Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/331

Rh miseries he had suffered during a long state of dependence, even to an advanced period of his life, made so deep an impression on his mind, that he determined never to marry, unless his fortune were such, as might enable him to make a suitable provision for his wife, or any offspring he might have by her. As he had no great propensity to the marriage state, on several accounts before mentioned, he found no difficulty in keeping this resolution; yet it is highly probable, at the time of his writing this part of his Journal, he had a distant view of being united sometime or other in the bands of wedlock to Mrs. Johnson, whenever his expected preferment in the church, and sufficient increase of fortune should render it eligible. For, though he might himself have been perfectly content to have passed the rest of his life with her, in the same manner as before, on the pure Platonick system; yet it could not escape his penetration, that she had other views, and felt a passion for him not quite so refined. And the charms of her society had become so essential to his happiness, that rather than run a risk of losing it, he would purchase it even at the price of matrimony, provided it could be done consistently with the unalterable resolution he had laid down.

But while Swift's thoughts were thus employed, and all his views in life tended to this point, as to their centre, an event happened which unhinged his mind, and filled his bosom with a disturbance, which all his philosophy could never calm, and which was the source of much disquiet to him ever after in life. This arose from that all powerful passion, which the greatest heroes, and most nowned