Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 3.djvu/298

290 Every first Sunday in Lent a part of the Liturgy is read to the people, in the preface to which, the church declares her wishes for the restoring of that discipline she formerly had, and which, for some years past, has been more wanted than ever. But of this no more, lest it might insinuate jealousies between the clergy and laity; which the author tells us, is the policy of vain ambitious men among the former, in hopes to derive from their order, a veneration they cannot deserve from their virtue. If this be their method for procuring veneration, it is the most singular that ever was thought on; and the clergy would then indeed have no more to do with politicks of any sort, than Mr. Steele or his faction will allow them.

Having thus toiled through his dedication, I proceed to consider his preface, which, half consisting of quotation, will be so much the sooner got through. It is a very unfair thing in any writer to employ his ignorance and malice together; because it gives his answerer double work: it is like the sort of sophistry that the logicians call two mediums, which are never allowed in the same syllogism. A writer, with a weak head, and a corrupt heart, is an over-match for any single pen; like a hireling jade, dull and vicious, hardly able to stir, yet offering at every turn to kick.

He begins his preface with such an account of the original of power, and the nature of civil tions,