Neither can You acquit your self of these Obligations, without telling the Arts, in their turn, share Your Influence and Protection: Besides, who knows, but some true Geniusmay happen to arise under Your Ministry, exortus ut aetherius Sol. Every Age migh perhaps produce one or two of these to adorn it, if they were not sunk under the Censure and Obloquy of plodding, servile, imitating Pedants. I do not mean by a true Genius, any bold Writere who breaks through the Rules of Decency to distinguish himself by the singularity of Opinions; but one, who upon a deserving Subject, is able to open new Scenes, and discover a Vein of true and noble thinking, which never entered into any Imagination before: Every Stroke of whose Pen, is worth all the Paper blotted by Hundreds of others in the compass of their Lives. I know, My Lord, Your Friends will offer in Your Defence, that in Your private Capacity, You never refus’d Your Purse and Credit to the Service and Support of learned or ingenious Men; and that ever since You have been in publick Employment, You have constantly bestowed Your Favours to the most deserving Persons. But I desire Your Lordship not to be deceived: We never will admit of these Excuses, nor will allow Your private Liberality, as great as it is, to attone for Your excessive publick thrift. But here again, I am afrain most good Subjects will interpose in Your Defence, by alleging the desparate Condition You found the Nation in, and the Necessity there was for so able and faithful a Steward, to retrieve it, if possible, by the utmost Frugality. We may grant all this, My Lord; but then, it ought likewise to be considered, that You have already saved several Millions to the Publick, and that what we ask, is too inconsiderable to break into any Rules of the strictest good Husbandry. The French Kingbestows about half a dozen Pensions to learned Men in several Parts ofEurope, and perhaps a dozen in his whole Kingdom; which, in the whole, do probably not amount to half the Income of many a private Commoner inEngland; yet have more contributed to the Glory of that Prince, than any Million he hath otherwise employed. For Learning, like all true Merit, is easily satisfied, whilst the False and Counterfeit is perpetually craving, and never thinks it hath enough. The smallest Favour given by a Great Prince, as a Mark of Esteem, to reward the Endowments of the Mind, never fails to be returned with Praise and Gratitude, and loudly celebrated to the World. I have known some Years ago, several Pensions given to particula Persons (how deservedly I shall not enquire) any one of which, if divided into smaller Parcels, and distributed by the Crown, to those who might, upon occasion, distinguish themselves by some extraordinary Production of Wit or Learning, would be amply sufficient to answer the End. Or if any such Persons were above Money, (as every great Genius certainly is, with very moderate Conveniences of Life) a Medal, or some Mark of Distinction, would do full as well.
BUT I forget my Province, and find myself turning Projector before I am aware; although it be one of the last Characters under which I should desire to appear before Your Lordship, especially when I have the Ambition of aspiring to that of being, with the greatest Respect and Truth,
My Lord,
Your Lordship’s
Most Obedient, Most Obliged,
And Most Humble Servant
J. Swift
1704
Jonathan Swift, 1667–1745
A Tale of a Tub
Advert
To the Right Honourable John Lord Somers.
The Bookseller to the Reader
The Epistle Dedicatory to His Royal Highness Prince Posterity
The Preface.
Section I.— The Introduction.
Section II.
Section III.— A Digression Concerning Critics.
Section IV.— A Tale of a Tub.
Section V.— A Digression in the Modern Kind.
Section VI.— A Tale of a Tub.
Section VII.— A Digression in Praise of Digressions.
Section VIII.— A Tale of a Tub.
Section IX.— A Digression Concerning the Original, the Use, and Improvement of Madness in a Commonwealth.
Section X.— A Farther Digression.
Section XI.— A Tale of a Tub.
The Conclusion.
The History of Martin.
A Digression on the Nature, Usefulness, and Necessity of Wars and Quarrels.
The History of Martin — Continued.
A Project for the Universal Benefit of Mankind.
Treatifes writ by the fame Author, moft of them mentioned in the following Discourfes; which will be fpeedily publifhed.
A Character of the prefent Set of Wits in this Ifland.
A Panegyrical Effay upon the Number THREE.
A Differtation upon the principal productions of Grub-ftree.
Lectures upon the Diffection of Human Nature.
A Panegyrick upon the World.
An Analytical Difcourfe upon Zeal, Hiftori-theo-phyfi-logically confidered.
A general Hiftory of Ears.
A modeft Defence of the Proceedings of the Rabble in all Ages.
A Defcription of the Kingdom of Abfurdities.
A Voyage into England, by a Perfon of Quality in Terra Auftralis incognita, tranflated from the Original.
A Critical Effay upon the Art of Canting, Philofophically, Phyfically, and Mufically confidered.
