Abstract
The story about big Gulliver living among the little Lilliputians is probably the best-known part of the Travels. The story of little Gulliver among the giants is less well known. Swift shows that we can recognize a common humanity in different people, but he also suggests human nature constrains us, and the more different we are from each other, the less likely it is that we will achieve an agreement. The little people have been made little by religious and political sectarianism—arguably the more sectarian they are, the smaller they become. The big people differ from small ones in souls as much as bodies—statesmanship and soul craft as much as cleverness or what we call technology. If we try to identify a “place” where we can find the giants, some of the actual ancient republics are a promising start, but Aristotle’s Ethics is also an indispensable source.
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Notes
- 1.
It is never clear why the little people, who are modern in some ways, lack gunpowder. The war technology of Swift’s time did not allow so much for big bombs that could kill many people at once, as for fairly small weapons that required many people at once to be deployed. Asimov says the fact that Lilliputians do not have gunpowder is convenient for Gulliver; the little people have little power to harm him; #44, p. 15; see also the demonstration of Gulliver’s pistol and gunpowder at the end of I.2.
- 2.
I.1, 19–23, I.2., 31, I.7, 74–77. Gulliver assumes wrongly that the leaders of the little people have given up all thought of killing him; they are actually trying to postpone the terrible issue of disposing of his huge corpse, while also thinking of the uses to which he can be put.
- 3.
For Gulliver to have a friendly spy at Court may be a matter of luck, but this nameless person seems to have thought that Gulliver did him a great favor by speaking on his behalf with the Emperor.
- 4.
II.3, 108–110.
- 5.
In the second voyage, Gulliver is so afraid for his physical security and his life, he can hardly think straight. He is something like the opposite of the great statesman he tried to be in the first voyage. Threats include being bitten by a baby, being attacked by animals, whether well-meaning (a monkey) or not, and being dropped or left in places where he might die. See II.1, 98, 100; II.2–3; II.5, 127–8.
- 6.
The King asks for a kind of scholarly consultation as to what kind of creature little Gulliver is; the answer seems to come back “unknown” (II.3, 111–12). The King of Brobdingnag seems to treat Gulliver as more or less human—particularly because of his ability to speak intelligently.
- 7.
Asimov is surely wrong to suggest that the giants, even Gulliver’s young female guardian Glumdalclitch, who always “tended” him with “much Care and Kindness,” saw him as somehow less than human; see #2,#4, and #5, p. 85, and passages on the girl’s care for Gulliver at II.2, 102–3, and II.3, 109.
- 8.
Enough for 1728 of their own people; I.1, 20–21; I.2, 31–2; I.3, 45; I.6, 68.
- 9.
See Gulliver’s thought that after not being killed at once, and then getting a meal (a huge task for his hosts) he is “bound by the Laws of Hospitality to a People who had treated me with so much Expense and Magnificence”; I.1, 21. Asimov may make the same mistake when he stresses how generous the Lilliputians are to Gulliver; to some extent he is trying to “correct” the obvious impression that the giants are better or more impressive people than the little people; see #14, p. 87—mistreatment/neglect by the giant peasants. Gulliver may understate the extent to which the two little Emperors run regimes based on fear, if not terror. Service to Gulliver is commanded by an Emperor.
- 10.
I.1, 20–21; I.2, 28, 31–2; II.1, 96; II.3, 113–14.
- 11.
I.5, 58–9. There seems to be agreement that this refers to Swift’s unorthodox defense of Anglicanism and the British throne in Tale of a Tub, and Queen Anne’s displeasure at it. See Damrosch 144–6, 254–6.
- 12.
Bloom (1990) p. 39; see Travels II.1, 100–1. Gulliver is not completely shameless when he first encounters the little people; in his first few hours in the home that has been found for him (the former temple), he goes into the farthest corner to “disburthen” himself; he soon finds that he needs some air, and on later occasions he goes outdoors (I.2, 27–8).
- 13.
II.1, 98–99, including the reflection that Gulliver could hardly tell the difference between two faces when he was among the little people; II.5, 128–9. See Asimov #16, p. 96, #13, p. 109.
- 14.
I.3, 42–3. This may be the only time the little people laugh in the Travels. Gulliver includes the word “admiration”; as in the movie “Young Frankenstein,” he seems pleased to be able to assure the little people that all parts of his body are proportionately as large as the most obvious parts.
- 15.
