Title: The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. — Volume 10
Author: Jonathan Swift
Editor: Temple Scott
Release date: July 28, 2004 [eBook #13040]
Most recently updated: October 28, 2024
Language: English
Credits: Etext produced by Terry Gilliland and PG Distributed Proofreaders
HTML file produced by David Widger
CONTENTS
THE HISTORY OF THE FOUR LAST YEARS OF THE QUEEN. By the late JONATHAN SWIFT, D.D. D.S.P.D.
THE HISTORY OF THE FOUR LAST YEARS OF THE QUEEN. I
THE HISTORY OF THE FOUR LAST YEARS OF THE QUEEN. II
THE HISTORY OF THE FOUR LAST YEARS OF THE QUEEN. III
THE HISTORY OF THE FOUR LAST YEARS OF THE QUEEN. IV
REMARKS ON "BISHOP BURNET'S HISTORY OF ['SCOTLAND IN'SWIFT] HIS OWN TIME," FOLIO EDITION, 1724-34.
Of late years, that is to say, within the last thirty odd years, there has existed a certain amount of doubt as to whether or no the work known to us as "The History of the Four Last Years of the Queen," was really the product of Swift's pen. That a work of this nature had occupied Swift during his retirement at Windsor in 1713, is undoubted. That the work here reprinted from the edition given to the world in 1758, "by an anonymous editor from a copy surreptitiously taken by an anonymous friend" (to use Mr. Churton Collins's summary), is the actual work upon which Swift was engaged at Windsor, is not so certain. Let us for a moment trace the history of what is known of what Swift did write, and then we shall be in a better position to judge of the authenticity of what we have before us.
All that we know of this work is gathered from Swift's correspondence, as published by Sir Walter Scott in his edition of Swift's Works issued in 1824. The first reference there made is in a note from Dr. William King to Mrs. Whiteway, from which we gather that Swift, towards the end of the year 1736, was meditating the publication of what he had written in 1713. "As to the History," writes King, "the Dean may be assured I will take care to supply the dates that are wanting, and which can easily be done in an hour or two. The tracts, if he pleases, may be printed by way of appendix. This will be indeed less trouble than the interweaving them in the body of the history, and will do the author as much honour, and answer the purpose full as well."
This was written from Paris, under date November 9th, O.S., 1736. It can easily be gathered from this that the tracts referred to are the tracts on the same period which Swift wrote at the time in defence of the Oxford ministry. They are given in the fifth volume of this edition.
On December 7th, 1736, King was in London, and he immediately writes to Swift himself on the matter of the History. "I arrived here yesterday," he says, "and I am now ready to obey your commands. I hope you are come to a positive resolution concerning the History. You need not hesitate about the dates, or the references which are to be made to any public papers; for I can supply them without the least trouble. As well as I remember, there is but one of those public pieces which you determined should be inserted at length; I mean Sir Thomas Hanmer's Representation; this I have now by me. If you incline to publish the two tracts as an Appendix to the History, you will be pleased to see if the character given of the Earl of Oxford in the pamphlet of 1715 agrees with the character given of the same person in the History.[1] Perhaps on a review you may think proper to leave one of them quite out. You have (I think) barely mentioned the attempt of Guiscard, and the quarrel between Rechteren and Mesnager. But as these are facts which are probably now forgot or unknown, it would not be amiss if they were related at large in the notes; which may be done from the gazettes, or any other newspapers of those times. This is all I have to offer to your consideration...."
[Footnote 1: See note on page 95 of this volume.]
There is thus no doubt left as to which were the tracts referred to by King, and as to the desire of Swift to include Sir Thomas Hanmer's Representation—two points that are important as evidence for the authenticity of the edition issued by Lucas in 1758.
Towards the middle of 1737, it must have become common knowledge among Swift's friends in London, that he was preparing for publication his "History of the Four Last Years of Queen Anne's Reign." Possibly King may have dropped a hint of it; possibly Swift may have written to others for information and assistance. Be that as it may, on April 7th, 1737, the Earl of Oxford (son of Swift's old friend) wrote to Swift as follows:
It is evident that Swift had gone so far as to consult with Faulkner on the matter of the printing of the "History," because he was present when Oxford's letter arrived, and he tells us that Swift answered the letter immediately, and made him read the answer, the purport of which was: "That although he loved his lordship's father more than he ever did any man; yet, as a human creature, he had his faults, and therefore, as an impartial writer, he could not conceal them."
