tions and logic, Swift is cautioning against the dangers of being taken in by clever but faulty reasoning. Swift is also satirizing the narrator whose morally-blind faith in the infallibility of his own reasoning leads him to believe cannibalism of the poor is a “modest” proposal, and he is warning readers how easily they can become fooled over complex social theory when the promoter of them is clever and powerful. Most find the narrator completely irrational in his proposal, but the narrator claims that he is a true Christian concerned with the plight of the poor. He quotes scientific experts, manipulates reason and science to justify his proposal, and stands as a moral degenerate even though he professes himself to be a truly enlightened Christian through rigorous logic. The following passage shows the irrationality of the narrator, but his blind faith in his proposal’s theories makes him argue that his irrational thinking actually represents justification for his theories:
I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold as to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals whether they would not at this day think it a great happiness to have been sold for food at a year old in the manner I prescribe, and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes as they have since gone through by the oppression of the landlords, the impossibility of paying rent without money or trade, the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor clothes to cover them from the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable prospect of entailing the like or greater miseries upon their breed forever.
Swift is attacking all those who try to pass themselves off as benevolent humanitarians concerned with social ills and theories to resolve them. Instead
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