XIV.—­THE POLITICS OF SWIFT AND SHAKESPEARE

(1) SWIFT

There are few greater ironies in history than that the modern Conservatives should be eager to claim Swift as one of themselves.  One finds even the Morning Post—­which someone has aptly enough named the Morning Prussian—­cheerfully counting the author of A Voyage to Houyhnhnms in the list of sound Tories.  It is undeniable that Swift wrote pamphlets for the Tory Party of his day.  A Whig, he turned from the Whigs of Queen Anne in disgust, and carried the Tory label for the rest of his life.  If we consider realities rather than labels, however, what do we find were the chief political ideals for which Swift stood?  His politics, as every reader of his pamphlets knows, were, above all, the politics of a pacifist and a Home Ruler—­the two things most abhorrent to the orthodox Tories of our own time.  Swift belonged to the Tory Party at one of those rare periods at which it was a peace party. The Conduct of the Allies was simply a demand for a premature peace.  Worse than this, it was a pamphlet against England’s taking part in a land-war on the Continent instead of confining herself to naval operations.  “It was the kingdom’s misfortune,” wrote Swift, “that the sea was not the Duke of Marlborough’s element, otherwise the whole force of the war would infallibly have been bestowed there, infinitely to the advantage of his country.”  Whether Swift and the Tories were right in their attack on Marlborough and the war is a question into which I do not propose to enter.  I merely wish to emphasize the fact that The Conduct of the Allies was, from the modern Tory point of view, not merely a pacifist, but a treasonable, document.  Were anything like it to appear nowadays, it would be suppressed under the Defence of the Realm Act.  And that Swift was a hater of war, not merely as a party politician, but as a philosopher, is shown by the discourse on the causes of war which he puts into the mouth of Gulliver when the latter is trying to convey a picture of human society to his Houyhnhnm master: 

Sometimes the quarrel between two princes is to decide which of them shall dispossess a third of his dominions, where neither of them pretends to any right.  Sometimes one prince quarrelleth with another for fear the other should quarrel with him.  Sometimes a war is entered upon because the enemy is too strong, and sometimes because he is too weak.  Sometimes our neighbours want the things which we have, or have the things which we want; and we both fight till they take ours or give us theirs.  It is a very justifiable cause of a war to invade a country after the people have been wasted by famine, destroyed by pestilence or embroiled by factions among themselves.  It is justifiable to enter into war with our nearest ally, when one of his towns lies convenient for us, or a territory of land that would render our dominions