See Armintor, Donoghue. The telescope and microscope were two modern inventions in which Swift took an interest; they appear in eccentric ways in the Travels. The Lilliputians lack spectacles or any kind of glass; the Brobdingnagians have spectacles, a magnifying glass and a looking glass; see I.2, 37, I.5, 54, II.2, 103, II.3, 111, 115. The Laputans have a telescope (III.3, 186). Gulliver refers to having seen a louse through a microscope back in England (II.4, 121)—the kind of image that was captured in Hooke’s Micrographia; none of the people Gulliver visits seem to have a microscope.
- 16.
In the first voyage, Gulliver has both a “Pair of Spectacles” and “a Pocket Perspective,” neither of which he shows to the Emperor when he is searched, and both of which are new to the little people; I.2, 37. His spectacles protect his eyes from arrows; I.5, 54. “The pocket perspective [glass], like the modern opera-glass, gives from one end a magnified image and, from the other, far sight”; Donoghue 248. In the third voyage, he has both a pocket glass and a “burning-glass.” The pocket glass makes appearances in all voyages except the second.
- 17.
A famous line from the first voyage: the little people “see with great Exactness, but at no great Distance”; I.6, 60. In the second voyage, little Gulliver, living with giants, is forced so to speak to see the feces of insects in his food; the “large Opticks” of the giants “were not so acute as mine in viewing smaller Objects,” so the giants noticed nothing; II.3, 117.
- 18.
I.4, 49–52. Gulliver is first told about High Heels, who are allegedly “most agreeable to our ancient Constitution,” and Low Heels who are favored by the (present) Crown and Administration. His Imperial Highness the King has one heel slightly higher than the other, so that he wobbles. This political/constitutional dispute probably has to do with the powers of the Crown as compared to Parliament. The war with arch-enemy Blefuscu has to do with a dispute about religion and an ancient text, famously focused on whether to break an egg on the small or large end. There is no doubt some overlap between High Heels/Big End and Low Heels/Small End.
- 19.
If Gulliver were to succeed in conquering Blefuscu on the Emperor’s behalf, the Emperor’s plan included “destroying the Big-Endian Exiles, and compelling that People to break the smaller End of their Eggs; by which he would remain sole Monarch of the whole World”; I.5, 56.
- 20.
Stories about Lilliputians acting collectively are punctuated with stories of strict orders being given and followed. Everything is done as the Emperor, or at most “his Majesty in Council,” commands, including giving Gulliver a sleeping potion just in case he does not live up to a kind of treaty; I.1, 22–3.
- 21.
Gulliver doesn’t seem to consider that the Treasurer bears the brunt of the cost of feeding Gulliver; I.2, 31–2, I.6, 69.
- 22.
Asimov suggests that both Bolingbroke and his Tory ally Harley/Oxford may have been the model for Gulliver in the first voyage (only Bolingbroke fled into exile in real life) and Lord Munodi in the third voyage. On Gulliver as Bolingbroke and/or Oxford see Asimov #17, p. 22, #2 p. 28, #6,7 p. 46, #3,4,5,6,7 pp. 59–60, #9 p. 61,, #14 p. 63, and #3 p. 66. On Munodi see Travels III.4, Asimov #3 p. 163, #6 p. 164. Generally, Asimov is skeptical of arguments that people and events in the Travels are exact matches for one person or event in “real life.” There is no reason why Swift cannot combine two or more people or fictionalize.
- 23.
Particularly for Lord Munodi—a great Lord, who thinks independently and is at odds with the Projector regime. From early in his life Swift was employed by Temple, who had performed valuable public service in a series of diplomatic postings over twenty years, then retired to country living. When he left public life, Temple wrote that he had had “enough of the uncertainty of princes, the caprices of fortune, the violence of factions, the unsteadiness of counsels, and the infidelity of friends ….” Of course Swift heard some of the thoughts of Temple and the others in conversation.
- 24.
Bolingbroke’s most famous book, The Patriot King, was not published until 1738, some years after the publication of the Travels, but the argument there is reminiscent of Gulliver in Lilliput.
- 25.
Stanlis suggests that Gulliver, like Bolingbroke, made the hubristic mistake of seeing himself as altogether greater than his fellow citizens, and the same kind of hubristic mistake may run through all of Gulliver’s voyages; Stanlis 418–19. This fits with an argument that Swift agrees with Gulliver at the end in saying the worst human sin is pride (IV.12, 333–4).
- 26.
Travels I.5, pp. 56, 58, I.7, 78, I.8, 82. At I.6, 70, Gulliver emphasizes that he has a higher rank than the man he may be cuckolding. Asimov says Gulliver takes “absurd pride in Lilliputian rank”; #33, p. 57. The Nardac promotion is referenced in #5, p. 45.
