This question refers to
Gulliver's last travels amongst the land of the Houyhnhnms and the Yahoos, and the way that he
identifies so strongly and is so impressed with the way of living of the Houynhnms that he
identifies his fellow humans with the yahoos, the uncivilised savages that the Houyhnhnms rule
over. This means that when he is forced to re-enter human society, very much against his will,
he finds it very difficult to slip back into his old life and ways of thinking. Note, for
example, the following quotation in which Gulliver describes his fellow humans:
But, when I behold a Lump of Deformity, and Diseases both in Body
and Mind, smitten with Pride, it immediately breaks all the Measures of my Patience; neither
shall I ever be able to comprehend how such an Animal and such a Vice could tally
together.
Gulliver's misanthropy at this point in the
book is interesting for a number of reasons, and is clearly used by Swift as part of his overall
project of . Gullliver holds up the example of the Houyhnhnms as an ideal to strive towards,
however what this fails to acknonwledge is the way that there life and culture has profound
problems to which Gulliver is completely blind. As much as the horses are clearly incredibly
rational and virtuous, at the same time their lives are profoundly boring and lacking in
interest. Swift deliberately presents their prosaic and monotonous life in contrast with the
richness of human life and experience, with all of its many faults. Swift therefore points
towards the way that Gulliver idolises a system of living that is impossible for humans to
follow, and the way that he ceases to identify himself as a human. Swift implicitly criticises
those who upheld nature as an ideal to be followed by humans and also those who would, like
Gulliver, criticise humanity whilst being blind to their own hypocrisy.
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