a problem to be solved—to be replaced, if possible, by a kind of prudence in seeking the good of a community. Christian hatred of Jews may be a footnote by comparison, but it may have roughly the same source: the religion of love, based on an interpretation of certain texts, can easily become a religion of hate such as may not have been seen or heard of elsewhere. All things considered, we might ask whether Swift shows a certain preference 33 In Modest Proposal, Swift’s narrator suggests it would be good for the Irish not to act like “the Jews, who were murdering one another at the very moment their city was taken”; their factional animosity toward each other undermines any attempt to protect themselves against outsiders. Yet the sense of identity persists. 34 Compare 1 Corinthians 13:13, Matthew 25, 34–46.

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for the Old Testament over the New, and for common Jewish practices over all too predictable Christian ones. If we ask why Swift never explicitly praises or defends the Jews or Brahmins, we can speculate that Swift probably prefers ancient Greek texts, if not actual Greek examples, due to the suggestion that it ought to be possible to maintain a good and austere life without either fear of an all-powerful God, or explicit promises about an afterlife. Given the history of Jews living with various Christian majorities, it may be understandable if Jews think whatever comes along in the form of post-Christianity may be better than Christianity. Swift gives people who think this way some reason to pause. Post-Christianity seems to take modern science for granted. Modern science, while somewhat free from old prejudices, is likely to threaten the well-being of practically everyone in the name of progress that is aimed more at future and hypothetical people than at actual ones. The debate rages as to whether Nazism was a throwback to something pre-modern, a predictable expression of modernity, or something post-modern or anti-modern. No matter what the case, the Holocaust provided evidence that if one scratches the goyim or gentiles, one finds anti-Semitism, often of a murderous variety. Is there some reason to say that the treatment of Jews by Christians, and indeed of “other people” by modern Europeans, is worse than simple or oldfashioned imperialism and mutual distrust and hatred of groups, which is apparently “natural” for human beings? Perhaps the Christians and the moderns can be blamed, even to the extent of “collective guilt,” for not living up to their ideals. Otherwise it is an old story. This is likely to raise the question of whether the ideals were reasonable in the first place. As we often find with Swift, it is not easy to make a clear identification of whom he is presenting us with. Who are the real-life Houyhnhnms? Who are the Yahoos? If we stick to our suggestions that the admirable people in the Travels are ancient Greeks and Romans, we might offer suggestions along the following lines. The great ancients as a group are immortal, based on their accomplishments alone. If all their books were to disappear, it would admittedly be difficult to prove their existence, but at least until that happens, they will always exist. They are in a position to look down on all other human beings: the slavish people, both Greek/Roman and otherwise, who happened to live in ancient times, and later people who belong to one or more types of decline. The wise ancients would naturally give some thought to exterminating all these others in order to keep the cosmos as pure as possible. As a kind of

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half-measure, they might exterminate quite a few and enslave the rest. What would the non-figurative slavery consist of? Perhaps forcing some combination of ancient thought and Christianity into what Hobbes called “Aristotelity.” This would provide medieval people with at least some access to ancient thought, and give those who can read at least a glimpse of this thought at its best, while expecting no more rationality from the generality of people than is realistically possible. Christianity might introduce a kind of slavish docility that could make the medieval regime fairly stable. Within the pages of the Travels, however, there is hope for a new beginning. The Master Houyhnhnm becomes attached to Gulliver, and Gulliver displays more ability to learn than perhaps any Yahoo has previously shown. The Houyhnhnms change Gulliver, who in turn may achieve some change in modern Europe by means of his book; Gulliver also changes the Houyhnhnms, and perhaps prepares for a warmer reception the next time a European Yahoo ventures among them.

CHAPTER 8

What We Can Learn

What Do the Houyhnhnms Learn? Upon Gulliver’s arrival, the Houyhnhnms do not immediately find him repulsive, even though they keep calling him a Yahoo. There must be something about him that makes him seem new and different. Their curiosity comes first, and they bring Gulliver to the Master as quickly as possible for further investigation. Only after some years, and long investigation by the Master and a few others, do they come to the conclusion that drastic action is needed in Gulliver’s case. The Master sums up his findings and asks the other Houyhnhnms to agree on some key points. Thanks to Gulliver’s arrival in a boat, the Master is able to work out that all the Yahoos in Houyhnhnm-land must be descended from two or more ancestors who arrived by water in a similar way, sometime after the aboriginal species.1 This agrees with the original idea that the Yahoos are not aboriginal, and it frees the Houyhnhnms from the notion that has sometimes tempted them, that the Yahoos somehow sprang up spontaneously from the land or water. The old Greek word for this would be 1 IV.9, 306–7. There has been no search for fossils (contrast II.7, 151). Gulliver is not present at the Assembly at which his fate is decided; the Master tells some of the story at the beginning of IV.9, but the bad news about Gulliver’s fate is postponed until about the middle of IV.10: “In the midst of all this happiness, my Master sent for me one morning...” 314.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_8

