obtained the position of private secretary to Earl Berkeley, one of the
lord justices of Ireland, but, after a while, got another church, and
tried preaching again. But he spent more of his time in writing
political satires than in prayer or sermonizing. He edited Sir William
Temple's speeches and wrote his biography, and went to London, where he
became a member of an interesting group of politicians and pamphleteers,
who supported Lord Bolingbroke. He contributed to _The Tattler_, _The
Spectator_, and other publications of the time, and soon became
recognized as one of the most brilliant and savage satirists and
influential political writers of the day. Through political influence,
and not because of his piety, he was appointed dean of St. Patrick's,
the most prominent and famous church in Dublin. He had not been in his
new position long before he created a tremendous sensation and set all
Ireland aflame by writing a political pamphlet signed "M.B. Drapier."
In 1723 Walpole's government gave to the Duchess of Kendall, the
mistress of George I., a concession to supply an unlimited amount of
copper coinage to Ireland, and she took William Wood, an iron
manufacturer of Birmingham, into partnership. There was no mint in
Dublin and no limitation in the contract, so the firm of Kendall & Wood
flooded the island with new copper pence and half-pence upon which they
made a profit of 40 per cent. The coins became so abundant that they
lost their value. Naturally the contract created not only scandal, but
an intense indignation. Many pamphlets were published and speeches were
made denouncing the transaction. The most telling attack came from what
purported to be an unpretentious Dublin dry goods merchant, who told in
simple language the story of the coinage contract and related anecdotes
of Dublin women going from shop to shop followed by carloads of copper
coins from the factory of the Duchess of Kendall. He mentioned a
workingman who gave a pound of depreciated pennies for a mug of ale, and
declared that they were so worthless that even the beggars would not
accept them.
The money was not really so much depreciated as Swift represented, but
the merchants of Dublin followed the advice of the simple draper and
refused to accept it any longer in trade. The government authorities
made a great fuss and arrested many of the repudiators, but the grand
juries refused to indict them, and on the contrary threatened to indict
merchants who accepted the shameful money. The printer of the pamphlet
was arrested, but never punished. The authorship became an open secret,
but the authorities dared not arrest the dean, whose popularity was so
great and who exercised such an extraordinary influence over the common
people that they accepted whatever he said as inspired and paid him the
greatest respect possible. His influence is illustrated by a story that
is related about a crowd which blocked the street around St. Patrick's
Cathedral one night to watch for an eclipse of the moon, and obstructed
traffic, but promptly dispersed when he sent one of his servants to tell
them that the eclipse had been postponed by his orders. He wrote
"Gulliver's Travels" about this period of his life in the deanery of St.
Patrick's, which was a part of what is now the barracks of the Dublin
police force. The present deanery, a modern building near by, contains
portraits of Swift and other of the fifty-seven clergymen who have
served as deans of St. Patrick's.
About the same time he wrote another masterpiece of satire upon the
useless and impractical measures of charity for the poor adopted by the
government. It was entitled:
A MODEST PROPOSAL
FOR PREVENTING THE CHILDREN OF
POOR PEOPLE IN IRELAND
FROM BEING A BURDEN TO
THEIR PARENTS BY
FATTENING AND EATING THEM.
He wrote several bitter satires on ecclesiastical matters, which would
have caused his separation from the deanery under ordinary
circumstances, but the archbishop as well as the civil authorities was
afraid of his caustic pen. In discussing the bishops of the Church of
Ireland at one time he declared that they were all impostors. He
asserted that the government always sent English clergymen of character
and piety to Ireland, but they were always murdered on their way by the
highwaymen of Hounslow Heath and other brigands, who put on their robes,
traveled to Dublin, presented their credentials, and were installed in
their places over the several dioceses of Ireland.