On the 4th of June, 1737, Swift wrote at length to Oxford a letter in which he details the circumstances and the reasons which moved him to write the History. The letter is important, and runs as follows:
The Earl of Oxford had failed to extract the manuscript from Swift for the purpose he had expressed in his letter. But his friend and Swift's old friend, Erasmus Lewis, who had been Under-Secretary of State during Lord Oxford's administration, came to the Earl's assistance. He had not written to Swift for many years, but on June 30th, 1737, he took occasion to renew the correspondence and referred to the proposal for publishing the History in a manner which leaves no doubt as to who suggested to him to write:
On the 4th of July, 1737, Oxford replied to Swift's letter of the 4th of June (referring to it as of the 14th of June), and emphasizes his earnest wish to see the manuscript. He also asks that it may be permitted him to show it to some friends:
While this correspondence was in progress, Swift had given the manuscript to Lord Orrery to hand over to Dr. King. On June 24th, 1737, King wrote to Swift stating that he had received a letter from Mrs. Whiteway in which he was told to expect the manuscript from the hands of Lord Orrery. To Mrs. Whiteway he replied, on the same day, that he would wait on Lord Orrery to receive the papers. On July 23rd, 1737, Lord Orrery wrote to Swift informing him that "Dr. King has his cargo."
With the knowledge that the manuscript was on its way to King, Swift wrote the following reply to Lewis's letter:
Swift is evidently about to accede to the desires of his two friends, and Lewis, in his reply, takes it for granted that the manuscript will soon be in his possession for perusal and examination:
From which we gather that Lewis and the friends had been able to show King the extreme inadvisability of publishing the work. Swift knew nothing of this at the time, but Lewis did not long keep him in doubt, and the letter Lewis wrote Swift on April 8th, 1738, sets forth at length the objections and criticisms which had so changed King's attitude.
It is to be presumed that Swift was again persuaded to abandon the publication of his History. Nothing further is heard of it, except a slight reference by Pope in a letter he wrote to Swift, under date May 17th, 1739, in which Pope informed him that Bolingbroke (who is writing his History of his own Time) has expressed his intention of differing from Swift's version, as he remembers it when he read the History in 1727. The variation would relate in particular to the conduct of the Earl of Oxford.
Slight as this reference is, there is yet enough in it to suggest another reason why Swift should withhold the publication of his work. It might be that this expressed intention of Bolingbroke's to animadvert on his dear friend's conduct, would just move Swift to a final rejection of his intention, and so, possibly, prevent Bolingbroke from publishing his own statement. However, the manuscript must have been returned, for nothing more was heard of it during Swift's lifetime.
Swift died in 1745, and thirteen years later appeared the anonymously edited "History of the Four Last Years." Is this the work which Swift wrote in 1713, which he permitted Pope and Bolingbroke to read in 1727, and which he prepared for publication in 1737?
In 1758 there was no doubt whatever raised, although there were at least two persons alive then—Lord Orrery and Dr. William King—who could easily have proved any forgery, had there been one.
The first suspicion cast on the work came from Dr. Johnson. Writing, in his life of Swift, of the published version, he remarks, "that it seemed by no means to correspond with the notions that I had formed of it from a conversation that I once heard between the Earl of Orrery and old Mr. Lewis." In what particulars this want of correspondence was made evident Johnson does not say. In any case, his suspicion cannot be received with much consideration, since the conversation he heard must have taken place at least twenty years before he wrote the poet's life, and his recollection of such a conversation must at least have been very hazy. Johnson's opinion is further deprived of weight when we read what he wrote of the History in the "Idler," in 1759, the year after its publication, that "the history had perished had not a straggling transcript fallen into busy hands." If the straggling manuscript were worth anything, it must have had some claims to authenticity; and if it had, then Johnson's recollection of what he heard Orrery and Lewis say, twenty years or more after they had said it, goes for very little.
Sir Walter Scott concludes, from the fact that Swift sent the manuscript to Oxford and Lewis, that it was afterwards altered in accordance with Lewis's suggestions. But a comparison of Lucas's text with Lewis's letter shows that nothing of the kind was done.
Lord Stanhope had "very great reason to doubt" the authenticity of the History, and considered it as "falsely ascribed to Swift." What this "very great reason" was, his lordship nowhere stated.
Macaulay, in a pencilled note in a copy of Orrery's "Remarks" (now in the British Museum) describes the History as "Wretched stuff; and I firmly believe not Swift's." But Macaulay could scarcely have had much ground for his note, since he took a description of Somers from the History, and embodied it in his own work as a specimen of what Somers's enemies said of him. If the History were a forgery, what object was gained in quoting from it, and who were the enemies who wrote it?