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“autochthonous,” and this might give a “species” an even higher claim to a piece of land than being “aboriginal.”2 The new understanding of Yahoos traveling by boat, however, raises a new problem. If the Houyhnhnms admit that Yahoos made a journey and arrived by water, this would imply that the inferior creatures possessed at least some reason— something the horses never want to admit. Does all of Gulliver’s hard work to prove himself cause the Master or any other Houyhnhnm to propose freeing all the Yahoos, providing them with an education, and perhaps better access to food? Is Gulliver chosen as an intermediary to carry out this great project? No. No rational horse, as far as we can tell, has any interest in liberating or helping Yahoos or modern Europeans in general. There is a disagreement among them on one related issue, however: how to deal with Gulliver. Here we come to a divide between the Master and the other Houyhnhnms. The Assembly of horses demands that Gulliver leave at once; it is not considered safe to enslave him, so the implication is that he will be killed if he stays (IV.10, 315). There is only one vote to leave Gulliver as he is, and that is cast by the Master, the horse with whom Gulliver has spent most of his time. The Master has shown more intense and lasting curiosity about Gulliver than any other Houyhnhnm, indeed more than anyone in any of his voyages. One would think the Master has conclusive proof that Gulliver is not really superior to the wild Yahoos in any significant way—especially if the Houyhnhnms are well aware that Gulliver sneaks around to kill and eat animals. Gulliver has rational speech, the wild Yahoos do not. The massive teaching of the Travels as a whole is that this, even though it allows for communication between people who initially seem very different, does not help as much as we might hope. The Assembly of horses in general, in fact, seems to be convinced that Gulliver has all the faults of the wild Yahoos, so his reason simply makes him more dangerous. This may be the conclusion that brought about the “general hunting” of Yahoos long ago. The horses fear that Gulliver is likely to lead a rebellion of wild Yahoos; the novelty about him, for them, is simply that he probably has more of the capacity to do something like that than any Yahoo they have ever heard of. We might think we know Gulliver better than that. He is awestruck by the Houyhnhnms, afraid of them, trying to emulate them, kidding himself he is one of them, and like a typical wild Yahoo, afraid to 2 IV.9, 305. See Plato Menexenus 237b–238b (the first Athenians); Republic 415 d–e (the guardians, who probably did not come first).

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take on any creature bigger than himself. He makes an unlikely hero for a rebellion, even if he somewhat resembles Swift who somewhat successfully led a rebellion in Ireland against a proposed new coinage. The Master presumably does not fear rebellion, or Gulliver’s leadership of a rebellion. We are almost forced to think the Master values Gulliver’s company and conversation. Gulliver seems to be uniquely interesting to the Master both in comparison with wild Yahoos and in comparison to other modern Europeans; the Master shows no interest in going to Europe. The two of them are close enough to being friends that Gulliver has been lulled into thinking he was in no danger; he shows the same inattention in Lilliput, where his only friend is a spy at Court. With all of Gulliver’s talk, sometimes dishonest or self-congratulatory, sometimes shamefully debasing of himself and his countrymen, the Master must think there is some inkling that reason might rule in him in a way that is different from the horses, but still admirable in its own way.3 As a Yahoo, and unlike the Houyhnhnms, Gulliver has itches that he either cannot scratch, or he finds even more urgent when he attempts to scratch them. By comparison the rational horses are almost, but not completely, free from wild or potentially uncontrollable passion. Perhaps the Master, even after some years, thinks there are things he can learn from this strange creature. In fact the Master has learned from Gulliver, and the horse society is going to be changed as a result. The Houyhnhnms have always thought that Yahoos are a jarring anomaly in an otherwise rational cosmos. They now have an opportunity they have not previously considered to make the cosmos, as far as they are concerned, Yahoo-free. The Master says he has learned of a very helpful policy from Gulliver. Asses or donkeys, far more docile than Yahoos, can be used as slaves; the Yahoos can be rendered infertile (the males castrated) so they will die off quite soon (IV.9, 306–7). The Yahoos have been constantly threatened with extinction, somewhat like the way the Lilliputians feared being crushed by giants; now it is happening. Asses have barely been mentioned to this point; now they are

3 Nichols (1160–61): “In his desire to know different ways of life Gulliver is Swift’s presentation of a philosopher.” Gulliver of course is constantly searching for a good way of life, until he finds one. “Gulliver even brings Socrates to mind … a man who investigated different opinions and ways of life in order to free himself from the partial truths embodied in the laws and customs of a particular time and place.”

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going to be a major part of the world of the horses.4 Supposedly the asses will be a better group of slaves, “in all respects more valuable Brutes,” with bigger and stronger bodies.5 There has been a lingering question up to this point: do the Houyhnhnms actually need slaves?6 When they regularly considered killing all the Yahoos, this surely would have meant doing without slaves. They have apparently never thought of the “asses” idea on their own; only now can they rid the world they know of Yahoos, do so in a way that is supposedly consistent with “respect for life” (IV.9, 307), and still have slaves. The nature of “asses” is likely to cause fewer problems than the Yahoos did. There may be no further need for radical change. The asses may even be grateful, or at least calm, at the opportunity to live indoors, with work that is not particularly hard and possibly food supplied in portions more generous than one would find in nature.7 The cows who have always been milked, and presumably fed as necessary, are a kind of precursor of enslaved asses. The horses have shown the ability to see no conflict between what is good for themselves as a group and what is supposedly consistent with a beautiful, sweet-smelling and harmonious cosmos or nature; this ability helps them maintain a good regime among themselves. They may continue to be non-modern in a way that Swift admires. If Gulliver were somehow to stay, would he be castrated like other male Yahoos? If so, the last Yahoo will die soon, the commitment to Gulliver would only be short term, and “keeping him” would make very little difference. There may be a deeper, unstated disagreement between the Master and the other horses. Keeping Gulliver may entail a breeding program, just for Gulliver and his offspring, so that they would become the only Yahoos. The wild Yahoos, generally speaking, are dumb animals in comparison to Gulliver. If he mated with one or more of the females

4 Houyhnhnms have not recognized asses as “their own kind” any more than Gulliver initially recognizes wild Yahoos. The flesh of asses has previously been included in the diverse foods of Yahoos; IV.6, 257–8, IV.7, 295. 5 Yahoos are said to be superior to Asses in only one feature, “agility.” 6 The Houyhnhnms all have dexterous “feet” allowing them to perform manual labor;

IV.2, 258, IV.9, 308–9. This reinforces their self-sufficiency. 7 Since horses and asses eat at least some of the same foods, the new regime may make food seem scarcer, and make it more difficult for Houyhnhnms to maintain the belief that nature generously provides what is needed with little forcing or intervention. See Aristotle Politics I.2, 5, 6, 8.

