th the din of these curses of the world, blasphemies
against Heaven, shrieking in his ears, that he began to write his dreadful
allegory--of which the meaning is that man is utterly wicked, desperate,
and imbecile, and his passions are so monstrous, and his boasted powers so
mean, that he is and deserves to be the slave of brutes, and ignorance is
better than his vaunted reason. What had this man done? what secret
remorse was rankling at his heart? what fever was boiling in him, that he
should see all the world bloodshot? We view the world with our own eyes,
each of us; and we make from within us the world we see. A weary heart
gets no gladness out of sunshine; a selfish man is sceptical about
friendship, as a man with no ear doesn't care for music. A frightful
self-consciousness it must have been, which looked on mankind so darkly
through those keen eyes of Swift.

A remarkable story is told by Scott, of Delany, who interrupted Archbishop
King and Swift in a conversation which left the prelate in tears, and from
which Swift rushed away with marks of strong terror and agitation in his
countenance, upon which the archbishop said to Delany, "You have just met
the most unhappy man on earth; but on the subject of his wretchedness you
must never ask a question."

The most unhappy man on earth;--_Miserrimus_--what a character of him! And
at this time all the great wits of England had been at his feet. All
Ireland had shouted after him, and worshipped as a liberator, a saviour,
the greatest Irish patriot and citizen. Dean Drapier Bickerstaff
Gulliver--the most famous statesmen, and the greatest poets of his day, had
applauded him, and done him homage; and at this time writing over to
Bolingbroke, from Ireland, he says, "It is time for me to have done with
the world, and so I would if I could get into a better before I was called
into the best, _and not to die here in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a
hole_."

We have spoken about the men, and Swift's behaviour to them; and now it
behoves us not to forget that there are certain other persons in the
creation who had rather intimate relations with the great Dean.(49) Two
women whom he loved and injured are known by every reader of books so
familiarly that if we had seen them, or if they had been relatives of our
own, we scarcely could have known them better. Who hasn't in his mind an
image of Stella? Who does not love her? Fair and tender creature: pure and
affectionate heart! B