Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/23

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the several attempts to gratify the curiosity of the world, in delineating the Life and Character of the immortal Jonathan Swift, yet hitherto little satisfactory has been produced on that subject. The different, and often opposite lights in which he has been shown by the several writers, have occasioned an equal diversity of judgments in their several readers, according to their various prepossessions; and even the most candid are too often left in a state of doubt, through the want of having the truth laid before them supported by sufficient proofs.

Perhaps there never was a man whose true character has been so little known, or whose conduct at all times, even from his first setting out in life, has been so misrepresented to the world, as his. This was owing to several causes, which will be laid open in the following work. But the chief source of all the erroneous opinions entertained of him, arose from Swift himself, on account of some singularities in his character, which at all times exposed him to the shafts of envy and malice, while he employed no other shield in his defence, but that of conscious integrity.

He had, early in life, from causes to be hereafter explained, imbibed such a strong hatred to Rh