Quote 1
It is a melancholy object to walk through this great town, or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and all importuning every passenger for an alms. (1)
One of Swift's favorite topics was how everyone in Ireland was as poor and miserable except the tippy-top classes. Check out "Causes of the Wretched Condition of Ireland" (1726) for a quick rundown of his serious thoughts.
Quote 2
These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg for sustenance for their helpless infants, who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbados. (1)
The narrator is basically saying that the Irish would rather become traitors or slaves than suffer through poverty. Pretty extreme, right? It's half true: many of the poorest Irish citizens sold themselves to sugar plantations in the West Indies to get out of Dodge.
Quote 3
I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in arms, or on backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is, in the present deplorable state of the kingdom, a very great additional grievance. (2)
Someone needs to hire a babysitter. Note the word choice: Swift is saying that overpopulation is "a great additional grievance" in a nation that's already suffering, not the reason for Ireland's problems.
Quote 4
I again subtract fifty thousand for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by accident or disease within the year. (7)
Don't let all the stats fool you: the narrator is throwing out random numbers to establish false authority.
Quote 5
Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people who are aged, diseased, or maimed, and I have been desired to employ my thoughts what course may be taken to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. (18)
Swift is definitely warming up his audience with his trademark irony. Swift's tracts on oppression in Ireland went largely unread.
Quote 6
But I am not in the least pain upon that matter because it is very well known that they are every day dying and rotting by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. (18)
The narrator alternates between appearing concerned and totally unaffected by the examples of suffering. Why do you think Swift uses this strategy?
Quote 7
Secondly, the poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own which by law may be made liable to distress and help to pay their landlord's rent, their corn and cattle being already seized, and money a thing unknown. (21)
Swift really, really did not like landlords. In "Causes of the Wretched Condition of Ireland" (1726), he likens them to Egyptian slave drivers. Harsh!
Quote 8
First, as things now stand, how they will be able to find food and raiment for one hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. (32)
Swift exaggerates the problem, as usual. This is a direct critique of what he perceived to be English colonialism (source.)
Quote 9
And secondly, there being a round million of creatures in human figure throughout this kingdom whose whole subsistence, put into a common stock, would leave them in debt two million pounds of sterling, adding those who are beggars by profession to the bulk of farmers, cottagers and labourers with their wives and children, who are beggars in effect. (33)
Once again, we see how Swift is comparing beggars to farmers and other poor-but-employed folks. If people who work this hard for a living are in trouble, he's saying, something's not right.
Quote 10
I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals whether they would not at this day think it is a great happiness to have been sold for food at a year old in the manner I prescribe and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes as they have since gone through[…]by the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor clothes to cover them from the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable prospect of entailing the like or greater miseries upon their breed forever. (34)
This is the call for action. Do you think this would be convincing enough to sway a stonyhearted reader?
Quote 11
I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for the landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children. (12)
This is the first time Swift likens the actions of wealthy citizens to the act of eating. He gives readers plenty of time to get hooked before he lays blame on the landlords.
Quote 12
Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people who are aged, diseased, or maimed, and I have been desired to employ my thoughts what course may be taken to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. (18)
Yeah, right. If anyone were clamoring for solutions, Swift wouldn't have written numerous other tracts and sermons that got ignored. Check out "Causes of the Wretched Condition of Ireland (1726) and A Short View of the State of Ireland (1727).
Quote 13
But I am not in the least pain upon that matter because it is very well known that they are every day dying and rotting by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. (18)
Sounding like fun yet? Notice how satiric jabs are mixed in with real details that highlight wealthy citizens' lack of action.
Quote 14
They cannot get work, and consequently pine away for want of nourishment to a degree that if at any time they are accidentally hired to common labour, they have not strength to perform it; and thus the country and themselves are happily delivered from the evils to come. (18)
No matter how much the Irish want to work for a living, the famine problem needs to get solved first. Priorities, people.
Quote 15
Supposing that one thousand families in this city would be constant customers for infants' flesh, besides others who might have it at merry-meetings, particularly weddings and christenings […] (27)
Ah, so now we get to the point. There may be some people who genuinely want to help the Irish, but a pretty big part of the population would just as rather dine on their flesh (that is, take their resources without saying sorry).
Quote 16
I can think of no one objection that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. (28)
Let's just say that Swift knows his audience. He's weeding out the people who care from the hardhearted majority.
Quote 17
This I freely own, and it was indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. (28)
Swift says he's proposing this solution to "the world," but is he addressing an audience broader than Ireland and England? Who else might take interest in Ireland's problems?
Quote 18
Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients till he hath at least some glimpse of hope that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them in practice. (29)
Like we mention in our "Summary," Swift had plenty of ideas to boost Ireland's economy. He was especially keen on encouraging agricultural development.
Quote 19
But as to myself, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this proposal, which, as it is wholly new, so it hath something solid and real, of no expense and little trouble, full in our own power, and whereby we can incur no danger in disobliging England. (30)
Although Swift is mostly addressing wealthy Irish citizens, he doesn't let England off the hook. England restricted Irish trade, meaning that the Irish missed out on a major source of income.
Quote 20
After all, I am not so violently bent upon my own opinion as to reject any offer, proposed by wise men, which shall be found equally innocent, cheap, easy, and effectual. (31)
Is this a call to action or just another dig at lazy people? Could it be both?