In 1729 the parliament of Ireland was installed in the imposing
structure that stands in the center of the city of Dublin opposite the
main buildings of Trinity College. Although the people had been
demanding home rule and a legislature of their own for years, the new
parliament soon lost its popularity. Its action provoked the hostility
of the fickle people and it was attacked on all sides for everything it
did. Swift took his customary part in the criticisms and christened the
parliament "The Goose Pie" because, as he said, the chamber had a crust
in the form of a dome-shaped roof and it was not remarkable for the
intellect or knowledge of its members.
One of his lampoons, directed at parliament under the name of "The
Legion Club," begins as follows:
"As I stroll the city, oft I
See a building large and lofty,
Not a bow-shot from the college,
Half the globe from sense and knowledge.
Tell us what the pile contains?
Many a head that holds no brains.
Such assemblies you might swear
Meet when butchers bait a bear.
Such a noise and such haranguing
When a brother thief is hanging."
This does not sound very dignified for the dean of a cathedral, but it
was characteristic of Swift.
He became a physical and mental wreck in 1742 and died an imbecile from
softening of the brain Oct. 9, 1745. His will, written before his mind
gave way, was itself a satire, and appropriately left his slender
fortune to found an insane asylum. The original copy may be seen in the
public records office in a beautiful great building known as the Four
Courts, the seat of the judiciary of Ireland, where the archives of the
government are kept. The insane asylum is still used for that purpose
and is known as St. Patrick's Hospital for Lunatics. It stands near the
enormous brewery of the Guinness company. It was the first of the kind
in Ireland, and was built when the insane were restrained by shackles,
handcuffs, and iron bars, but more humane modern methods of treatment
were introduced long ago and it is considered a model institution. The
corridors are three hundred and forty-five feet long by fourteen feet
wide, with little cells or bedrooms opening upon them. Swift's writing
desk is preserved in the institution.
His whimsicalities are illustrated in the cathedral more than anywhere
else and among them is the "Schomberg epitaph," found in the north aisle
to the left of the choir, chiseled in large letters upon a slab of
marble. Duke Schomberg, who commanded the Protestant army of King
William of Orange at the Battle of the Boyne, and was killed toward the
end of that engagement, July, 1690, was buried in St. Patrick's at the
time of his death, but his grave remained unmarked. His bones were
discovered, however, in 1736, during some repairs, while Swift was dean
of the cathedral. In order that their ancestor's character and
achievements might be properly recognized and called to the attention of
posterity, Swift applied to the head of the Schomberg family for fifty
pounds to pay the expense of a memorial, which they declined to
contribute. Then Swift, whose indignation was excited, paid for the slab
himself and punished them by recording upon it in Latin that the
cathedral authorities, having entreated to no purpose the heirs of the
great marshal to set up an appropriate memorial, this tablet had been
erected that posterity might know where the great Schomberg lies.
"The fame of his valor," he adds, "is much more appreciated by strangers
than by his kinsmen."
Upon the other farther side of the church, between the tombs of the
Right Honorable Lady Elizabeth, Viscountess Donneraile, and Archbishop
Whately, the gentleman who wrote the rhetoric we studied at college, is
buried the body of an humble Irishman, who was Dean Swift's body servant
for a generation. He was eccentric but loyal, and as witty as his
master. One morning the dean, getting ready for a horseback ride,
discovered that his boots had not been cleaned, and called to Sandy:
"Why didn't you clean these boots?"
"It hardly pays to do so, sir," responded Sandy, "they get muddy so soon
again."
"Put on your hat and coat and come with me to ride," said the dean.
"I haven't had my breakfast," said Sandy.
"There's no use in eating; you'll be hungry so soon again," retorted the
dean, and Sandy had to follow him in a mad gallop into the suburbs of
Dublin without a mouthful.
When they were three or four miles away they met an old friend who asked
them where they were going so early. Before the dean could answer, Sandy
replied:
"We're going to heaven, sir; the dean's praying and meself is fasting;
both of us for our sins."
The epitaph of Sandy in St. Patrick's Cathedral reads as follows:
HERE LIES THE BODY OF
ALEXANDER MAGEE,
SERVANT TO DR. SWIFT, DEAN
OF ST. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL,
DUBLIN.
