Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/505

Rh ill founded. He has been represented as a man of great ambition, pride, avarice, and misanthropy. Now let us see what foundation there was for any of these charges. And first as to ambition.

This is generally considered as so powerful a passion, that it impels those who are under its dominion, to seek its gratification by all means, just or unjust. From this species of ambition, never mortal was more free than Swift. How little he was inclined to make use even of the common allowable modes of rising in the world, or to gain preferment by any solicitation on his part, may be seen by the following extracts from his letters to the archbishop of Dublin, written at a time when he was in the highest favour with the people then in power. "I humbly thank your grace for the good opinion you are pleased to have of me, and for your advice, which seems to be wholly grounded on it. As to the first which relates to my fortune, I shall never be able to make myself believed how indifferent I am about it. I sometimes have the pleasure of making that of others, and I fear it is too great a pleasure to be a virtue, at least in me . . . . It is my maxim to leave great ministers to do as they please; and if I cannot distinguish myself enough, by being useful in such a way, as becomes a man of conscience and honour, I can do no more; for I never will solicit for myself, though I often do for others." And in another place he says, "I know nothing of promises of any thing intended for myself, but, I thank God, I am not very warm in my expectations, and know courts too well, to be surprised at disappointments; which, however, I should have no great reason to fear, if I Rh