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(who will not be infertile), as if he were a rational horse mating with a donkey, would his offspring have some chance to be born with his good qualities, while being somewhat more passive or obedient? We never learn how the Houyhnhnms got to be the way they are, or if they changed or developed over time. We can be confident the wild Yahoos became worse than they once were, while modern Europeans perhaps in some ways became better than in some previous periods. Gulliver might have improved if he had been allowed to live his life in Houyhnhnm-land; his offspring might do even better. Would this allow them to fit in better than Gulliver, without being expelled? This might seem far-fetched, but it becomes more plausible when we think of the one incident where we know the Houyhnhnms laugh. Gulliver, becoming very comfortable among the Houyhnhnms, has just finished bathing in the nude; his nudity reminds us that he is the only creature in this land who ever wears clothes. An eleven-year-old Yahoo girl, naked as always, runs toward him, more in lust than any other emotion, clearly believing he is a suitable sexual partner. We might say she has in mind an Appalachian wedding. A group of Houyhnhnms are watching, and this seems to be what makes the incident embarrassing to Gulliver; the separation between wild Yahoos and modern Europeans remains frustratingly indistinct. The girl hangs on to Gulliver so tightly, it requires the efforts of a horse to separate them. Gulliver decides the only statesmanlike course is to run away in embarrassment after struggling to get loose, and the Houyhnhnms who are watching laugh. Is it possible he has an erection? Gulliver claims the horses may be discovering for the first time that “their” wild Yahoos are sexually compatible with Gulliver, i.e., this is one more piece of evidence that they are the same species. There is no real doubt that the horses have known this from the first time they saw him.8 Of course even if the Master is impressed at Gulliver himself, that doesn’t mean he would be interested in allowing the offspring of Gulliver to be around; if the breeding plan had been carried out, there might have been a culling of the bad offspring, saving only the good. All of this remains a matter of speculation, but it suggests that someone like us may someday, somehow be acceptable to the Houyhnhnms, instead of every last one of us deserving to be exterminated.

8 IV.8, 300. See IV.2, 257, IV.3, 264–5, IV.10, 317–18.

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Gulliver pretends the attack by a Yahoo girl is a complete shock to him—he has apparently never considered such a possibility. One striking thing is the combination of Gulliver trying to impress the Houyhnhnms, perhaps to the extent of trying to hide the truth, and at the same time perhaps kidding himself. Has Gulliver by any chance had similar contacts with Yahoo females before? Gulliver takes time to note that this particular Yahoo girl is not all that unattractive; she has black hair rather than red, “and her Countenance did not make an Appearance altogether so hideous as the rest of the Kind.” Of course Gulliver says red hair might be “some Excuse for an Appetite a little irregular”—meaning in the girl; unfortunately, there may be an Irish joke here. How much time has Gulliver spent looking at Yahoo females? Is there a chance there could already be a little Gulliver out there somewhere? If we find this suggestion surprising, we may be too influenced by Gulliver’s apparently complete lack of any sexual activity in the third and fourth voyages, in contrast to the first and second. In the first voyage, big Gulliver shows a willingness to lie about an affair with a small aristocratic lady.9 Gulliver goes to great lengths to say it would have been impossible for anyone to visit him in his quarters in secret (I.6, end). In the very next chapter Gulliver describes exactly how he was able to have a secret visitor, with no witnesses (I.7, 71). In saying that a lady could not have been smuggled in, Gulliver lies.10 He is a bit more frank about what big naked ladies get up to with little naked Gulliver in the second voyage, although one might speculate that things go a bit farther than he admits (II.5, 128–9).11 Scholars have often not pursued these suggestions.12 In the third voyage there is no hint that Gulliver has any kind of sex, even though the neglected wives on the flying island are available. Swift definitely conversed with women up on the island; he found them capable of talking in a more sensible way 9 The lady in question is the wife of Flimnap, the High Treasurer, who becomes one of the leading conspirators against Gulliver due to jealousy; once again, Gulliver has failed to anticipate, or protect himself against, the very real dangers that face him as he complacently concludes he is safe. The analogy does not work in every detail, but Swift probably underestimated the bias, the influence and the skill of Walpole. 10 See I.6, 69–70; contrast I.7, 71; Asimov #32, p. 57. Bloom (1990) begins his essay by pointing out Gulliver’s lie—which clearly makes him a Yahoo. 11 See II.5, 128–9; perhaps a reminder of Spartan women; see Aristotle Politics 1269b12–70a8. 12 Asimov sees something disreputable in the second voyage, but not the first; #32, p. 57, #9, p. 108; #12, p. 109. See Glendinning 246, Damrosch 365.

