THE AUTHOR’S VERACITY—HIS DESIGN IN PUBLISHING THIS WORK—HIS
CENSURE OF THOSE TRAVELERS WHO SWERVE FROM THE TRUTH—THE AUTHOR
CLEARS HIMSELF FROM ANY SINISTER ENDS IN WRITING—AN OBJECTION
ANSWERED—THE METHOD OF PLANTING COLONIES—HIS NATIVE COUNTRY
COMMENDED—THE RIGHT OF THE CROWN TO THOSE COUNTRIES DESCRIBED
BY THE AUTHOR IS JUSTIFIED—THE DIFFICULTY OF CONQUERING
THEM—THE AUTHOR TAKES HIS LAST LEAVE OF THE READER; PROPOSES
HIS MANNER OF LIVING FOR THE FUTURE; GIVES GOOD ADVICE, AND
CONCLUDES.
Thus gentle reader, I have given thee a faithful history of my travels
for sixteen years and above seven months; wherein I have not been so
studious of ornament as of truth. I could perhaps, like others, have
astonished thee with strange improbable tales; but I rather chose to
relate plain matter of fact in the simplest manner and style, because my
principal design was to inform, and not to amuse thee.
It is easy for us to travel into remote countries, which are seldom
visited by Englishmen or other Europeans, to form descriptions of
wonderful animals both at sea and land. Whereas a traveler’s chief aim
should be to make men wiser and better, and to improve their minds by the
bad, as well as good example, of what they deliver concerning foreign
places.
I could heartily wish a law was enacted, that every traveler, before
he were permitted to publish his voyages, should be obliged to make
oath before the lord high chancellor, that all he intended to print
was absolutely true to the best of his knowledge; for then the world
would no longer be deceived, as it usually is, while some writers, to
make their works pass the better upon the public, impose the grossest
falsities on the unwary reader. I have perused several books of travels
with great delight in my younger days; but having since gone over most
parts of the globe, and been able to contradict many fabulous accounts
from my own observation, it has given me a great disgust against this
part of reading, and some indignation to see the credulity of mankind so
impudently abused. Therefore, since my acquaintance were pleased to think
my poor endeavors might not be unacceptable to my country, I imposed on
myself as a maxim never to be swerved from, that I would strictly adhere
to truth; neither indeed can I be ever under the least temptation to vary
from it, while I retain in my mind the lectures and example of my noble
master and the other illustrious Houyhnhnms of whom I had so long the
honor to be a humble hearer.
_... Nec si miserum Fortuna Sinonem_
_Finxit, vanum etiam, mendacemque improba finget._
I know very well, how little reputation is to be got by writings which
require neither genius nor learning, nor indeed any other talent except
a good memory, or an exact journal. I know likewise, that writers of
travels, like dictionary-makers, are sunk into oblivion by the weight
and bulk of those who come after, and therefore lie uppermost. As it
is highly probable, that such travelers who shall hereafter visit the
countries described in this work of mine, may, by detecting my errors (if
there be any), and adding many new discoveries of their own, jostle me
out of vogue, and stand in my place, making the world forget that I was
ever an author. This indeed would be too great a mortification, if I
wrote for fame; but as my sole intention was the public good, I cannot be
altogether disappointed. For who can read of the virtues I have mentioned
in the glorious Houyhnhnms, without being ashamed of his own vices, when
he considers himself as the reasoning, governing animal of his country?
I shall say nothing of those remote nations where the _yahoos_ preside;
among which the least corrupted are the Brobdingnagians, whose wise
maxims in morality and government it would be our happiness to observe.
But I forbear descanting farther, and rather leave the judicious reader
to his own remarks and application.
I am not a little pleased that this work of mine can possibly meet
with no censurers; for what objections can be made against a writer
who relates only plain facts that happened in such distant countries,
where we have not the least interest with respect either to trade or
negotiations? I have carefully avoided every fault with which common
writers of travels are often too justly charged. Besides, I meddle not
with any party, but write without passion, prejudice, or ill will against
any man, or number of men whatsoever. I write for the noblest end, to
inform and instruct mankind; over whom I may, without breach of modesty,
pretend to some superiority, from the advantages I received by conversing
so long among the most accomplished Houyhnhnms. I write without any view
to profit or praise. I never suffer a word to pass that may look like
reflection, or possibly give the least offense, even to those who are
most ready to take it. So that I hope I may with justice pronounce myself
an author perfectly blameless; against whom the tribes of answerers,
considerers, observers, reflectors, detecters, remarkers, will never be
able to find matter for exercising their talents.
I confess, it was whispered to me that I was bound in duty, as a subject
of England, to have given in a memorial to a secretary of state at my
first coming over; because whatever lands are discovered by a subject,
belong to the crown. But I doubt whether our conquests in the countries I
treat of, would be as easy as those of Ferdinando Cortez over the naked
Americans. The Lilliputians, I think, are hardly worth the charge of a
fleet and an army to reduce them; and I question whether it might be
prudent or safe to attempt the Brobdingnagians; or whether an English
army would be much at their ease with the Flying Island over their
heads. The Houyhnhnms indeed appear not to be so well prepared for war,
a science to which they are perfect strangers, and especially against
missive weapons. However, supposing myself to be a minister of state, I
could never give my advice for invading them. Their prudence, unanimity,
unacquaintedness with fear, and their love of their country, would amply
supply all defects in the military art. Imagine twenty thousand of them
breaking into the midst of a European army, confounding the ranks,
overturning the carriages, battering the warriors’ faces into mummy by
terrible yerks from their hinder hoofs; for they would well deserve the
character given to Augustus, _Recalcitrat undique tutus_. But instead
of proposals for conquering that magnanimous nation, I rather wish they
were in a capacity, or disposition, to send a sufficient number of their
inhabitants for civilizing Europe, by teaching us the first principles of
honor, justice, truth, temperance, public spirit, fortitude, chastity,
friendship, benevolence, and fidelity. The names of all which virtues are
still retained among us in most languages, and are to be met with in
modern as well as ancient authors; which I am able to assert from my own
small reading.