When, in 1873, Lord Beaconsfield, then Mr. Disraeli, made a speech at Glasgow, in which he quoted from the History and spoke of the words as by Swift, a correspondent in the "Times" criticised him for his ignorance in so doing. But the discussion which followed in the columns of that periodical left the matter just where it was, and, indeed, justified Beaconsfield. The matter was taken up by Mr. Edward Solly in "Notes and Queries;" but that writer threw no new light whatever on the subject.
But the positive evidence in favour of the authenticity is so strong, that one wonders how there could have been any doubt as to whether Swift did or did not write the History.
In the first place we know that Swift was largely indebted for his facts to Bolingbroke, when that statesman was the War Secretary of Queen Anne. A comparison of those portions of Swift's History which contain the facts with the Bolingbroke Correspondence, in which the same facts are embodied, will amply prove that Swift obtained them from this source, and as Swift was the one man of the time to whom such a favour was given, the argument in favour of Swift's authorship obtains an added emphasis.
In the second place, a careful reading of the correspondence between Swift and his friends on the subject of the publication of the History enables us to identify the references to the History itself. The "characters" are there; Sir Thomas Hanmer's Representation is also there, and all the points raised by Erasmus Lewis may be told off, one by one.
In the third place, Dr. Birch, the careful collector, had, in 1742, access to what he considered to be the genuine manuscript. This was three years before Swift's death. He made an abstract of this manuscript at the time, and this abstract is now preserved in the British Museum. Comparing the abstract with the edition published in 1758, there is no doubt that the learned doctor had copied from a manuscript which, if it were not genuine, was certainly the text of the work published in 1758 as "The History of the Four Last Years." But Dr. Birch's language suggests that he believed the manuscript he examined to be in Swift's own handwriting. If that be so, there is no doubt whatever of the authenticity. Birch was a very careful person, and had he had any doubts he could easily have settled them by applying to the many friends of the Dean, if not to the Dean himself. Moreover, it is absurd to believe that a forged manuscript of Swift's would be shown about during Swift's lifetime without it being known as a forgery. Mrs. Whiteway alone would have put a stop to its circulation had she suspected of the existence of such a manuscript.
Finally, it must be remembered that when the History was published in 1758, Lord Orrery was still living. If the work were a forgery, why did not Lord Orrery expose it? Nothing would have pleased him more. He had read the manuscript referred to in the Correspondence. He had carried it to Oxford and given it to King, at Swift's request. He knew all about it, and he said nothing.
These considerations, both negative and positive, lead us to the final conclusion that the History published in 1758 is practically the History referred to in Swift's Correspondence, and therefore the authentic work of Swift himself. We say practically, because there are some differences between it and the text published here. The differences have been recorded from a comparison between Lucas's version and the transcript of a manuscript discovered in Dublin in 1857, and made by Mr. Percy Fitzgerald. Mr. Fitzgerald found that this manuscript contained many corrections in Swift's own handwriting. At the time he came across it the manuscript was in the possession of two old ladies named Greene, grand-daughters of Mrs. Whiteway, and grand-nieces of Swift himself. On the title-page there was the following note:
"This is the originall manuscript of the History, corrected by me, and given into the custody of Mrs. Martha Whiteway by me Jonathan Swift, June 15, 1737. seven.
"I send a fair copy of this History by the Earl of Orrery to be printed in England.
Mr. Fitzgerald was permitted to make a collation of this manuscript, and his collation he sent to the late John Forster. It is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington.[2]
[Footnote 2: I regret that I have been unable to trace the existence of this manuscript of Swift's "History." Mr. Fitzgerald himself has no recollection of having made the collation. "Forty-five years ago," he writes, "is a long time to look back to," and he cannot recall the fact.]
If this manuscript be what, on the face of it, it claims to be, then the question of authenticity is for ever settled. As we have no doubt on this point, the corrections and variations between this manuscript, as collated by Mr. Percy Fitzgerald and the Lucas version, have been noted in the present edition.
In 1752 Lord Orrery issued his "Remarks" on the life and character of Swift. The work obtained for him a certain notoriety, and brought down upon him some severe censure from the friends of Swift who were still alive. But, whatever may have been Orrery's private opinion of Swift, that should not invalidate any information as to fact of which he had the knowledge to speak. Writing in that book of the History, he says: "Dr. Swift left behind him few manuscripts. Not one of any consequence, except an account of the peace of Utrecht, which he called 'An History of the four last Years of Queen Anne.' The title of an history is too pompous for such a performance. In the historical style, it wants dignity and candour: but as a pamphlet it will appear the best defence of Lord Oxford's administration, and the clearest account of the Treaty of Utrecht, that has hitherto been written."[3]
[Footnote 3: Second edition, pp. 206-207.]