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than the men (III.4, 192). The ladies are known to enjoy the attentions of visiting “gallants,” and they go to great trouble to spend time with passionate and dangerous paramours (possibly Irish) on the land below. There is no reason to think Gulliver would suffer any bad consequences for having a fling; the husbands notice nothing (III.2, 180–81). Nevertheless, somehow the shift to intellectual virtue, and intellectual life, seems to mean no sex for Gulliver.13 Skipping ahead to the end of the Travels, there is some reason to be suspicious that Gulliver, while deploring the fact that he has fathered Yahoo children, and claiming to find his wife’s odor offensive (IV.11, 326; IV.12, 333), might sneak away from the stables at night to be with his wife. This is something she probably wants, and there is no impediment that cannot be overcome with some effort.14 Another possible breeding program would be between horses and asses. Living at close quarters, with no restraints necessary, not entirely different species, there may be romantic possibilities. Technically the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse is called a “mule”; the opposite combination, for which breeding is more difficult, brings about a “hinny.” With some of Swift’s word games, we may be reminded once again of Gulliver, whose first name is Lemuel.15 If there were offspring born to super-rational, superbly just horses, on the one hand, and dumb animals, compliant but strong, on the other, would this suggest another way in which there might be a home for human beings? Many of us are a bit like Gulliver, neither one nor the other. Swift was in a way part Irish, part English, neither one nor the other completely; Gulliver is part Houyhnhnm, part Yahoo. We can hope that mules are not simply an

13 This is apparently Asimov’s view; #2, p. 255. 14 Gulliver has no difficulties being comfortable with his wife on his return from the

first and third voyages—the “modern” ones. The difficulties come at the end of the second and especially the fourth—the “ancient” ones. Gulliver and his wife seem to have two children before the first voyage begins (I.8, 86); the child with whom his wife is pregnant at the beginning of the fourth voyage is likely their third (IV.1, 247). At the end of the second voyage, during which Gulliver has become somewhat used to living with giants, he has difficulty in bed with his wife because he imagines himself much bigger than she is (II.8, 164). It is possible to overcome the “smell” issue even in the case of the giant women; II.5, 128. 15 Lemuel Gulliver’s first name, apart from an obscure Bible reference, may indicate that he is to some extent a mule—part horse, part ass. Of course Psalms 32:9 warns that we should not imitate the horse or the mule, both of which lack understanding, and are spirited and difficult to control; see Gardiner 2004.

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unfortunate compromise, but represent a truly promising possibility. Of course any offspring of two “kinds” might simply bring out the worst of both; once again culling may be necessary. With Swift it is tempting to go back and forth between the figurative and the literal. The Houyhnhnms seem to be roughly the ancient Greeks.16 In their first contact with other human beings, whom they always considered to be Yahoos, they treated these other creatures as natural slaves, and in various ways limited their opportunities—cut off their contact with reason—so these “others” acted in some ways like the slaves they were considered to be. Even after this, the horses were always thinking of destroying the Yahoos altogether, and some accident might have pointed out a way for them to do this without any disadvantage to themselves. Before such an event, there was a somewhat different contact with the non-Houyhnhnm world: Gulliver’s arrival. A solitary human/Yahoo, forced to think for himself, to tell stories and make arguments. The Master, at least, comes to the conclusion that Yahoos are capable of having reason without this attribute simply making them more of a nuisance such that it is reasonable to destroy them. Perhaps in the future some other human being or group may have the opportunity to make yet another contact with the Greeks; this would have to be by way of books. One way in which Gulliver may be a mule is that he is, after years of study, both an ancient and a modern. He has good reason to fear that he continues to see the ancients through a modern filter: Why did they not do more to conquer nature?; why did they not accept some kind of universal humanity? It would be a lively question whether some kind of mule or mixed species can be good company, learn from the Greeks, and not do anything that will bring about their own expulsion.

The Master: Reason, Enlightenment and Physics The Houyhnhnms are more notable for their dedication to their own community than for their possibly independent intellectual life. The curiosity of Houyhnhnms in general may be somewhat limited. Their studies without books include “traditional knowledge,” oral histories, 16 Nichols (1160): “The parallel between the Trojan horse and the Houyhhnms suggests that it is wise to reject the Houyhnhnms.” Surely it makes a difference that the Trojan horse brought Greeks to a victory over the barbarians. To say that Greek rationalism, like modern science, can be taken too far, does not deal with bigger issues.

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herbal medicine, a limited amount of astronomy, poetry and simple techniques for building shelters, sewing and other handwork. Their limited astronomy is as follows: They calculate the Year by the Revolution of the Sun and the Moon, but use no Subdivisions into Weeks. They are well enough acquainted with the Motions of those two Luminaries, and understand the Nature of Eclipses; and this is the utmost Progress of their Astronomy. (IV.9, 307–9)

Perhaps the concern with astronomy never goes much beyond what is helpful for agriculture. Nevertheless, according to Gulliver, all the horses, even apparently the lower class ones who perform menial labor, specialize in careful and precise observations, “like philosophers” (IV.1, 252). There are indications that the Master and a few of his friends are more intelligent than Gulliver seems to realize. Gulliver actually has trouble estimating how intelligent the Master Houyhnhnm in particular is—other than to say that he is more intelligent than Gulliver. Gulliver supposedly has difficulty even explaining to the Master what a “lie” is—a device which is universally used by all Yahoos as far as Gulliver is aware. In other ways the baseness of human beings is a shock and an obstacle to the Master’s learning.17 Nevertheless: “… being of an excellent Understanding, much improved by Contemplation and Converse, he at last arrived at a competent Knowledge of what human Nature in our Parts of the World is capable to perform”…; IV.4, 272–3. Soon enough the Master’s comprehension— not simply what we might call his moral example—is demonstrated to be much beyond Gulliver’s: “I shall hardly be able to do Justice to my Master’s Arguments and Expressions, which must needs suffer by my Want of Capacity, as well as by a Translation into our barbarous English” (IV.5, 274). Eventually Gulliver is forced to offer very high praise: “… I may be allowed to observe, That his Honour, to my great Admiration, appeared to understand the Nature of Yahoos much better than my self”; IV.10, 313. Once the Master and his friends learn some details about modern Europe, they go over them again and again for a laugh. Based on the third voyage of the Travels, we might think the ultimate test of pure intellectual capacity, including a tough adherence to evidence as the basis of science, is an interest in, and a grasp of, physics. Here the Master may surprise us. Back in the second voyage, Gulliver says of 17 IV.4, 270, 273.