But I had another reason, which made me less forward to enlarge his
majesty’s dominions by my discoveries. To say the truth, I had conceived
a few scruples with relation to the distributive justice of princes upon
those occasions. For instance, a crew of pirates are driven by a storm
they know not whither; at length a boy discovers land from the topmast;
they go on shore to rob and plunder; they see a harmless people; are
entertained with kindness; they give the country a new name; they take
formal possession of it for their king; they set up a rotten plank, or
a stone, for a memorial; they murder two or three dozen of the natives,
bring away a couple more by force, for a sample; return home, and get
their pardon. Here commences a new dominion, acquired with a title by
divine right. Ships are sent with the first opportunity; the natives
driven out, or destroyed; their princes tortured to discover their gold;
a free license given to all acts of inhumanity and lust, the earth
reeking with the blood of its inhabitants; and this execrable crew of
butchers, employed in so pious an expedition, is a modern colony, sent to
convert and civilize an idolatrous and barbarous people.
But this description, I confess, does by no means affect the British
nation, who may be an example to the whole world for their wisdom,
care, and justice in planting colonies; their liberal endowments for
the advancement of religion and learning; their choice of devout and
able pastors to propagate Christianity; their caution in stocking their
provinces with people of sober lives and conversations from this the
mother kingdom; their strict regard to the distribution of justice,
in supplying the civil administration through all their colonies with
officers of the greatest abilities, utter strangers to corruption; and,
to crown all, by sending the most vigilant and virtuous governors, who
have no other views than the happiness of the people over whom they
preside, and the honor of the king their master.
But as those countries which I have described, do not appear to have
any desire of being conquered and enslaved, murdered or driven out, by
colonies; nor abound either in gold, silver, sugar, or tobacco; I did
humbly conceive, they were by no means proper objects of our zeal, our
valor or our interest. However, if those whom it more concerns think fit
to be of another opinion, I am ready to depose, when I shall be lawfully
called, that no European did ever visit those countries before me. I
mean, if the inhabitants ought to be believed, unless a dispute may arise
concerning the two _yahoos_, said to have been seen many years ago upon
a mountain in Houyhnhnmland, whence the opinion is, that the race of
those brutes has descended; and these, for anything I know, may have been
English. This, indeed, I was apt to suspect from the lineaments of their
posterity’s countenances, although they were much defaced. But how far
that will go toward making out a title, I leave to the learned in colony
law.
But as to the formality of taking possession in my sovereign’s name, it
never came once into my thoughts; and if it had, yet, as my affairs then
stood, I should perhaps, in point of prudence and self-preservation, have
put it off to a better opportunity.
Having thus answered the only objection that can ever be raised against
me as a traveler, I here take a final leave of all my courteous readers,
and return to enjoy my own speculations in my little garden at Redriff;
to apply those excellent lessons of virtue which I learned among the
Houyhnhnms; to instruct the _yahoos_ of my own family, as far as I shall
find them docile animals; to behold my figure often in a glass, and thus,
if possible, habituate myself by time to tolerate the sight of a human
creature; to lament the brutality of Houyhnhnms in my own country, but
always treat their persons with respect, for the sake of my noble master,
his family, his friends, and the whole Houyhnhnm race, whom these of
ours have the honor to resemble in all their lineaments, however their
intellectuals came to degenerate.
I began last week to permit my wife to sit at dinner with me, at the
farthest end of a long table; and to answer (but with the utmost brevity)
the few questions I asked her. Yet the smell of a _yahoo_ continuing very
offensive, I always keep my nose well stopped with rue, lavender, or
tobacco leaves. And although it be hard for a man late in life to remove
old habits, I am not altogether out of hopes, in some time, to suffer a
neighbor _yahoo_ in my company, without the apprehensions I am yet under
of his teeth or his claws.
My reconcilement to the _yahoo_ kind in general might not be so
difficult, if they would be content with those vices and follies only,
which nature has entitled them to. I am not in the least provoked at the
sight of a lawyer, a pickpocket, a colonel, a fool, a lord, a gamester, a
politician, a physician, an evidence, a suborner, an attorney, a traitor,
or the like; this is all according to the due course of things: but when
I behold a lump of deformity and diseases, both in body and mind, smitten
with pride, it immediately breaks all the measures of my patience;
neither shall I be ever able to comprehend how such an animal, and such a
vice, could tally together. The wise and virtuous Houyhnhnms, who abound
in all the excellencies that can adorn a rational creature, have no name
for this vice in their language; which has no terms to express anything
that is evil, except those whereby they describe the detestable qualities
of their _yahoos_; among which they were not able to distinguish this
of pride for want of thoroughly understanding human nature, as it shows
itself in other countries where that animal presides. But I, who had more
experience, could plainly observe some rudiments of it among the wild
_yahoos_.
But the Houyhnhnms, who live under the government of reason, are no more
proud of the good qualities they possess than I should be for not wanting
a leg or an arm; which no man in his wits would boast of, although he
must be miserable without them. I dwell the longer upon this subject,
from the desire I have to make the society of an English _yahoo_ by any
means not insupportable; and therefore I here entreat those who have any
tincture of this absurd vice, that they will not presume to come in my
sight.
THE END