- 27.
In 1662, five years before Swift was born, the Act of Uniformity gave currency to the term “non-conformists” for Protestants who did not agree with Anglican practice; given the establishment of the Church of England, any non-Anglican could be referred to as a non-conformist. In 1689, the year Swift turned 22, the Act of Toleration brought about a shift to the word “dissenter.” This Act “gave all non-conformists, except Roman Catholics, freedom of worship, thus rewarding Protestant dissenters for their refusal to side with James II. They had to promise to be loyal to the British ruler and their heirs.” The Puritans had never formed a distinct organized group—they joined with various denominations that shared their rejection of Roman Catholic practices, and what sometimes seemed the excessively easygoing Anglican acceptance of such practices. By 1689 the main dissenting groups were Presbyterians and Congregationalists. The Test Act of 1673 required officeholders to avow specific Anglican beliefs.
- 28.
Apparently some of the worst things Gulliver sees—the introduction of “small-endism” by a child’s prank or mistake, the ridiculous exercises to win honors, and even the cruelty of the Emperor’s punishments (or perhaps only the glowing words about brutal punishments resulting from love)—are innovations going back no more than a few generations. See I.4, 51; I.6, 63; I.7, 77.
- 29.
See I.6, 61–67. For a discussion of two different “old Lilliputs,” see below.
- 30.
Gulliver actually says he might “say a little in [the] Justification” of the “peculiar” laws of Lilliput, “if they were not so directly contrary to those of my own dear Country.” He never makes any attempt to become a political reformer on any of his stays back home.
- 31.
Throughout most of the first voyage, “most Lilliputians display characteristics which would have justified Gulliver had he passed the same judgment on them as the King of Brobdingnag did upon the English”; Speck 117–8.
- 32.
When little Gulliver introduces himself to the Queen of the giants, he says he is a “slave” to his peasant master, who works him in show business; II.3, 108–9. Gulliver may remain blissfully unaware of how work in the fields is done, or how food is prepared for the aristocrats. In Lilliput there is a sense that the people in general are slaves; the aristocrats, somewhat servile themselves, probably have servants (I.6, 64–5; cf. 68–70).
- 33.
To say the difference between big and small relates to spiritual depth, and intellectual capacity that is relevant to a good human life, is one guiding motif of Bloom’s interpretation of Gulliver, especially the first two voyages; see “Preface,” Bloom (1990), 9, along with “Giants and Dwarfs,” 39–41. Gardiner (2004), although she thinks in terms of an earlier church and a present church, sees that the Lilliputians are “spiritual midgets” and the Brobdingnagians are “spiritual giants.”
- 34.
At one point, Gulliver gets to witness the execution of a murderer; no one editorializes about the punishment, or the King’s role, in any way (II.5, 129). The main punishments we see are in relation to Gulliver. The “Queen’s Dwarf” is whipped and given to another lady (II.3, 116) because of putting Gulliver in danger, despite the lack of a truly harmful intention. A monkey terrifies Gulliver, while apparently trying to mother him, and is killed despite, again, the lack of any bad intention (II.5, 131–133).
- 35.
We learn when Gulliver observes military exercises that the army is “under very good Discipline”: “how should it be otherwise, where every Farmer is under the Command of his own Landlord, and every Citizen under that of the principal Men in his own City, chosen after the Manner of Venice by Ballot?” (II.7, 151).
- 36.
There are beggars on the streets of the city—many with severe disabilities or medical conditions that apparently account for their inability to work for pay (II.4, 120–1). See the Lilliputians by contrast: “the old and diseased among them, are supported by hospitals; for begging is a trade unknown in this empire”; I.6, 67.
- 37.
Asimov points out the “low state of medicine and hygiene” in the land of the giants (#9, p.102, also #14, p. 95) and repeatedly contrasts the virtue of the Lilliputians with the vice of the Brobdingnagians; see Asimov #21, p. 98, #8 p. 94, #3 p. 92, #14 p. 87, #12 p. 86, #8 p. 85.
- 38.
II.3, 114–15; II.6, 137; II.7, 148–50. In order for the giants to pay any attention to Gulliver, it helps to be endowed with “wit and humor”; this is displayed first by the Queen, only later by the King, but the King may be pretending in showing austerity and gravity (II. 3, 110).
- 39.