My LORD,
Though the author has written a large Dedication, yet that being addressed to a Prince whom I am never likely to have the honour of being known to; a person, besides, as far as I can observe, not at all regarded or thought on by any of our present writers; and I being wholly free from that slavery which booksellers usually lie under to the caprices of authors, I think it a wise piece of presumption to inscribe these papers to your Lordship, and to implore your Lordship’s protection of them. God and your Lordship know their faults and their merits; for as to my own particular, I am altogether a stranger to the matter; and though everybody else should be equally ignorant, I do not fear the sale of the book at all the worse upon that score. Your Lordship’s name on the front in capital letters will at any time get off one edition: neither would I desire any other help to grow an alderman than a patent for the sole privilege of dedicating to your Lordship.
I should now, in right of a dedicator, give your Lordship a list of your own virtues, and at the same time be very unwilling to offend your modesty; but chiefly I should celebrate your liberality towards men of great parts and small fortunes, and give you broad hints that I mean myself. And I was just going on in the usual method to peruse a hundred or two of dedications, and transcribe an abstract to be applied to your Lordship, but I was diverted by a certain accident. For upon the covers of these papers I casually observed written in large letters the two following words, DETUR DIGNISSIMO, which, for aught I knew, might contain some important meaning. But it unluckily fell out that none of the Authors I employ understood Latin (though I have them often in pay to translate out of that language). I was therefore compelled to have recourse to the Curate of our Parish, who Englished it thus, Let it be given to the worthiest; and his comment was that the Author meant his work should be dedicated to the sublimest genius of the age for wit, learning, judgment, eloquence, and wisdom. I called at a poet’s chamber (who works for my shop) in an alley hard by, showed him the translation, and desired his opinion who it was that the Author could mean. He told me, after some consideration, that vanity was a thing he abhorred, but by the description he thought himself to be the person aimed at; and at the same time he very kindly offered his own assistance gratis towards penning a dedication to himself. I desired him, however, to give a second guess. Why then, said he, it must be I, or my Lord Somers. From thence I went to several other wits of my acquaintance, with no small hazard and weariness to my person, from a prodigious number of dark winding stairs; but found them all in the same story, both of your Lordship and themselves. Now your Lordship is to understand that this proceeding was not of my own invention; for I have somewhere heard it is a maxim that those to whom everybody allows the second place have an undoubted title to the first.
This infallibly convinced me that your Lordship was the person intended by the Author. But being very unacquainted in the style and form of dedications, I employed those wits aforesaid to furnish me with hints and materials towards a panegyric upon your Lordship’s virtues.
In two days they brought me ten sheets of paper filled up on every side. They swore to me that they had ransacked whatever could be found in the characters of Socrates, Aristides, Epaminondas, Cato, Tully, Atticus, and other hard names which I cannot now recollect. However, I have reason to believe they imposed upon my ignorance, because when I came to read over their collections, there was not a syllable there but what I and everybody else knew as well as themselves: therefore I grievously suspect a cheat; and that these Authors of mine stole and transcribed every word from the universal report of mankind. So that I took upon myself as fifty shillings out of pocket to no manner of purpose.
If by altering the title I could make the same materials serve for another dedication (as my betters have done), it would help to make up my loss; but I have made several persons dip here and there in those papers, and before they read three lines they have all assured me plainly that they cannot possibly be applied to any person besides your Lordship.
I expected, indeed, to have heard of your Lordship’s bravery at the head of an army; of your undaunted courage in mounting a breach or scaling a wall; or to have had your pedigree traced in a lineal descent from the House of Austria; or of your wonderful talent at dress and dancing; or your profound knowledge in algebra, metaphysics, and the Oriental tongues: but to ply the world with an old beaten story of your wit, and eloquence, and learning, and wisdom, and justice, and politeness, and candour, and evenness of temper in all scenes of life; of that great discernment in discovering and readiness in favouring deserving men; with forty other common topics; I confess I have neither conscience nor countenance to do it. Because there is no virtue either of a public or private life which some circumstances of your own have not often produced upon the stage of the world; and those few which for want of occasions to exert them might otherwise have passed unseen or unobserved by your friends, your enemies have at length brought to light.
It is true I should be very loth the bright example of your Lordship’s virtues should be lost to after-ages, both for their sake and your own; but chiefly because they will be so very necessary to adorn the history of a late reign; and that is another reason why I would forbear to make a recital of them here; because I have been told by wise men that as dedications have run for some years past, a good historian will not be apt to have recourse thither in search of characters.
There is one point wherein I think we dedicators would do well to change our measures; I mean, instead of running on so far upon the praise of our patron’s liberality, to spend a word or two in admiring their patience.
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