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expressing sentiments the most absurd and ridiculous, the most shocking and atrocious, or sometimes the most energetic and original, in a sort of composed, calm, and unconscious way, as if they were plain, undeniable, commonplace truths, which no person could dispute, or expect to gain credit by announcing, and in maintaining them always in the gravest and most familiar language, with a consistency which somewhat palliates their extravagance, and a kind of perverted ingenuity which seems to give pledge for their sincerity. The secret, in short, seems to consist in employing the language of humble good sense, and simple, undoubting conviction, to express in their honest nakedness sentiments which it is usually thought necessary to disguise under a thousand pretences, or truths which are usually introduced with a thousand apologies.

POPE'S LINES ON SWIFT.

O thou! whatever title please thine ear,
Dean,' Drapier,' Bickerstaff," or Gulliver!"
Whether thou choose Cervantes" serious air,
Or laugh and shake in Rabelais" easy-chair,
Or praise the court, or magnify mankind,
Or thy grieved country's copper chains unbind;
From thy Bootia, though her power retires,
Mourn not, my Swift, at aught our realm acquires.
Here pleased behold her mighty wings outspread
To hatch a new Saturnian age of lead.

1 Dean, because dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.

Drapier, because he signed the name M. B. Drapier to a series of wonder

fully vigorous letters on a local political subject.

3

* Bickerstaff, because under the name of Isaac Bickerstaff he wrote an amusing mystification in regard to astrology.

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THE ACADEMY OF LAGADO.

[INTRODUCTION. -The following extract is from Part III. of Gulliver's Travels, the "Voyage to Laputa." The feigned Laputa, or flying island, seems to be located, by Swift, off the coast of China, and Lagado, the seat of the Academy described, was the chief city of the kingdom. The aim of Swift in this piece is to satirize the knavish "projectors" (inventors) and the quack philosophers, both so numerous in his day. Gulliver's Travels was first published in 1726.]

1. I was received very kindly by the warden, and went for many days to the academy. Every room has in it one or more projectors, and I believe I could not be in fewer than five hundred rooms. The first man I saw was of a meagre* aspect, with sooty hands and face, his hair and beard long, ragged, and singed s in several places. His clothes, shirt, and skin were all of the same color. He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers,* which were to be put in vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw, inclement summers. He told me he did not doubt in eight years 10 more that he should be able to supply the governor's gardens

NOTES.-Line 1. the warden: properly

the keeper of a mad-house, but
applied satirically by Swift to
the superintendent of the La-
gado Academy, the pursuits of

whose students sufficiently pro.
claim them to be lunatics.

3. projectors, inventors.
4. meagre, thin.

7. eight years upon. Supply engaged.

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-1-17. Of the seven sentences in the first paragraph, one is simple, three are complex, and three are compound: select those of each type. Is the order of words in the sentences direct or rhetorical? (See Defs. 44, 45.)

8. sunbeams out of cucumbers. What class of persons does Swift intend to satirize in the description of the genius who was engaged on the project for "extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers ?"-Considering that the success of the satire turns on the extreme absurdity of the schemes on which the projectors were engaged, what do you think as to the aptness of this example? Point out, in this paragraph, some touches characteristic of the whole class of chimerical inventors.

10, 11. in eight years more. Place this adverbial phrase in a position that shall be better by being nearer the word it modifies.

with sunshine at a reasonable rate; but he complained that his stock was low, and entreated me to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers. I made him a small present, for my 15 lord had furnished me with money on purpose, because he knew their practice of begging from all who go to see them.

2. I saw another at work to calcine ice into gunpowder, who likewise showed me a treatise he had written concerning the malleability of fire, which he intended to publish.

3. There was a most ingenious architect, who had contrived a new method of building houses, by beginning at the roof and working downward to the foundation; which he justified to me by the like practice of those two prudent insects, the bee and the spider.

20

25

4. In another department, I was highly pleased with a projector who had found a device of ploughing the ground with hogs, to save the charges of ploughs, cattle, and labor. The method is this: In an acre of ground you bury, at six inches distance, and eight deep, a quantity of acorns, dates, chestnuts, and other 30 mast* or vegetables, whereof these animals are fondest. Then drive six hundred or more of them into the field, where in a

you

12, 13. his stock: that is, his stock of 20. malleability, the quality of being

sunbeams.

