Dean Swift
THE great Dean of St. Patrick's who ranks among the mighty satirists of all ages and all lands, was born in Hoey's Court, Dublin, November 30, 1667. He died October 19, 1745.
This most brilliant wit, genius, hater of rascality, master of irony and invective, and true Irish patriot, was born to poverty and dependence; he started life embittered and he ended "dying of rage like a poisoned rat in a hole," to use his own expression. His life was a failure, though he played a mighty part. "Good God! what a genius I had when I wrote that book!" he said when he later reread the "Tale of a Tub," and the world has agreed with him. Yet failure ever tracked him. He never received the preferment in the Church which his ability would have brought another; by his political pamphlets he largely formed the public opinion of his time, yet that was the end of it for him; he had the strongest attachments for two women, Stella, to whom the famous "Journal" was written, and Vanessa, but little happiness came to him. "To think of him," said Thackeray, "is like thinking of the ruins of a great empire." "Gulliver's Travels" (1726), though a satire on courts and statesmen, has survived its temporary and local purpose, and, especially in the first two parts, is considered to be one of the great possessions of literature.