His Grateful Master Caused This Monument to Be Erected in Memory
of His Discretion, Fidelity and Diligence in That Humble Station.
That long-suffering woman known as Stella, whose relations with Dean
Swift have been discussed for a century and a half, and are still more
or less of a mystery, was Mrs. Hester (sometimes spelled Esther)
Johnson, a relative of Sir William Temple, whose private secretary
Jonathan Swift, her inconstant and selfish lover, was for several years.
Swift called her "Stella" because her name, "Hester," is the Persian for
"star," and first met her while he was curate of a little village church
at Laracor, where she lived with a Mrs. Dingley, a companion or
chaperon, who seemed to be always by her side, whether she was in Dublin
or London. From the beginning of their acquaintance she shared the inner
life of Swift and exercised an extraordinary influence over him. When he
left Laracor for London to become the private secretary of Sir William
Temple their remarkable correspondence commenced, and he wrote her a
daily record of his life, his thoughts, his whims, and his fancies.
Those letters have been published under the title of "Swift's Journal to
Stella," and the book has been described as "a giant's playfulness,
written for one person's private pleasure, which has had indestructible
attractiveness for every one since."
She followed him to London and, when he became dean of St. Patrick's,
returned with him to Dublin and lived near the deanery with Mrs. Dingley
as her chaperon until her death. But Swift was not true to her. This
eminent author and satirist, this merciless critic of the shortcomings
of others, this doctor of divinity, this dean of the most prominent
cathedral in Ireland, had numerous flirtations with other women, and
Stella must have known of them, although there is no evidence that her
loyal heart ever wavered in its devotion.
In 1694 he fell desperately in love with a Miss Varing, but seems to
have escaped without any damage to himself or his reputation, although
we do not know what happened to her. A few years later he became
involved in an entanglement with a Miss Van Homrigh, which ruined her
life and effectually destroyed his peace of mind. The character of their
acquaintance is shown by a series of poems which passed between them as
her passion developed, and he allowed it to drift on uninterrupted from
day to day, evidently giving her encouragement by tongue as well as pen.
His poetical communications to her were signed "Cadenus," the Latin word
for dean, and hers were signed "Vanessa," a combination of her Christian
and surname.
It was not a very dignified situation for the dean of St. Patrick's, and
the flirtation caused a decided scandal in Dublin. It appears that
Vanessa expected Swift to marry her and he undoubtedly gave her good
reasons, while Mrs. Johnson was regarded as his mistress to the day of
her death and bore the odium with uncomplaining resignation. Long after
both of them were buried under the tiles of St. Patrick's Cathedral it
was discovered that they had been secretly married in 1716, but why she
consented to keep that fact a secret has never been explained except
upon the theory that she was afraid of what Vanessa Van Homrigh might
do. The latter, however, having lost her patience and becoming
hysterical with jealousy, wrote to Stella, inquiring as to the real
nature of her relations with Swift and demanding that she should
relinquish her claims upon him. Stella replied promptly by sending
Vanessa indisputable evidence that they had been married seven years
before. Vanessa, who lived at Marley Abbey, Celbridge (now Hazelhatch
Station), ten miles from Dublin, on the railway to Cork, sent Stella's
letter to Swift and retired to the house of a friend in the country,
where she died a few months later of a broken heart. Swift never
replied; he never saw her or communicated with her after that day, and
seems to have dismissed the affair with the same indifference that he
always showed concerning the interests of other people.
Five years later Stella died and was buried in the cathedral at midnight
by Swift's orders, but he did not attend the funeral. She lived in the
neighborhood of the deanery, and from one of its windows he witnessed
the passage of the casket to the tomb. "This is the night of the
funeral," he writes in his diary, "and I moved into another apartment
that I may not see the light in the church, which is just over against
the window of my bed chamber." He then sat down at his desk and
described her devotion and her love for himself and her virtues in
language of incomparable beauty. His tribute, written at that moment, is
one of the most beautiful passages in English literature. He preserved a
lock of her hair upon which he inscribed the words:
"Only a woman's hair!"
