Jonathan Swift and "Dying at the Top"

Blasted Trees; or Dying at the Top.

By Rev. John Hall, D.D., Dublin (now of New York).

Dr. Jonathan Swift, the Dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin, was one of
the most remarkable men of these kingdoms in the last century. His
commanding talents, his great political influence as a writer, his
extraordinary influence to two women -- each of whom loved him, and
each of whom he admitted to the most confidential intercourse,
without marriage and without scandal -- and his unhappy end, render
him an object of instense and very melancholy interest. The most
charitable -- perhaps the most reasonable -- account that can be
given of his life, is to suppose him all along suffering from the
malady which at length destroyed his great capacity and consigned
him to total imbecility.

It is stated on good authority that, walking with a friend, near
Dublin, the eye of the Dean rested on a fine ash-tree, all the
highest branches of which had been blighted, and were dry and
leafless. Regarding it with the most touching look of gloomy
anticipation, he exclaimed, "Look at that tree! I shall be like
it; I shall die at the top" -- touching, as he said it, his rugged
forehead. The foreboding was sadly realized. Under the influence
of this feeling, he devoted the bulk of his property to founding
an asylum for the insane; and "Swift's Hospital," as it is called
(though "Saint Patrick's" was the name given by the founder), is a
permanent memorial -- perhaps the most useful -- of one whose genius
was too much consecrated to worldly ambition, till it sunk into the
fixed torpor of idiocy.

Had his mind been well regulated and well employed -- above all,
had it been devoted to the service of the Lord, as a minister's
should be -- it is hard to say how different his end might have
been -- how far salutary employment and the "peace that passeth
understanding" might have counteracted disease. But, without harshly
judging where so much is obscure, we may say generally, this mental
death, anticipating the dissolution of the body, came from the
Divine hand.

But what if it came from his own? What if Johnathan Swift had
himself lauched the bolt that blighted his towering intellect? What
if, directly, deliberately, and by a long persistence in indulgence,
the evil of which he acknowledged, himself had sapped the foundation
of his strength, to become a self-made ruin? To any rightly-judging
man his actual career was sad enough; then it had been wrapped in
tenfold gloom. We should have exclaimed, "Such talents, culture,
station, means, opportunities, all thrown away! This is madness
indeed, but madness that is criminal before God and man!"

But look around and inquire, Are there no blighted trees under your
observation? Can you point to none who are dying at the top? If
there be any obscurity about the question, let me try to remove it
by detailing the process of killing. I write down only what I have
seen, or know on undoubted authority. We begin in the

DINING-ROOM.

Look around, and ere fish or sauce has been tasted, you may see
some whet a sluggish appetite with a little stimulant, which does
what honest labor and healthy hunger ought to have done. Each
successive relay of food is accompanied with more stimulant. There
is, indeed, a small and ornamental supply of water on the table,
but it is neglected for beer, ale, or wine. If the occasion be
special, obsequious attendants remind you of the duty of drinking,
or well-meaning people invite you to ruin your health in compliment
to theirs. The cloth is removed, and the wine is put down. Why,
it was down all the time! Oh! yes; but now it is THE wine, and as
bottles pass and repass, you may see the effects in the opening
confidences, broader jokes, courser wit, louder talk, and more
rubicund faces. Good society does not allow the thing to go further
"under the mahogany." Now and then it will happen that a weak-headed
person joins the ladies with an utterance rather thick. Polite
people, however, wink hard and do not see it -- till they return
home, when they pronounce it "beastly." Now and then, the champagne
having flowed freely, even a chairman will forget the dignity and
propriety of his place. But when persons get so far, they are
withdrawn from the field, like wounded soldiers; and they feed the
appetite at home, till diseases, generated or rendered malignant
by their habits, cut them off; and their old "friends," who used
to dine with them, decently bury them, perhaps drinking at the
funeral, somewhat as soldiers fire a volley over the grave of a
deceased comrade. Hundreds and thousands are thus "dying at the
top" every year.

THE DRAWING-ROOM

is the grand rendezvous of the cultivated of both sexes. Here music
charms, smiles fascinate, conversation beguiles, taste arranges all
agreeable things, and good-feeling appreciates the effort. All
seek to please, and most are pleased. Here, too, in very many cases
-- and why not in all? -- the family Bible is opened, and thanks
are given for blessings received, and kneeling friends commend one
another's families to the Lord's kindly keeping. In a basket of
flowers Cleopatra had the asp conveyed to her which -- you may have
seen her in the prints -- she held to her bosom, that she might not
survive her overthrow. And what a pity that, upon the refined
enjoyments of such a scene, where all is fitted to soften, soothe,
and make more plastic the yielding nature of man, the curtain should
fall in the shape of wines for ladies and gentlemen! For "at the
last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder." But it
is part of the system. The occasional cigar trains the smoker; the
glass of wine "now and then" trains the drunkard.

