Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 5.djvu/173

No. 74. should underwrite his reason for the place he allots his candidate.

The thing is of the last consequence; for we are about settling the greatest point that ever has been debated in any age; and I shall take precautions accordingly. Let every man who votes, consider, that he is now going to give away that, for which the soldier gave up his rest, his pleasure, and his life; the scholar resigned his whole series of thought, his midnight repose, and his morning slumbers. In a word, he is, as I may say, to be judge of that afterlife, which noble spirits prefer to their very real beings. I hope I shall be forgiven therefore, if I make some objections against their jury, as they shall occur to me. The whole of the number by whom they are to be tried, are to be scholars. I am persuaded also that Aristotle will be put up by all of that class of men. However, in behalf of others, such as wear the livery of Aristotle, the two famous universities are called upon on this occasion: but I except the men of Queen's, Exeter, and Jesus Colleges, in Oxford, who are not to be electors, because he shall not be crowned from an implicit faith in his writings, but receive his honour from such judges as shall allow him to be censured. Upon this election, as I was just now going to say, I banish all who think, and speak after others, to concern themselves in it. For which reason, all illiterate distant admirers are forbidden to corrupt the voices, by sending, according to the new mode, any poor students coals and candles for their votes in behalf of such worthies as they pretend to esteem. All newswriters are also excluded, because they consider fame as it is a report which gives foundation to the filling up Rh