"Only a woman's hair!" comments Thackeray. "Only love, fidelity, purity,
innocence, beauty; only the tenderest heart in the world, stricken and
wounded, and pushed away out of the reach of joy with the pangs of hope
deferred. Love insulted and pitiless desertion. Only that lock of hair
left, and memory, and remorse for the guilty, lonely, selfish wretch,
shuddering over the grave of his victim."
Swift's extraordinary vanity is illustrated in the inscription he placed
over Hester Johnson's grave and his selfishness by his neglect to
vindicate her reputation by announcing their marriage. The mistress of a
dean is not usually buried in a cathedral over which he presides, but no
one has ever questioned the right of Stella's dust to be there. Her
epitaph, which was written by his own pen, runs:
"Underneath is interred the mortal remains of Mrs. Hester Johnson,
better known to the world by the name of Stella, under which she was
celebrated in the writings of Dr. Jonathan Swift, dean of this
cathedral.
"She was a person of extraordinary endowments and accomplishments in
body, mind, and behavior; justly admired and respected by all who knew
her on account of her many eminent virtues, as well as for her great
natural and acquired perfections.
"She died Jan. 27, 1727, in the forty-sixth year of her age, and by her
will bequeathed £1,000 toward the support of the hospital founded in
this city by Dr. Steevens."
Although Swift did his best work after Stella's death, he was never
himself again. He became sour, morose, and misanthropic. His soul burned
itself out with remorse. The last four years of his life were
inexpressibly sad, and the retribution he deserved came from inward
rather than outward causes. He was harassed by periodical attacks of
acute dementia, to which his wonderful brain gradually yielded, and
before his death he became an utter imbecile. He seemed to anticipate
and prepare himself for such a fate, because among his papers was found
his will, in which he bequeathed his entire estate to found an asylum
for just such creatures as he himself became. He prepared his own
epitaph, which reads as follows:
"Hic Depositum est Corpus.
Jonathan Swift, S.T.P.
Hujus, ecclesiae cathedrae decani ubi saeva
Indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit.
Abi viator, et imitare, si poteris,
Strenuum pro virili libertatis vindiceim."
A liberal translation reads: "Here is deposited the body of Jonathan
Swift, dean of this cathedral, where cruel indignation can no longer
lacerate the heart. Go, stranger, and imitate, if you can, his strenuous
endeavors in defense of liberty."
The vault in which the two bodies rest has been twice disturbed during
repairs of the cathedral, in 1835, when casts of their skulls were
taken, and in 1882, when a new floor was laid. It is now marked by a
modest tablet of tiles near the south entrance to the cathedral. Upon a
bracket near by is a bust of Swift contributed by Mr. Faulkner, the
nephew and successor of his original publisher.
Many anecdotes are told of Swift's peculiarities. He must have filled a
large place in the life of Dublin during the thirty years that he was
the dean of the cathedral. He was prominent in political, social, and
ecclesiastical affairs during all that period and always welcome as a
guest at the houses of the aristocracy in this neighborhood. In the
suburb of Glasnevin was an estate called Hildeville, belonging to a
generous but pretentious patron of the arts and sciences, named Dr.
Delany, where the brilliant minds of that day used to gather for a good
time. Swift is closely associated with the place and was one of Dr.
Delany's most frequent and regular visitors. He called it "Hell-Devil,"
and chose for its motto "Fastigia Despicet Urbis," in which the verb is
used in a double sense.
Many of his most stinging satires were written there, including his
ferocious libel on the Irish parliament. A reward was offered for the
discovery of the author, and although a hundred members of the commons
knew that it was from Swift's pen, no attempt was ever made to punish
him and he was never even denounced publicly. And he wasn't above
ridiculing his host, for here is an extract from an ode addressed to Dr.
