The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. X. | Page 7

peace of Utrecht in
such a beautiful and strong manner as you have done it. Once more, my
dear Dean, adieu; let me hear from you."
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