“For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation as well as our dangerous enemies ...”
"A Modest Proposal," p. 210
The plain argument is that if the Irish children are eaten, there will be fewer Irish Catholics to contend with. This line is emblematic of the religious prejudices Swift intended to expose with “A Modest Proposal.” The “papists” are Catholics, those who believe in the spiritual primacy of the Pope. Swift is writing in the voice of an extreme, bigoted English Protestant in order to mock such a person. He reveals the stereotype that the Irish have lots of children by having his narrator call them “the principal breeders.” Swift’s narrator also asserts that the Irish Catholics are “our dangerous enemies.” Swift was not suggesting that he believed any of these things. He more likely was suggesting that such beliefs were destructive and foolish, since he put those ideas in the writing of a very prejudiced narrator.
“For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation as well as our dangerous enemies ...”"A Modest Proposal," p. 210The plain argument is that if the Irish children are eaten, there will be fewer Irish Catholics to contend with. This line is emblematic of the religious prejudices Swift intended to expose with “A Modest Proposal.” The “papists” are Catholics, those who believe in the spiritual primacy of the Pope. Swift is writing in the voice of an extreme, bigoted English Protestant in order to mock such a person. He reveals the stereotype that the Irish have lots of children by having his narrator call them “the principal breeders.” Swift’s narrator also asserts that the Irish Catholics are “our dangerous enemies.” Swift was not suggesting that he believed any of these things. He more likely was suggesting that such beliefs were destructive and foolish, since he put those ideas in the writing of a very prejudiced narrator.
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