Page:A Compendium of Irish Biography.djvu/536

 SWI

the Irish showed itself in the full glow of national enthusiasm. The interval was forgotten during which their great pa- triot had been dead to the world, and he was wept and mourned, as if he had been called away in the full career of his public services. Young and old of all ranks sur- rounded the house, to pay the last tribute of sorrow and of affection." Swift was by his own desire interred privately in St. Patrick's (.^athedral, beside the remains of Esther Johnson. The epitaph was pre- pared beforehand by himself : " Hie de- positum est corpus Jonathan Swift, S.T.P., hujus ecclesiae Cathedralis Decani : ubi saeva indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit, Abi viator, et imitare, si poteris, strenuum pro virili libertatis vindicem. Obiit anno 1745 : mensis Octobris : die 19 : setatis anno 78." In old age Swift's countenance conveyed an expression which, though severe, was noble and impressive. About £10,000 of his pro- perty was available for the foundation of the Hospital for the Insane in Dublin, which bears his name, and which for gene- rations has tended to alleviate the suffer- ings of that unhappy class. It would be impossible m a notice of this character to do justice to Swift's genius by an effective examination of his writings. The coarse- ness that disgraces them cannot be palli- ated, and has done more than anything else to unfairly degrade his character in the eyes of posterity. Scott says that three peculiarities stamped his character as an author — originality — total indif- ference to literary fame or to the profits arising from his works — and the dis- tinguished pitch of excellence which he attained in every style of composition he attempted : he might have added his en- tire absence of any feelings of literary jealousy. Mr. Lecky thus concludes the ablest essay that has ever been written upon Swat's life and character : " Of the intellectual grandeur of his career it is needless to speak. The chief sustainer of an English Ministry, the most powerful advocate of the Peace of Utrecht, the creator of public opinion in Ireland, he has graven his name indelibly in English history, and his writings, of their own kind, are unique in English literature. . . Gulliver and the Tale of a Tub remain isolated productions, unrivalled, unim- itated, and inimitable." Swift showed himself through life a sincere Churchman, of the type that would now be considered that he participated in the latitudinarian views of many of his contemporaries and friends. While he made no pretence of re- 512
 * ' high." There is no reason to suppose

SWI

ligion, it is knovm that in all his cures, at Kilroot, Laracor, and afterwards as Dean of St. Patrick's, he was strict in the per- formance of the ceremonies of the Church. It was only by chance his friends discovered that he used to steal out to early service in London, and that he read prayers regu- larly in his own family. His principles re- garding Church prerogative were extreme. He advocated the passage of the Test Act, which would have prevented all but mem- bers of the Church from filling public offices ; whilst he brought the proposal for the equality of Protestant dissenters in Ire- land to the supposed reductio ad absurdum. that it would imply a like freedom being accorded to Catholics. The best edi- tion of his Life and Works is that by Sir Walter Scott, in 19 vols. Literature has, in the present century, sustained few greater losses than the death of Mr. Forster before the completion of his Life of Swift. The work, imperfect as it stands, is the most important contribution yet made to- wards enabling the world to form a proper estimate of Swift's character. ^" =33 320

320t 321 322

Swift, Deane, the grandson of God- win Swift, Jonathan Swift's uncle, was born about 1 707. The Dean, in a letter to Pope, dated 28th April 1739, thus recom- mends him : " This cousin of mine, who is so desirous to wait on you, is named Deane Swift, because his great grandfather . . was Admiral Deane, who, having been one of the regicides, had the good fortune to save his neck by dying a year or two before the Eestoration. I have a great esteem for Mr. Deane Swift, who is much the most valuable of any of his family : he was first a student in this University [Dublin], and finished his studies at Oxford. . . He has a true spirit for liberty, and is a perfect master, equally skilled in the best Greek and Eoman authors." In 1755 he published an essay on the life of Jonathan Swift, and ten years afterwards contributed two volumes to Hawkesworth's edition of his great relative's Life and Writings. Neither of these works is of much value. Mr. Forster, in his Life of Swift, speaks of " The entire untrustworthiness of all Mr. Deane Swift's family flourishes " — " One of the few passages worth preserving from Mr. Deane Swift's dull and incoherent essay." Deane Swift died in Worcester, 12th July 1783. [His son Theophilus, who inherited estates in the County of Limerick, and died in 1815, was the author of several miscellaneous works of small merit. His grandson, Deane, was a writer in the Press, one of the organs of