reckoned the loss of that worthy man's acquaintance, meaning the dean: but I'll try, said he, to recover it. When he overtook the dean, he asked him how he did. "I'll lay you a groat, my lord," says Swift, "I don't know you."
In such a situation of affairs, Swift chose the most prudent part, that of retiring wholly from the world, and employing himself chiefly in the care of his deanery, in the discharge of his duty as a clergyman, and arranging his domestick affairs, without once casting his eye toward the publick. In a letter to Pope, dated January 10, 1721, he gives this account of himself: "In a few weeks after the loss of that excellent princess, I came to my station here, where I have continued ever since in the greatest privacy, and utter ignorance of those events which are most commonly talked of in the world. I neither know the names nor number of the family which now reigneth, farther than the prayer book informeth me. I cannot tell who is chancellor, who are secretaries, nor with what nations we are in peace or war. And this manner of life was not taken up out of any sort of affectation, but merely to avoid giving offence, and for fear of provoking party zeal[1]." But though in this
- ↑ The following anecdote taken down at the time by the same gentleman who communicated the former to me, will show how cautious Swift was in his behaviour at that juncture, for fear of provoking party zeal, and at the same time afford an instance of his peculiar vein of humour. Among other tyrannical acts of the whigs, in the first parliament of George I, such members of the house of commons as had voted for an address in favour of sir Constantine Phipps, were ordered to beg pardon of the house. This order was generally complied with. Three who refused were