The most ardent and devoted of Swift's admirers could hardly find a juster criticism of the work. It should satisfy any unprejudiced reader of the printed History as we now have it, and to that extent emphasize the authenticity.
An interesting sidelight on Swift's History is thrown by Chesterfield in a letter he wrote to Dr. Chenevix, Bishop of Waterford, on May 23rd, 1758. We must believe that the noble lord wrote in good faith and certainly in the full belief that the work he was criticising was the work of Swift. Chesterfield's criticism points directly to Swift as the author, since his justification for Bolingbroke's story is to be found in the work as Lucas printed it in 1758. Speaking of the History, Chesterfield calls it "a party pamphlet, founded on the lie of the day, which, as lord Bolingbroke who had read it often assured me, was coined and delivered out to him, to write Examiners, and other political papers upon. That spirit remarkably runs through it. Macarteney, for instance, murdered duke Hamilton;[4] nothing is falser, for though Macarteney was very capable of the vilest actions, he was guiltless of that, as I myself can testify, who was at his trial on the king's bench, when he came over voluntarily to take it, in the late king's time. There did not appear even the least ground for a suspicion of it; nor did Hamilton, who appeared in court, pretend to tax him with it, which would have been in truth accusing himself of the utmost baseness, in letting the murderer of his friend go off from the field of battle, without either resentment, pursuit, or even accusation, till three days afterwards. This lie was invented to inflame the Scotch nation against the Whigs; as the other, that prince Eugene intended to murder lord Oxford, by employing a set of people called Mohocks, which society, by the way, never existed, was calculated to inflame the mob of London. Swift took those hints de la meilleure foi du monde, and thought them materials for history. So far he is blameless."[5]
[Footnote 4: See page 178 of this volume.]
[Footnote 5: "Chesterfield's Works," pp. 498-499.]
Ignoring Chesterfield's indignation, we must believe that the references made by him to Macartney and Eugene, must have been in the manuscript Bolingbroke read; else how could Bolingbroke tell Chesterfield of their meaning? If this be so, we have a still further warrant for a strong presumption in favour of authenticity. There can really be very little doubt on the matter.
What we may doubt, however, is not the authenticity, but the value of the History as an historical document. Without question, Swift wrote in good faith; but he also wrote as a partisan, and a partisan with an affectionate leaning for the principal character in the drama he was describing. Orrery was right when he called it "a pamphlet," and "the best defence of Lord Oxford's administration." As a pamphlet and as a defence it has some claim on our attention. As a contribution to the history of the treaty of Utrecht it is of little account. Swift could not, had he even known everything, write the true story of the negotiations for publication at the time. In the first place, he would never have attempted it—the facts would have been demoralizing; and in the second place, had he accomplished it, its publication would have been a matter for much more serious consideration than was given even to the story he did write. For Swift's purpose, it was much better that he did not know the full extent of the ministry's perfidy. His affection for Oxford and his admiration for Bolingbroke would have received a great shock. He knew their weaknesses of character, though not their infidelity to honour. There can be no defence of the Oxford administration, for the manner in which it separated England from its allies and treated with a monarch who was well known to it as a political chicaner. The result brought a treaty by which Louis XIV. gained and the allies lost, and this in spite of the offers previously made by the bankrupt monarch at Gertruydenberg.
The further contents of this volume deal with what might better be called Swiftiana. They include a collection of very interesting annotations made by Swift in his copies of Macky's "Characters," Clarendon's "History of the Rebellion," Burnet's "History of his Own Time," and Addison's "Freeholder." The notes to Clarendon and Burnet have always found an important place in the many editions of these well-known works which have been issued from time to time. As here reprinted, however, they have in all cases been compared with the originals themselves. It will be found that very many additions have been made, the result of careful comparison and collation with the originals in Swift's handwriting.
My obligations are again due to Mr. W. Spencer Jackson for very valuable assistance in the collation of texts; to Mr. George Ravenscroft Dennis for several important suggestions; to Mr. Percy Fitzgerald for the use I have made of his transcriptions; and to Mr. Strickland of the National Gallery of Ireland for his help in the matter of Swift portraits.
I am greatly indebted to Mr. C. Litton Falkiner of Killiney, co. Wicklow, for his untiring assistance to me during my stay in Dublin; to the Very Rev. the Dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral for permission to consult the Marsh collection; and to the Rev. Newport J.D. White, the courteous librarian of the Marsh Library, for enthusiastic aid in my researches. I also owe very hearty thanks to Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole for introductions to the librarians of Trinity College and the Royal Irish Academy.
The portrait prefixed to this volume is a reproduction of the bust by Roubiliac in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin.
August 14th, 1902.