15, 16. my lord: that is, the King of

malleable, or extended by hammering.

28. charges, cost.

Laputa. 18. calcine, to reduce to a powder by 31. mast, the fruit of the oak, beech, or the action of heat. other forest trees.

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-18. calcine. Define this word, and state from what the aptness of its employment here arises. Would a generic term, such as "change" or "convert," be as felicitous?-who. Notice the distance of the relative pronoun from its antecedent, and improve the sentence by breaking it up into two.

21. ingenious. What is the figure of speech? (See Def. 26.)—By what two examples did this projector justify his new method of building? Note the ele ment of the absurd in this.

26-37. In another department. . . improvement. In the device of ploughing by hogs, point how by the mention of minute details and exact figures, the author gives verisimilitude to the mad project.—With what ironical touch does the paragraph close?

few days they will root up the whole ground in search of their food, and make it fit for sowing. It is true, upon experiment, they found the charge and trouble very great, and they had little 35 or no crop. However, it is not doubted that this invention may be capable of great improvement.

5. There was an astronomer who had undertaken to place a sundial upon the great weathercock in the town-house by adjusting the annual and diurnal motions of the earth and sun sO 4o as to answer and coincide with all accidental turnings of the wind. I visited many other apartments, but shall not trouble my readers with all the curiosities I observed, being studious of brevity.

6. We crossed a walk to the other part of the academy, where, 45 as I have already said, the projectors in speculative learning resided. The first professor I saw was in a very large room, with forty pupils about him. After salutation, observing me to look earnestly upon a frame which took up the greatest part of both the length and breadth of the room, he said perhaps I might 50 wander to see him employed in a project for improving speculative knowledge by practical mechanical operations; but the world would soon be sensible of its usefulness, and he flattered himself that a more noble, exalted thought never sprang in any other man's head. Every one knows how laborious the usual 55 method is of attaining to arts and sciences; whereas, by his contrivance, the most ignorant person, at a reasonable charge, and

46. speculative learning. The term is 47. large room. "Large," perhaps, in used in contrast with the practical pursuits of the projectors.

allusion to the vastness of the domain of speculation.

We are not to look for astro

LITERARY ANALYSIS.-40. annual . . . sun. nomical accuracy in this satirical description: otherwise what should we say in regard to Swift's speaking of the "annual and diurnal motions of the earth and sun?"

45-81. Give synonyms of the following words in paragraph 6: "resided " (46, 47); “salutation" (48); "wonder" (51); "employed" (51); “exalted" (54); "contrivance" (56, 57); "assistance" (59, 60); "slender" (65); "com

mand" (70); "shifted" (80).

48. observing me to look. Modernize this expression.

with a little bodily labor, may write books in philosophy, poetry, politics, laws, mathematics, and theology, without the least assistance from genius or study. He then led me to the frame, 60 about the sides whereof all his pupils stood in ranks. It was twenty feet square, placed in the middle of the room. The superficies was composed of several bits of wood, about the bigness of a die, but some larger than others. They were all linked together by slender wires. These bits of wood were 65 covered, on every square, with papers pasted on them; and on these papers were written all the words of their language, in their several moods, tenses, and declensions, but without any order. The professor then desired me to observe, for he was going to set his engine at work. The pupils, at his command, 70 took each of them hold of an iron handle, whereof there were forty fixed around the edges of the frame; and giving them a sudden turn, the whole disposition of the words was entirely changed. He then commanded six-and-thirty of the lads to read the several lines softly, as they appeared upon the frame ; 75 and where they found three or four words together that might make part of a sentence, they dictated to the four remaining boys, who were scribes. This work was repeated three or four times, and at every turn the engine was so contrived that the words shifted into new places as the square bits of wood moved so upside down.

7. Six hours a day the young students were employed in this labor; and the professor showed me several volumes in large folio,* already collected, of broken sentences, which he intended to piece together, and out of those rich materials to give the world a s complete body of all arts and sciences; which, however, might

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78-81. This work... down. Rewrite this sentence, substituting synonymou words wherever possible.

82. hours. What is the grammatical construction of "hours?"
82-90. Give an example of an epithet used ironically in this sentence.

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