Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 6.djvu/361

Rh assembly's exhortation executed, which he could not put off much longer. He doubted it would be impossible for me to swim to another country; and therefore wished I would contrive some sort of vehicle, resembling those I had described to him, that might carry me on the sea; in which work I should have the assistance of his own servants, as well as those of his neighbours. He concluded, that for his own part, he could have been content to keep me in his service as long as I lived; because he found I had cured myself of some bad habits and dispositions, by endeavouring, as far as my inferiour nature was capable, to imitate the Houyhnhnms.

I should here observe to the reader, that a decree of the general assembly in this country, is expressed by the word hnhloayn, which signifies an exhortation, as near as I can render it: for they have no conception how a rational creature can be compelled, but only advised, or exhorted; because no person can disobey reason, without giving up his claim to be a rational creature.

I was struck with the utmost grief and despair at my master's discourse; and being unable to support the agonies I was under, I fell into a swoon at his feet: when I came to myself, he told me, that he concluded I had been dead; for these people are subject to no such imbecilities of nature. I answered in a faint voice, that death would have been too great a happiness; that although I could not blame the assembly's exhortation, or the urgency of his friends; yet in my weak and corrupt judgement, I thought it might consist with reason to have been less vigorous: that I could not swim a league, and probably the nearest land to theirs might be