Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 3.djvu/156

148 cause of hatred, by prompting us to fly from our other side, and dividing the same body into two, gave each slice the name of a party.

I approve the fable and application, with this refinement upon it: for parties do not only split a nation, but every individual among them, leaving each but half their strength, and wit, and honesty, and good nature; but one eye and ear for their sight and hearing, and equally lopping the rest of the senses. Where parties are pretty equal in a state, no man can perceive one bad quality in his own, or good one in his adversaries. Besides, party being a dry disagreeable subject, it renders conversation insipid or sour, and confines invention. I speak not here of the leaders, but the insignificant crowd of followers in a party, who have been the instruments of mixing it in every condition and circumstance of life. As the zealots among the Jews, bound the law about their forehead, and wrists, and hems of their garments, so the women among us, have got the distinguishing marks of party in their muffs, their fans, and their furbelows. The whig ladies put on their patches in a different manner from the tories. They have made schisms in the playhouse, and each have their particular sides at the opera: and when a man changes his party, he must infallibly count upon the loss of his mistress. I asked a gentleman the other day, how he liked such a lady? But he would not give me his opinion, till I had answered him whether she were a whig or a tory. Mr., since he is known to visit the present ministry, and lay some time under a suspicion of writing the Examiner, is no longer