1 18 th Century Literature A Tale of a Tub and the Author s Intent Attempting to find a specific target of satire in Jonathan Swift s A Tale of a Tub requires an extremely close reading of a text that is completely entangled in religious, philosophical, and linguistic allegory. In addition the complexities of the text, the composition of the work demands the reader to divert from narrative, to digression, and back to narrative at the pleasure of a fictitious author created by Swift. This unreliable narrator makes it possible for Swift to acceptably distort his own authorial voice while maintaining an earnestness that is both powerful and playful. The narrator s unstable and ambivalent personality makes the targets of satire in A Tale (of a Tub) subject to both criticism and raillery. As a result, the author s distracted disposition causes him to address a vast amount of issues he finds important, potentially at the expense of the attention of the audience, an inclination which he also addresses. While Swift historically criticized modernity and the pursuit of modern philosophy, the use of an unreliable narrator allows him to sarcastically defend modern learning, language, philosophy, and religious beliefs, while refuting the Ancient. Representing essentially what makes up a Modern, the author s defense of the superfluities, inadequacies, and ambiguity of modernity, is Swift s way of creatively exposing what he believes to be its flaws. This paper will point out the necessity of Swift s author, examine each way Swift uses him to express his opinions on all subjects of Modern dispute, and determine whether this text, which is widely considered as a religious satire, actually specifically targets the Church of England. The Three Brothers Narrative satirically addresses Swift s dissatisfaction with dissenters, and alludes to the way modernity has caused a distortion of scriptural interpretation to appease Modern philosophy and science. Their father wills them nothing in the form of wealth, but leaves them each a coat that if unaltered, will ensure their prosperity and will always seem to fit their bodies despite any
2 physical changes they may undergo. These coats, meant to represent New Testament scripture in its original form, become compromised by the brother s desire to keep up with the current vogue. Much like the modern Anglican Clergy s distorted interpretation of scripture or, the Original, the brother s faith in their father s will fails to stand up to relentless pressure of modern philosophies and fashions. Similarly, by incorporating modern science and philosophy into their sermons and teachings, Restoration era clergymen attempted to assimilate these ideas to argue against atheism to a modern audience (Bywaters). When the rapidly changing fashions of the time demand that the brothers enhance their coats, they must carefully manipulate and essentially alienate the original will through the dismantling of single words, and even single letters to provide some referential support for their actions. As the story shows, the fleeting nature of vogue ultimately turns their coats into a confused mass in which the original is hardly discernible. While Swift uses the narrative to mock the clergy s desire for modern philosophical acceptance, he simultaneously parodies meaninglessness of modern language theories such as the Referential theory of language. According to Deborah Baker Wyrick in Jonathan Swift: The Vested Word, she defines the referential theory of language in that, ultimately there exists a one-to-one correspondence between a word and a thing named (Wyrick 3). In short, meanings of words are innate in nature. This theory is parodied by the brother s systematic dismantling of the fathers will, letter by letter, until they can find the most primitive reference that will allow them to adorn their coats in the latest fashion. Swift would dispute that an alternate appellation for shoulder knots does not alter the father s original intent. Wyrick points out that Naming is extrinsic, not intrinsic, to things. Envy by any other name would stab as sharply (Wyrick 8). This application of linguistic philosophy is but one example of the superfluities Swift finds the Church of England to be pointlessly preoccupied with.
3 In addition to the aforementioned attacks he makes on philosophy and linguistics, Swift manages to satirize what he considers to be the state of modern learning. He implies in section II of A Tale, the way Modern philosophical movements such as the Referential theory, (among other Modern theories of language) has negatively affected modern learning. On page 449 of the text, Swift refers to the brother who is able to successfully manipulate the will as the more Book-learned brother. The brother s implementation of Modern learning through the Referential theory influences the willingness of the other two to carry out the transgressions against their father s will. This subtle allusion is an example of Swift s perception of what he considers to be the infectious and malevolent nature of Modern learning and Modern wit. It implies that the same philosophies that come to justify the brothers transgressions against their father s will have similarly deceived a great number of well known clergymen such as John Dryden and William Wotton, and Swift blames this state of complacency on the genesis of Modern learning. The Three Brothers narrative is not the only place in the text that satirizes Anglican apologists. David Bywaters states that, the Digression on Madness is directed not against philosophical atheism, but against philosophical speculation whatever its ostensible purpose, and especially against those philosophically based refutations of atheism that the Anglican clergy had been turning out by the yard since the Restoration (Bywaters 1). Swift frequently mentions his dislike of this sort of speculation through the satirical portrayal of one member of the clergy in particular, William Wotton. In the narrator s Digression on Madness, he refers to Wotton as A Person, in Appearance, ordained for great designs, as well as Performances;, but whose happy Talents misapplied to vain Philosophy, been turned to into their proper Channels of Dreams, and Visions, where Distortion of Mind and Countenance are of such Sovereign use; (Swift 480). The negative reaction from apologists like Wotton, further proved Swift s point regarding what he believed to be the dullness and witlessness of the Anglican