Alas! the training often begins early, as early as the

SCHOOL-ROOM.

The young man can be named who has sold his horse, and not returned
to his home while the money brought drink. He had followed to the
grave a companion who was never drunk, but constantly drinking.
Both had been the friends of one who "was the only son of his mother,
and she was a widow," whose estates are now in strangers' hands.
All three are dead and gone in their early prime. At the school
for gentlemen's sons, where they were educated, drink was brought
in by the favor of a tippling usher. It was doubtless thought
generous to buy it, and manly to swallow it, and the poisonous
waters were all the sweeter because stolen. "Boys' frolics," you
may say; but the comedy is turned to horrid tragedy when the mothers
are wringing their hands over the heirs to their houses, besotted,
ruined, dead!

How sad it is that the medical student should so often feel obliged
to drink! Traditions of the thing float down from generation to
generation of students, till a young man gradually concludes that
he must do it, or pass for a "muff." No wonder that a taste thus
early acquired, and habitually indulged, should become a tyrant,
and the

CONSULTING-ROOM

be profaned -- for there is no common honor about the physician's
place -- by drink. The busy brain, the broken rest, the weary
watch, the over-strained faculties -- these form the excuse and
palliation. The unguarded hours, the gossiping servants, the
unsteady hand, the mistrusting patient, the envious rival, the
ambitious junior hoping to rise on the ruin of the unsteady
practitioner -- these are the means of disclosing the mischief which
the mischief-maker fondly believes unknown. The diminished business,
the forgotten engagement, the mismanaged case, the ungracious manner,
the bitter vexation, the vain struggle to keep up appearances, the
sore disgrace, the poverty, the self-loathing and remorse -- these
are the bitter fruits, if a merciful death do not avert the closing
misery.

No wonder the medical profession contributes its quota of the slain,
when that profession which alone is higher than the medical, has
not been exempt.

THE VESTRY-ROOM

has often its cupboard, and a glass is often tendered, at least,
to a preacher ere the words of the blessing have well passed from
his lips. I suppose it is often taken -- even before preaching,
sometimes, I have heard. Hospitable and respectable hearers will
repeat the civility in their own dwellings, and when the miserable
"Reverend" drunkard is so lost to self-respect that he may be seen
at the bar of the public house drinking, they are shocked and ashamed
of him; and if his church be faithful enough to deliver a congregation
from his worthless ministrations and corrupting example, they feel
themselves very good in condemning his sin and rejoicing over his
removal.

THE SICK-ROOM.

What, drink here? "Yes, sir; the doctor ordered my mistress at
least three glasses of wine in the day, and a bottle of porter to
her dinner." 'Indeed?' "Yes, sir; and if she feels weak-like, I
am to give her more." "And does she feel weak?" "Oh, yes, sir,
often; she does be very nervous, and it keeps her up like." So
says the valuable nurse -- and obeys "orders," nothing loth. Just
so; excited; stimulated; stupified; and the last breath that murmurs,
"God have mercy on me," is foul with the fumes of drink -- that
easy, grateful prescription which soothes pain, and if it precludes
every purer spiritual feeling -- if the smell of drink destroys the
fine aroma of Christian faith, and hope, and joy, it is ordering
something, and it saves trouble. Oh! pity the feeble women with
their little children that have been cured into secret drunkenness.
Oh! pity the reclaimed drunkard, that by the "doctor's orders" has
resumed a little stimulant, and now, like the tiger that has tasted
blood, nothing will withhold it from him. Oh! pity the young men
and maidens, old men and little children, who, not in crowded alleys
and in low gin-houses, but in quiet, genteel homes and around
hospitable boards, among friends and refined neighbors, are slowly
but surely letting out their own life, and miserably "dying at the
top." Save yourselves from this generation, and do what you can to
save others. -- SCOTTISH TEMPERANCE LEAGUE.

--from National Temperance Society tract no. 62

weary flake wrote, in

on Sun, 07 Dec 2008 15:53:05 -0800:

> Blasted Trees; or Dying at the Top.
>
> By Rev. John Hall, D.D., Dublin (now of New York).
<snip>
> Under the influence
> of this feeling, he devoted the bulk of his property to founding
> an asylum for the insane; and "Swift's Hospital," as it is called
> (though "Saint Patrick's" was the name given by the founder), is a
> permanent memorial -- perhaps the most useful -- of one whose genius
> was too much consecrated to worldly ambition, till it sunk into the
> fixed torpor of idiocy.

I don't know when this was written but the hospital, which is still the
main psychiatric hospital in Dublin, is never known as anything but St.
Patrick's, or more commonly perhaps as St. Pat's.
--
Nick Spalding