Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 9.djvu/313

Rh all my wicked brethren, the present places of their abode, with a short account of the chief crimes they have committed; in many of which I have been their accompllce, and heard the rest from their own mouths: I have likewise set down the names of those we call our setters, of the wicked houses we frequent, and of those who receive and buy our stolen goods. I have solemnly charged this honest man, and have received this promise upon oath, that whenever he hears of any rogue to be tried for robbing or housebreaking, he will look into his list, and if he finds the name there of the thief concerned, to send the whole paper to the government. Of this I here give my companions fair and publick warning, and hope they will take it.

In the paper abovementioned, which I left with my friend, I have also set down the names of several gentlemen who have been robbed in Dublin streets for three years past: I have told the circumstances of those robberies; and show plainly that nothing but the want of common courage was the cause of their misfortune. I have therefore desired my friend, that whenever any gentleman happens to be robbed, in the streets, he will get that relation printed and published, with the first letters of those gentlemen's names, who by their own want of bravery are like to be the cause of all the mischief of that kind which may happen for the future.

I cannot leave the world without a short description of that kind of life which I have led for some years past; and it is exactly the same with the rest of our wicked brethren.

Although we are generally so corrupted from our childhood, as to have no sense of goodness; yet something