Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

A Tale of a Tub

1704

"But when a man's fancy gets astride his reason, when imagination is at cuffs with the senses, and common understanding as well as common sense, is kicked out of doors; the first proselyte he makes is himself, and when that is once compassed the difficulty is not so great in bringing over others, a strong delusion always operating from without as vigorously as from within."

Having therefore so narrowly passed through this intricate difficulty, the reader will I am sure agree with me in the conclusion, that if the moderns mean by madness, only a disturbance or transposition of the brain of certain vapours issuing up from the lower faculties, then has this madness been the parent of all those mighty revolutions that have happened in empire, in philosophy, and in religion. For the brain, in its natural position and state of security, disposeth its owner to pass his life in the common forms without any thoughts of subduing multitudes to his own power, his reasons, or his visions; and the more he shapes his understanding by the pattern of human learning, the less he is inclined to form parties after his own particular notions, because that instructs him in his private infirmities, as well as in the stubborn ignorance of the people. But when a man's fancy gets astride his reason, when imagination is at cuffs with the senses, and common understanding as well as common sense, is kicked out of doors; the first proselyte he makes is himself, and when that is once compassed the difficulty is not so great in bringing over others, a strong delusion always operating from without as vigorously as from within.
(p. 82)

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Reading

Swift, J. A Tale of a Tub and Other Works. Angus Ross and David Woolley. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986.

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10/23/2003