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the giants: “… as to Ideas, Entities, Abstractions and Transcendentals, I could never drive the least Conception into their Heads”; II.7, 149. It is probably telling that this is not said of the rational horses. We arrive at the fullest sense of the intellectual capacity of the Master, and of his range of interests, when we learn of a small discussion group that he regularly leads. In the conversations of this group, “nothing passed but what was useful, expressed in the fewest and most significant Words.” Presumably all participants are members of the elite, freed from manual labor. They please themselves and each other with their conversation; they avoid “Differences of Sentiments”; there are silences to prompt “new Ideas”; they cover a range of topics. Their Subjects are generally on Friendship and Benevolence, or Order and Oeconomy; sometimes upon the visible Operations of Nature, or ancient Traditions; upon the Bounds and Limits of Virtue; upon the unerring rules of Reason; or upon some Determinations, to be taken at the next great Assembly; and often upon the various Excellencies of Poetry. (IV.10, 312–13)

Here we find the “operations of nature,” no doubt including the movements of stars and planets insofar as they are visible to the naked eye. This is one topic and apparently not the most important. This discussion group is the real peak of Houyhnhnm existence. Whatever the conformity that is expected in the wider community, the wise Houyhnhnms seem to enjoy a freedom to pursue inquiries and satisfy their curiosity. Some scholars have suggested that the wise Houyhnhnms never laugh; this is surely untrue.18 Some make the related point that the horses are unerotic, which would reinforce a sense that they are literally inhuman. Surely they cannot be participating in Socratic political philosophy (that of the Socrates who comes after the pre-Socratics) if this is the case. Burrow says that “although appearances suggest otherwise,” the Houyhnhnms 18 See Damrosch 374. Gulliver laughs among the big people when a “dim-sighted” old man uses spectacles to try to see Gulliver better; unfortunately, the old man gets angry and advises Gulliver’s “master” to put him on display for money; II.2, 103. Gulliver almost laughs at himself, and people his own size, after living with big people; II.3, 115– 16, II.8, 162. There is laughter by superior beings at II.3, 115, II.6, 143, IV.8, 300, 301. The Master Houyhnhnm says “privately” to other Houyhnhnms (how does Gulliver find out?), that treating Gulliver with civility “would put me into good Humor, and make me more diverting”; IV.3. 266. Generally speaking, it seems Gulliver does not get Swift’s jokes.

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are erotic, and as evidence he cites the fact that “Philosophical conversation [among the Master’s very small group] is the only activity specifically mentioned as giving the Houyhnhnms pleasure.”19 If enlightenment belongs to the few, not the many, as even the work of the modern scientists seems to confirm, then what place does something like physics have in the best regime? One clear suggestion is that there may be some truths arrived at by an elite which it is best not to share with the many. There may be more frankness in the Master Houyhnhnm’s elite group, or a wider range of topics, than with the Houyhnhnms in general, but there is certainly no conspiracy of the few against the many. The overall context is the good of the community. There is some contemplation of the sky, at least among the elite, and experience suggests it is possible to achieve some enjoyable understanding of the constellations and so on with only the naked eye; but of course there have been none of the startling revelations that come with the use of a telescope.20 The main question about physics for the Houyhnhnms is apparently not: How much can we learn about physics, how can we apply ourselves in a disciplined way to learn as much as possible? But given some natural curiosity about these matters, how to make a certain study of them consistent with the common good? The discussion of such topics must always remain “civil,” in more senses than one; and perhaps it is best to confine a widerranging discussion to the elite, so as not to distract others from their duties. This may remind us of the Socratic approach as well as what Swift regards as a wise approach to physics; political and moral matters retain a certain urgency, and speculative matters of physics must be addressed in a way that is public-spirited. We might say: of the range of things that bright people might find interesting to study, anything that is “published” or taught to the young must be consistent with the good of the community. Even beyond what is good for the community, there is of course the question what human beings can actually learn about physics, setting aside possible political harms or benefits of making knowledge generally 19 Burrow (1993, pp. 48–49), referring to IV.10 near the beginning. 20 Intelligent speculation about the moon and the sun has a

long history going back to ancient Babylon, Greece, and China. “By the fifth century B.C., [among the Greeks] it was widely accepted that the Earth is a sphere. This is a critical point, as there is a widespread misconception that ancient peoples thought the Earth was flat. This was simply not the case.” See ancient cosmology here: https://www.loc.gov/collections/finding-our-place-in-the-cosmos-with-carl-sagan/ articles-and-essays/modeling-the-cosmos/ancient-greek-astronomy-and-cosmology.

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available. The Master Houyhnhnm responds when Gulliver describes the controversies that are typical of modern Europe—including controversies about natural philosophy. He argues that there are reasons from within science to be cautious about any conclusions one arrives at. The Master thinks, and Gulliver comes to agree, that “Reason taught us to affirm or deny only where we are certain; and beyond our Knowledge we cannot do either.” [On natural philosophy] he would laugh that a Creature pretending to Reason, should value itself upon the Knowledge of other Peoples Conjectures, and in Things, where that Knowledge, if it were certain, could be of no Use. Wherein he agreed entirely with the Sentiments of Socrates, as Plato delivers them; which I mention as the highest Honour I can do that Prince of Philosophers. (IV.8. 301)

Once again we find some of the rare references to specific thinkers and authors. Neither the Master nor Socrates, as paraphrased here, says certain knowledge is impossible. We may be reminded of Socrates’ comment that as far as he knows, he is unique in one way: when he does not know something, he knows that he does not know it.21 In the Republic all subjects that are taught to guardians are carefully defined in terms of what is good for the city, as opposed to what bright people might want to study if they were on their own (522a ff.). When Gulliver gets to speak to the dead in the third voyage, Aristotle goes so far as to say all socalled knowledge of physics is conjectural; he admits this about his own findings, and says the same will be true of “attraction” or gravity—the description, not the discovery of which is usually attributed to Newton.22 The Master Houyhnhnm may be closer to the thought of Socrates and Aristotle than he seems at first. There may be no one in the Travels who

