Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 19.djvu/92

80 at the pains of assuming it, is allowed a right to all those who have either written or fought in English with any distinction, as Scotland impudently whips away from Ireland all her old saints and her sophists, on account of having shared with her the same name of Scotia. The Ushers, Boyles, Congreves, Garths, Denhams, Swifts, Ormonds, Cadogans, Aylmers, &c. are all taken for English in foreign countries. Mac Flecno, and all the wretched adepts in metaphysicks, are counted Irish in course: We have had but one Dunse of irrefragable fame, the father of Dunses by thousands all over Europe; and the Scots have kidnapped him from us, by the consent or connivance of all modern dictionaries, notwithstanding the number of sheriffs and sheriffs bailiffs, of the same name, upon the records of our ancient city of Dublin. In short, what can Ireland have left her, but her bogs and her stupidity, since England and Scotland have swept away the stakes? If we must give up all our great men of war and figure to England, let her even show us the example, and resign to the Normans her Plantagenets, Talbots, and Nevills, conquerors of France.

However, we will not stick out in our controversy about these mighty men. They shall belong to England, since they have made her a present of their arms and allegiance. But, in the name of wonder, let us have our men of parts and letters. Let not the English wits, and particularly my friend Mr. Pope (whom I had the honour to bring up to London, from our retreat in the forest of Windsor, to dress à la mode, and introduce at Will’s coffeehouse), run down a country, as the seat of dulness, to whose geniuses he owns himself so much Rh