Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/11

Rh there one of them, who, although he hath all the symptoms of the vice appearing upon every occasion, can look with such an impartial eye upon himself, as to believe that the imputation thrown upon him is not altogether groundless and unfair? who, if he were told, by men of a discerning spirit and a strong conjecture, of all the evil and absurd things which that false heart of his would at one time or other betray him into, would not believe as little, and wonder as much, as Hazael did before him? Thus for instance; tell an angry person, that he is weak and impotent, and of no consistency of mind; tell him, that such or such a little accident which he may then despise and think much below a passion, shall hereafter make him say and do several absurd, indiscreet, aud misbecoming things: he may perhaps own that he hath a spirit of resentment within him, that will not let him be imposed on; but he fondly imagines, that he can lay a becoming restraint upon it when he pleaseth, although it is ever running away with him into some indecency or other.

Therefore, to bring the words of my text to our present occasion, I shall endeavour, in a farther prosecution of them, to evince the great necessity of a nice and curious inspection into the several recesses of the heart, being the surest and the shortest method that a wicked man can take to reform himself: for let us but stop the fountain, and the streams will spend and waste themselves away in a very little time; but if we go about, like children, to raise a bank, and to stop the current, not taking notice all the while of the spring which continually feedeth it, when the next flood of temptation rises and breaketh in upon it, then we shall find that we have begun at the wrong Rh