21 Plato Apology 21d. 22 III.8, 222. See Asimov #11, p. 189. Without going into detail here, there is good

reason to think Newton’s thinking has in fact proved to be conjectural rather than final, and Asimov departs at least somewhat from the strict truth in order to maintain his defense of Newton against Swift. The scholars who brief the King in the second voyage remind Gulliver of “the Modern Philosophy of Europe,” disdaining the evasions of the medieval followers of Aristotle, but practicing similar evasions of their own (II.3, 111–12). Patey suggests this is part of Swift’s critique of the moderns: “… with their own new entities and forces, the new scientists are as guilty as the old of using insignificant speech to frame explanations that do not explain” (Patey 1995, 221).

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is an exact match to Socrates; but the Master comes closest.23 We are left to speculate because conversations among the Master and his closest friends may be partly a secret, even from Gulliver, and Gulliver may not share everything he knows or thinks. The study of physics might seem superior to any study of politics and morality insofar as it can promise certainty, and progress in knowledge, whereas the “humanities” cannot. There is a long-standing tantalizing suggestion that political problems can be explained by something like physics or chemistry, and one great promise of modern science and technology is that technical solutions based on physics can bring about political and moral progress. Both the Flying Islanders and the Projectors seem to have arrived at a dogma on such matters. Swift’s Projectors are in the process of moving away from alchemy to “real science,” but they are driven by what might be called an “alchemical” idea: that one kind of thing in nature can be turned into another. Inert powders and other materials can be turned into explosive gunpowder, which in turn can turn small metal projectiles, virtually useless as weapons in themselves, into deadly ammunition. Medical treatments which work for dogs can be applied to human beings—the mammalian body is similar when it comes to treatment and experimentation. Excrement, once it is understand as a compound of elements and nutrients, can be turned into food. A person whose skull has been split open, a procedure which would presumably kill her or him, can be stitched together and brought back to life. If a good brain is chosen for the new person (not AB Normal’s brain), this could make the world a better place. If species are not fixed, but are subject to change beyond the changes that “happen” to individuals, then it may be that the only thing “fixed” in nature is constant change delivered through something like atoms, and the atoms themselves remain the same even when they occur in different (ephemeral or changing) species. Nature may not be a thing or place in which “beings” reside with considerable stability. The world we know is not likely to be “eternal.” Instead it may be a place of changes, with change as the only constant; with human beings involved, it becomes a thing of makings. Modern science asks: Why

23 Nichols (1168–9) says there is no room in the just city of Plato’s Republic for Socrates, and suggests that something similar must be true of the community of the Houyhnhnms. It is surely true of the former and may be true of the latter, that these communities would not have their specific shapes or landscapes without a Socratic hand at work.

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should we accept apparently stable “things” which are actually changing? Why should we accept changes that do not serve us instead of demanding changes that do serve us? For religion in general, the world as it strikes our senses provides some specific guidance to God’s plans; we might even say that God is mysterious, but He has stooped to make a world for us that is not utterly mysterious, and fixed beings or categories are part of this order. For science in general, all of this is questionable. Darwinian evolution, clarified a century after Swift, has taught many people the dogma that all species are changeable; this more than many other scientific discoveries has arguably undermined the faith of many people. Some of the fundamental thinking here was familiar to the ancients. It was fairly common among ancient thinkers, and those who read their works, to believe that the mix of living species on earth had changed from time to time—there were even suggestions that the present world did not always exist, and that somewhat different worlds existed in the past and may exist in the future.24 Probably no one was able to work out the exact mechanism by which one set of species came about, and then changed to a significantly different set of species. Plato and Aristotle seem to have stood out, as it were against much of the sophisticated thinking of their time, in arguing that species are more or less fixed, and the world we know is eternal. Plato of course emphasized the “ideas”: the categories that we use to divide the world in everyday speech, which are presumably present to us by intellect rather than the senses, may be more fixed or lasting than the individual things, including living things, of which we become aware through our senses. Indeed as a hypothetical: How could or can we ever become aware of anything eternal, or even be convinced there is any such thing? If categories and ideas are not somehow fixed, and subject to communication between rational individuals, then how can we have any confidence that anything is fixed? Aristotle more than Plato teaches a kind of “teleology,” including final causes, as if it were true as well as edifying. There is some reason to think there is less certainty about a final cause, suggesting that everything is “meant” to be a certain way, than about more immediate causes. Perhaps as Swift suggests, for

24 See Lucretius, On the Nature of Things II (elaborating the thought of Epicurus). According to one Internet source: “Anaximenes, Heracleitus, Diogenes and the Stoics appear to have believed in a continuous series of single worlds. Empedocles accepted a discontinuous series of single worlds with nothing—no kosmos —in the intervals between worlds.”