Delany of "Hell-Devil," when he was the latter's guest:
"A razor, though to say 't I'm loath,
Might shave you and your meadow both,
A little rivulet seems to steal
Along a thing you call a vale,
Like tears adown a wrinkled cheek,
Like rain along a blade of leek--
And this you call your sweet meander,
Which might be sucked up by a gander,
Could he but force his rustling bill
To scoop the channel of the rill.
In short, in all your boasted seat,
There's nothing but yourself is--great."
"Is it singin' yees want?" said the verger of Christ Church Cathedral,
Dublin, when we entered that ancient sanctuary shortly before the hour
for worship on a gloomy, drizzly Sabbath morning. "Then yees have come
to the roight place. The choir of Christ Church is the finest in all
Ireland, and mebbe in the whole wurrld, I dunno. Thay's twinty-four
b'ys and min, and every mother's son iv thim is from the first families
of Dooblin. The lads has been singin' frum their cradles, and they make
the swatest music that ears ever heard; blessed be the Lord! Not as if
they had no mischief in thim, for b'ys will be b'ys, singin' or no
singin'; and thim that has the medals hangin' on their chists is the
best behaved and the least mischaveous."
We remained after the service to look about, and when the verger asked
what I thought of the sermon I told him.
"It's not of much consequence!" observed the cynic. And when I told him
that the singing wasn't much better than the preaching, and that the
boys sang out of tune, he replied apologetically:
"I hope your honor won't think the liss of thim for that; they're all
honest, well-meaning lads, an' what harm is it at all, at all, if they
do sing out of chune betimes?"
Christ Church is one of the oldest structures in Ireland, was originally
erected in 1038 by the Danish king Sigtryg, "Of the Silken Beard," and
in 1152 was made the seat of the archbishop of Dublin. In 1172
Strongbow, the Welch Earl of Pembroke, leader of the Norman invasion,
swept away the original building to make room for the present edifice,
which was fifty years in building. The present nave, transepts, and
crypt are those that Strongbow erected, having been thoroughly repaired
and restored by Henry Roe, a wealthy distiller, at a cost of £220,000,
between 1870 and 1878. In 1178 Strongbow died of a malignant ulcer of
the foot, which his enemies attributed to the vengeance of the early
Irish saints whose shrines he had violated, and he is buried within the
church he built. His black marble tomb is on the south side, with a
recumbent effigy in chain armor lying upon the sarcophagus. A smaller
effigy in black marble, representing the upper half of a human form,
lies beside him and is said to mark the tomb of Strongbow's son, whom
his father literally cut in half with his mighty sword for showing
cowardice in battle. Sir Henry Sidney, who discussed the question at
length in 1571, declares that there is no doubt that the remains of
Strongbow were deposited here, but there is another tomb, with a similar
effigy of one-half of his son lying beside it, in an ancient church at
Waterford, where Strongbow dwelt in a castle and made his headquarters.
The claims of the Waterford tomb are considered much stronger than those
of Christ Church in Dublin, because that was where he died and where his
wife and family lived after him.
[Illustration: THE TOMB OF STRONGBOW, CHRIST CHURCH, DUBLIN]
The interior of the church has many points of beauty, especially the
splendid stone work of the nave and aisles and the graceful arches
which, although very massive, are chiseled with such delicacy that their
heaviness does not appear. The floor is covered with modern tiles which
are exact copies of the originals, and in the restoration of the
building the architect has shown similar conscientiousness in all his
work. The great age of the stone gives it a rich and mellow tone, and
although here and there one may come across evidences of decay or
damage, it is in better condition than most of the modern churches of
Ireland.
Across the street and connected by a bridge with the cathedral is the
Synod Hall, the headquarters of the general synod, which has control of
the affairs of the Episcopal Church of Ireland since it was separated
from the Church of England and made independent of the state by an act
of parliament July 26, 1869. This was called "The Disestablishment"--a
long and awkward word--but such words are common in English and Irish
official literature. It is often difficult for an American to understand
the meaning of the terms used in acts of parliament and reports of the
officials of the government.
III
HOW IRELAND IS GOVERNED