Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/500

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FROM the foregoing memoirs may be drawn the true character of Swift; not on the slender ground of opinion, but the solid foundation of facts.

He was, from his earliest days, as he describes himself in one of his poems,

Wine, women, and gaming, the three great seducers of youth, had never the least influence over him. He has been often heard to say, that he never was drunk in his life: there have been strong reasons assigned for supposing that he never had any criminal commerce with the fair sex: and though for a short time, during his residence in London, he fell in with the fashion of playing for trifles, yet he wholly left it off when he appeared in Ireland in the character of the dean of St. Patrick's.

is an old adage; and the bosom that is free from vice, is finely prepared for the reception of virtue. The soil in which no weeds sprout up, will reward the cultivator with plenteous crops of useful grain. Accordingly we find, from his first appearance in the world, he was possessed of three of the cardinal virtues, justice, temperance, and fortitude, in an eminent degree. His prudence, indeed, with regard to worldly views, might often be called in question; and sometimes he might be hurried away from listening to her sober dictates, by the impetuosity of a warm imagination, or allured by the sportiveness of fancy: yet