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both Plato and Aristotle what is edifying has considerable weight even in a consideration of what is true.25 There may be an emphasis in the Socratic thinkers on thoughts or sayings that are both true and edifying; at the same time, there may be true but less edifying teachings that are to be found somewhere. One reason this might be a kind of treasure hunt is that the Socratics believe in offering edifying teachings for the public, and keeping something like endless cross-examination for private conversation. Socrates tells the Athenian jurors they are turning on him because of his habit of cross-examining “the wise.” The jurors seem confident that this is not true; they are prosecuting him for spreading specific teachings that they regard as false and/or bad for the city. Swift joins Socrates in holding on to at least some skepticism in these matters. The modern scientists of the third voyage are obsessed with physics, both theoretical and applied; Swift implies that the wisest people, while they might find this interesting, are not so obsessed. Politics and morality, as is suggested by the notion of a “Socratic turn,” always have a certain priority for human beings. Socrates was famous for turning away from physics and mathematics, at least to some extent, and toward matters of virtue, politics and the best way of life.26 It would be strange if political teachings contradicted physics, but there is no reason to expect an adequate understanding of politics and morality to come from experts in physics.27 25 See Bolotin. “The priority of the eternal celestial revolutions ... guarantees the causal finitude of the universe”; Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, “Aristotle’s Natural Philosophy.” Aristotle’s approach seems to require a kind of ultimate certainty in order for our daily observations, “the phenomena,” to be “saved,” or to achieve some definite degree of plausibility. 26 In Plato’s Apology, Socrates seems to claim he does not teach “physics” (19b–20c, 21d–22a); this allows him to avoid discussing what he believes about such matters. He challenges the Athenians who are present to say whether they have heard him teach about physics. The people who are present and might know what he teaches behind closed doors, including Plato, do not speak up. On the Socratic turn see Pangle (1983), pp. 13 ff.; Strauss (1953/1971), 120 ff. and generally chapters III and IV. Strauss has suggested that Aristophanes’ Clouds includes “the only available presentation of the ‘preSocratic’ Socrates”; Strauss (1966), p. 4. This seems to mean a Socrates dedicated to nonhuman or inhuman science, and one who is unerotic, somewhat like the flying islanders if not the Projectors. Nichols suggests that Gulliver’s excessive or mistaken liking for the Houyhnhnms indicates an attraction to moderns such as Descartes, but also to the young Socrates, before the ‘Socratic turn’, or to the pre-Socratics; Nichols (1981), pp. 1168–9. 27 Aristotle suggests in the NE that mathematics and astronomy are among the “highest” studies, but the most urgent studies have to do with prudence and politics; training

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Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels is in the Socratic tradition. The fact that the best regime, when Gulliver finds it, turns out to be one made up of an entirely different species, a species that Gulliver could not join even if his efforts to do so were more impressive, does not apparently mean that we ought to give up our aspirations for justice. Such aspirations have to do with achieving true or lasting good things both for oneself and for a community; they seem to depend on a world that cannot simply be altered to suit our wishes or whims. Oddly enough, Gulliver at the end of the Travels may not be a bad example for us to follow. After all his journeys, Gulliver pursues a way of life that is entirely different from anything he has tried before. He has no more thought of traveling. He seems to give no thought to earning a living. He has written a book—the one we have before us. His plan was to bring moral reform to Britain, and when we last see him, he notes with some bitterness that his plan is a failure so far. Without knowing whether Swift has anyone like Socrates in mind, we might say Gulliver in the end has some of the tendencies of Socrates, but not those that may have brought Socrates to be tried, convicted and executed. Gulliver does not teach mathematics or physics (the things in the sky/the things below the ground). He is not introducing new gods to his homeland; if one had to venture, one might say he has no gods at all. He does not teach anyone for money or corrupt the young; he seems to have no contact with any young people except through his book. He does not cross-examine the leading people of his time, who are often considered to be wise, thereby revealing their true folly and ignorance. He never mentions Walpole, Marlborough or Newton by name, and indeed one might guess he has never heard of them. He is avoiding any involvement with political and religious factions, or intrigues at Court, and the authorities seem to be paying no attention to him. Despite Gulliver’s weird and anti-social behavior, really only enjoying the company of horses who, with no offense meant, may not be particularly rational, we might say he represents the morally salutary, even exemplary side of Socrates as we find him in literature. Gulliver says the best thing to do is adopt the Houyhnhnms’ in the former is not likely in itself to help with the latter; VI.7, 1141a9 ff. See Politics I. 12–13, and the ambiguous “teleology” throughout Book I (barely referred to again in later books). One might expect Aristotle to refer to his properly “scientific” writings, such as Generation of Animals, or indeed to the Physics; he does not do so. Specifically, he never suggests the human family ought to be based literally on “the birds and the bees”; in a way the family is more natural than the city, and Aristotle is a bit evasive or “dialectical” as to whether the family is a reliable example or support for political life.

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way of life, but he never really did that himself, even when he lived among the rational horses (how much oats and milk could one stand?). If he is trying to teach the horses, who after all are noble beasts (better than chimpanzees), he might find that while being less difficult, they are about as rewarding to teach as many human students. There is no reason to think Gulliver stings the horses. Of course he may fail in finding a true friend, who would presumably have to be a human being. Gulliver may not be doing much good; but it is difficult to believe he is doing much harm.

