Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 18.djvu/31

Rh was himself carried home in a chair, followed by the lamentations and prayers of the people for his recovery, who attended him to his own door with their sighs and sorrows.

The bold marquis, though subdued, was still untamed: his fury, despair, and desire of instant death, made him use his efforts to prevent the good intentions of the surgeon and the assistants. They were forced to keep him down by strength of hand, whilst his wounds were searched and dressed; after which, he was sent to Newgate, where he continued in the same violence of mind. He begged to die, he strove to die, by rubbing the plasters from his wounds; to prevent which, there were persons perpetually employed to watch on each side the bed.

If we read his sentiments in his own Memoirs, we may find they were always disposed to violence. Speaking to those whom he would draw into a confederacy against the king, "That it was better to die once for all, than to die in a manner a thousand times a day, always at the mercy of men who made it their business to embitter their life, and make it insupportable," p. 8. In another place, "How can we better spend some few and uncertain days, which every moment are ended by some disease, by misfortune, or old age, than by making our name famous and immortal?" p. 14. And thus, "Pusillanimous men, who, for want of courage, dare not attempt any thing at their peril, will never see an end of their misfortune," p. 46.

These, being his avowed tenets, may give us some light into a design so execrable, that it were sin to look into it with any other eyes but detestation. Mons. de Guiscard was to reconcile himself to . XVIII.