Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/357

Rh It is impossible there could be any mistake about the kind of love mentioned in this passage, were it not for an expression in the subsequent lines, which might admit of a bad interpretation, by those who do not understadunderstand [sic] the true force of words, which has been on many occasions the source of infinite errours among us, from not studying our own language. The expression I mean, is to be found in the last of the following lines:

Or, to compound the business, whether They temper love and books together, Must never to mankind be told, Nor shall the conscious muse unfold.

Here the word conscious, being much oftener used in a bad than a good sense, is apt to mislead the unwary reader, and make him conceive that there was something in the secret dishonourable to the parties if revealed: But upon examining into the proper meaning of this word, we shall find that it has a very different sense when applied to one's self, and when it refers to others. Consciousness, applied to self, is the perception of what passes in a man's own mind; from which proceeds an internal sense of guilt or innocence, by which we either stand acquitted or condemned to ourselves, and is therefore equally capable of a good or bad sense. But when it refers to another person, it has nothing to do with any judgment formed of the rectitude or depravity of the action, it only means that that other person is in the secret, or privy to the transaction, be it good, or be it bad. And consciousness of this sort can never affect the nature of the thing itself: Rh