Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/511

Rh rest of the world, that some of the most lofty ones among them, sacrificed their pride to the vanity of being numbered among his acquaintance. But it was only to the vainglorious, who were proud of the accidental superiority which their birth gave them, that he assumed this behaviour. To his equals, among which number he reckoned all men of genius and virtue, he put on no airs of superiority, but lived with them on the most friendly and familiar footing. His inferiours, he always treated with complacency and good humour, unless they happened to show themselves to be either knaves or fools, and to them he was not sparing of his correction. In mixed societies, according to his own principle, he expected the same respect to be shown him, as is usually paid to persons of the highest rank: nor was he often disappointed in this, as there was something so commanding in his aspect, expressive of the native superiority of his mind, that it struck the beholders with awe, and produced that reverence from the heart, which is only shown by external ceremonies to artificial greatness. But among his intimates, this deportment was entirely thrown aside; where he indulged the utmost familiarity, giving free scope to the vagaries of fancy, often to a childish playfulness of mirth. In short his pride, if by that name it must be called, was of the same kind as that of admiral Villars, described by Sully, as arising from that inborn noble elevation of mind, which, in great souls, is only a perception of their own worth, without the least mixture of mean vanity, or the intoxication of self-love.

The charge of avarice against him, is, if possible, less founded than any of the others; for never man was more free from that vice, till it came upon