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_______. The City and Man. University Press of Virginia, 1964. ________. Socrates and Aristophanes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966. ________. “Plato.” In History of Political Philosophy, 3rd ed., 33–89, edited by Leo Strauss and Joseph Cropsey. University of Chicago Press, 1987. ________. Liberalism Ancient and Modern. University of Chicago Press, 1995. Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels. Edited by Dutton Kearney. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010. _______. Gulliver’s Travels and Other Writings. Edited by Ricardo Quintana. New York: Random House, 1958. _______. The Battle of the Books (A Full and True Account of the Battel Fought Last Friday, Between the Antient and the Modern Books in St. James’ Library. London: 1710). Text from A Tale of a Tub, to which is Added the Battle of the Books and the Mechanical Operation of the Spirit, edited by A. C. Guthkelch and D. Nichol Smith (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1920). Edited, with paragraph numbers and annotations, by Jack Lynch. http://jacklynch.net/Texts/ battle.html Syfret, Miss R.H. “The Origins of the Royal Society.” Royal Society Journal of the History of Science (April 1 1948): 75–137. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr. 1948.0017 Temple, Sir William. Essays on Ancient and Modern Learning. Edited with an Introduction by J.E. Springarn. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909. Tieje, Ralph Earle. “The Prose Voyage Imaginaire Before 1800.” Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy in English. University of Illinois, 1917. Traugott, John. “A Voyage to Nowhere with Thomas More and Jonathan Swift: ‘Utopia’ and ‘The Voyage to the Houyhnhnms.’” The Sewanee Review Vol. 69, No. 4 (October–December 1961): 534–565. Ward, David. Jonathan Swift: An Introductory Essay. Methuen, 1973. Winchester, Simon. The Man Who Loved China: The Fantastic Story of the Eccentric Scientist Who Unlocked the Mysteries of the Middle Kingdom. Harper, 2008. Wood, Nigel. “Introduction.” In Jonathan Swift, edited by Nigel Wood. Routledge, 2014. Wooten, John. “From Purgatory to the Paradise of Fools: Dante, Ariosto, and Milton. ELH Vol. 49, No. 4 (Winter 1982): 741–750. Wooton, David. “History: Science and the Reformation.” Nature Vol. 550 (2017): 454–455. https://doi.org/10.1038/550454a Xu, Xiang. “Jonathan Swift’s Journey of Religions Satire.” Asian Culture and History Vol. 1, No. 1 (January 2009).

Index

A Agriculture, 3, 58, 69, 71, 193 Ancients, 1–3, 11, 16–26, 28–34, 42, 48, 51, 53, 54, 60, 67, 68, 75, 77, 84, 86, 87, 107, 110, 111, 114–118, 120, 121, 123–127, 143, 146, 148, 149, 151, 152, 157, 167, 168, 173, 179, 183, 184, 191, 192, 194, 195, 198 Aristophanes, 12, 35, 85, 199 Aristotle, 2, 3, 17, 20, 21, 24–26, 33, 35, 53–57, 59, 60, 62, 68, 84, 86, 87, 101, 105, 106, 112, 118, 121, 125–128, 130, 137, 138, 140–142, 145, 146, 159, 168, 169, 184, 188, 190, 196, 198–200 B Bacon, Francis (1st Viscount St. Alban), 4, 23, 31, 66–68 Bolingbroke, Viscount (Henry St. John), 14, 45–47, 59, 89

Brahmins, 21, 148, 157, 173, 181, 183 C Cannibalism, 13, 156, 180, 181 D Descartes, René, 19, 25, 26, 32, 33, 67, 68, 70, 112, 121, 127, 199 E Epicurus, 21, 82, 127–129, 152, 198 F Food, 27, 39, 41, 42, 44, 48, 50, 61, 64, 71, 72, 103, 111, 144–148, 153, 155–157, 160, 168, 173, 180, 181, 186, 188, 197 Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus (novel by Mary Shelley), 4, 76, 181

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 L. W. Robertson, Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels, Recovering Political Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1

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INDEX

G Gunpowder, 27, 38, 56, 58, 59, 64, 66, 67, 121, 197

H Heidegger, Martin, 4, 5 Hobbes, Thomas, 9, 26, 98, 158, 184 Homer, 21, 30, 35, 112, 119, 121, 125, 126, 132–135

I Ireland, 13, 14, 47, 62, 64, 88, 110, 160, 174–176, 180, 182, 187, 190, 191

L Locke, John, 96, 98–101, 172 Lucretius (Titus Lucretius Carus), 52, 82, 83, 151–153, 198

M Machiavelli, Niccolo, 32, 68, 98, 120, 141, 143 Madison, James, 8 Mandeville, Bernard, 13, 15 Marlborough, Duke of (John Churchill), 9, 113, 116, 117, 121, 123, 200 Marx, Karl, 29 Meat, 69, 80, 148, 153–157, 160–162, 164, 168, 178–180, 188 Medicine, 3, 49, 61, 69, 74–78, 156, 181, 193 Moderns, 1–5, 7, 10–14, 18–34, 38, 41, 42, 50, 53, 56–58, 60, 61, 63, 66–71, 74–78, 80, 83–87, 98, 110, 111, 113–117, 120–128, 138, 139, 142–145,

147, 148, 152, 156, 158–164, 167–172, 174, 175, 177–181, 183, 184, 186–189, 191–193, 195–197, 199 More, Sir Thomas, 2, 3, 7, 10, 34, 36, 107, 117–120, 132, 137, 138, 141–143, 158

N Navigation, 22, 66 Newton, Sir Isaac, 19, 20, 31, 66, 72, 84, 128, 196, 200

P Plato, 2, 3, 7, 12, 21, 24–26, 29, 32, 35, 54, 65, 69, 77, 87, 107, 118, 119, 124, 130–132, 134, 137–140, 142, 155, 157, 158, 168, 186, 196–199 Pope, Alexander, 84, 90, 119, 120, 159

S Savage, 170, 171, 174, 175, 179, 181 Slavery, 1, 7, 10, 38, 43, 44, 48, 56, 68, 106, 117, 133, 139, 141, 142, 144–146, 154, 171–174, 178, 184, 187, 188, 192 Socrates, 3, 11, 16, 25, 32, 33, 54, 65, 69, 77, 87, 107, 117, 119, 120, 130, 132, 133, 135, 141, 142, 155–157, 194–196, 199, 200

T Temple, Sir William, 3, 18–23, 25, 26, 30, 31, 45, 51, 152, 157 Transubstantiation, 51, 55, 72–74, 90, 120, 161–163

INDEX

W Walpole, Robert (First Earl of Orford), 160, 190, 200

Waugh, Evelyn, 12

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