4 clergy. Most failed to realize that by pointing out the follies and transgressions of the Church s deviation from the original, Swift does not attack, but undeniably defends the Church of England in its purest form. Immediately after exploiting Wotten s misguided enthusiasm, the narrator seems to rush to the defense of delusion and madness, almost arguing for the very points he made against Wotten on the previous page. He argues that delusion and self deception of the senses may be the key to Happiness. He states, For if we take an Examination of what is generally understood by Happiness, as it has Respect either to the Understanding or the Senses; we shall find all its Properties and Adjuncts will herd under this short Definition; That, it is a perpetual Possession of being well Deceived (Swift 481). By defining Happiness in this manner, the narrator attempts to defend delusion and madness as philosophies in themselves. Swift parodies Modern philosophy and phanticism through the narrator s abrupt and enthusiastic rush to the defense of madness. Throughout the text, the narrator frequently criticizes Ancient learning, and incessantly argues that it has become obsolete with the rise of Modern learning. Specifically in the Digression Concerning Critics, the narrator attempts to explain how Critics which he expresses as critics that belong to the Ancient school of learning, have since been justly replaced by the True Critic. True Critics have taken the benefits of Ancient learning and delighted to nibble at the Superfluities, and Excrescencies of books; which the Learned at length observing, took warning of their own Accord, to lop the Luxurient, the Rotten, the Dead, the Sapless, and the Overgrown Branches from their Works (Swift 454). The narrator argues that the alterations made by Moderns upon Ancient learning have been immensely beneficial to the improvement of mankind. Since he refers to Wotton two pages earlier as one of these True Critics, it is very clear where Swift is going in this digression. Where this digression differs however from the Digression on
5 Madness, is that it doesn t seem to parody the implementation Modern philosophy with Ancient beliefs as much as it seems to point out the Modern refutation of Ancient beliefs all together. If the Ancient is to be considered a reference to religion, then this could be interpreted as a satire on modern science s attempt to refute the Ancient. It states at the bottom of 453 that: they (the Ancients) have proved beyond Contradiction, that the very finest Things delivered of old, have been long since invented, and brought to light by much later Pens, and that the noblest Discoveries those Ancients ever made of Art or Nature, have all been produced by the transcending Genius of the present Age (Swift 453). With passages like these, Swift is mocking new science and attacking atheism. The narrator s deluded enthusiasm further alludes to what Swift previously refers to as the Modern s tendency to project a sort of pretentious loftiness. Towards the end of the digression Swift uses wordplay to take one last dig at modernity stating: True Critics are known by their Talent of swarming around the noblest Writers, to which they are carried merely by instinct, as a Rat to the best Cheese, or a wasp to the fairest Fruit and a True Critic, in the Perusal of a Book, is like a Dog at a Feast, whose Thoughts and Stomach are wholly set upon what the Guests fling away, and consequently is apt to Snarl most, when there are the fewest Bones (Swift 456). Swift believes that the misconception of Moderns to pursue reason and meaning through science and philosophy in the interest of yielding happiness, explains irrationality of modern enthusiasms shown by dissenters and apologists alike. He despises modernity and its disposition for meaningless indulgences, and that science may be able to explain the physical, but scripture remains the only credible evidence for the metaphysical. If Moderns define happiness as the ability to be well deceived, and faith
6 considered by moderns to be likewise a deception, then this Modern philosophy becomes a contradiction. Faith in its purest form is perhaps the only real source of happiness. Swift s faith allows him with an extraordinary amount of clarity to view the irrationalities, fruitless indulgences, and purgatorial pursuits of modern philosophy with an incredible amount of simplicity. If his faith can t prove anything modern reason has been able to, it can allow him to obtain one thing modern science and philosophy cannot, meaning. If he is indeed deceived, then he must be well deceived.
7 Works Cited Bywaters, David. "Anticlericism in Swift's 'Tale of the Tub.'" Anticlericism in Swift's 'Tale of the Tub.' 3.36 (1996): n. pag. Questia. Web. 12 Dec. 2011. <http://www.questia.com/pm.qst?a=o&d=5001638181>. Swift, Jonathan. "A Tale of a Tub Written for the Universal Improvement of Mankind." British Literature 1640-1789 AN ANTHOLOGY. Ed. Robert Demaria. 3rd ed. Malden: Blackwell, 2008. 426-96. Print. Wyrick, Deborah B. Jonathan Swift AND THE VESTED WORD. Chapel Hill & London: UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA, 1988. Questia. Web. 12 Dec. 2011. <http://www.questia.com/pm.qst?a=o&d=94873239>.