"At last we have a well-printed, carefully edited text of Swift's famous Journal in a single, handy, and cheap volume. The present edition will, we hope, encourage many timid souls, who have been awed by the formidable array of Scott, Sheridan, or Hawkesworth's editions, to make the acquaintance of the most interesting, charming, and tender journal that ever man kept for a woman's eye."--_St. James's Gazette._ "Mr. Dennis is quite justified in his boast of now first giving us a complete and trustworthy text [of 'Gulliver's Travels']."--_Manchester Guardian._ "The number of useless reprints of Gulliver, based on Hawkesworth's untrustworthy edition, and mostly expurgated besides, is so great that we owe double thanks to Mr. Dennis, since he has not shirked the trouble of collating the five earliest editions, and has given us again at last--as far as is possible in the present case--the complete and authentic text of the original."--PROF. MAX FOeRSTER in _Anglia_. "An ideal text of 'Gulliver's Travels.'"--_Literary World._ "The best and most scholarly edition of 'Gulliver's Travels.'"--_University Correspondent._ * * * * * [Illustration: _Jonathan Swift_ _From an engraving by Andrew Miller after the painting by Francis Bindon in the Deanery of St. Patrick's Dublin._] THE PROSE WORKS OF JONATHAN SWIFT, D. D. EDITED BY TEMPLE SCOTT. VOL. VII HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL TRACTS--IRISH LONDON GEORGE BELL AND SONS 1905 CHISWICK PRESS. CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO. TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON. INTRODUCTION Swift took up his permanent residence in the Irish capital in 1714. The Harley Administration had fallen never to rise again. Harley himself was a prisoner in the Tower, and Bolingbroke a voluntary exile in France, and an open adherent of the Pretender. Swift came to Dublin to be met by the jeers of the populace, the suspicion of the government officials, and the polite indifference of his clerical colleagues. He had time enough now in which to reflect and employ his brain powers. For several years he kept himself altogether to his duties as Dean of the Cathedral of St. Patrick's, only venturing his pen in letters to dear friends in England--to Pope, Atterbury, Lady Howard. His private relations with Miss Hester Vanhomrigh came to a climax, also, during this period, and his peculiar intimacy with "Stella" Johnson took the definite shape in which we now know it.