If Gardiner is correct, “big end” refers to the Roman Catholic belief that there is a Real Presence “both on the altar and in the communicant”; “little end” refers to a Lutheran or perhaps “high church” Anglican belief that there is a Real Presence “only in the communicant.” These alternatives could be referred to as “transubstantiation” and “consubstantiation”; Gardiner 2004. See also Cunningham p. 348.
- 40.
I.4, 49–52. Gardiner (2004).
- 41.
In fairness, Gardiner notes that our narrator Gulliver seems not to be a Christian at this stage (he identifies himself as a Christian once, much later, in an attempt to save his life)—he is not looking for Christianity, and he may not know what to look for. See Gardiner (2004).
- 42.
The only building the little people can find for Gulliver to sleep in is “an ancient Temple, esteemed to be the largest in the whole Kingdom”—huge for them, desecrated by regicides and perhaps (as Gardiner suggests) by Puritans at some point in the past; I. 1, 25; Gardiner 2002, 2004. We are told that the little people bury their dead in a specific way, and the “vulgar” as opposed to the learned keep up old beliefs about the resurrection that is in store for the dead; I.6, 61, Gardiner 2004. If the belief here is an example of Christian teaching, it is very garbled and refers to a practice that was always very rare.
- 43.
See Ch. 5 below on the details of the “little utopia” that is connected with Lilliput.
- 44.
II.7, 150–1. This book, “of little esteem except among the Women and the Vulgar,” dealing with the “degeneration” of nature, what man was like originally, the “laws of nature” and “how we were made,” may be the same little book that is used by young girls, “giving a short account of their religion”; II.2, 107. Gardiner 2004.
- 45.
A Creator is merely implied, and there is no reference to a Fall. Fossil evidence is regarded as real evidence which can be used to confirm “history and tradition”; there is no reference to Scripture. The story seems to bear more resemblance to Lucretius than to the Bible; see below.
- 46.
II.4, 123. Gardiner 2002, 2004. Gardiner points out that saints are referred to once in Scripture as “gods,” and a country’s kings might be seen as emperors. A church building roughly like the temple of the giants would belong to the primitive or ancient church, before the Middle Ages. Constantine the Great probably initiated the building of large churches “decorated with elaborate images of Jesus and saints.” It might be more normal for a civilization to deny “godlike” treatment to human beings until a late stage. Alexander the Great “made the divinity of kings standard practice among the Greeks.” Of course there were ancient Greek temples featuring both gods and heroes; in the Agora at Athens, the famous “labors of Heracles” were recognized on the outside of the temple called Hephaisteion, primarily dedicated to “the god of the forge.” In later Roman times, “no fewer than 94 altars … are known to have been dedicated in Athens to the emperor Hadrian.” There are famous Hindu temples depicting gods and heroes on the outside walls, such as the one at Pattadakal, Karnataka.
- 47.
For the giants, Wednesday is “their Sabbath” (II.2, 106); the use of the word deriving from Hebrew may be suggestive, but a visitor to a strange land might say “their Sabbath” to mean something other than “the Sabbath.” It is possible that no group inspired by the Bible has ever declared “the Sabbath” to fall on a Wednesday.
- 48.
Mansfield. See also Bloom (1990), 38 (adding that the giants may be Romans), 47. Kearney seems to accept that the Giants may be Romans, but if so they are Romans “without philosophy” (meaning in particular “speculative” as opposed to “natural” philosophy) (382, 387; cf. xiv: Brobdingnag “parodies Swift’s contemporaries against the backdrop of ancient Rome”).
- 49.
Aristotle NE IV.3. Contrast justice in Book V: generally thought to be the good of others rather than oneself. Moral virtue makes one prepared or ready to serve, and in some cases eager to serve in order to demonstrate and live virtue, and to be recognized. What might seem a sacrifice is not necessarily seen as such.
- 50.
IV.1124b17–23. When it comes to the virtue of truth-telling, irony or self-deprecation is treated as a vice; the best-known practitioner of irony is probably Socrates. See II. 1108a20–23; IV.1127b23–31.
- 51.
1223b5–8. Aristotle includes other references, bordering on the ludicrous or comical, to what we might call “merely physical” attributes—a deep voice, a slow gait and so on; 1125a13–16.
- 52.
See Xenophon, Hiero.
- 53.
NE I.5, 1095b14 ff.
- 54.
Aristotle’s warrior-gentleman is familiar from various cultures, including Chinese; the Brobdingnagians have clothing that could be Persian or Chinese (II.3, 113), and their temples do not seem to be necessarily those of ancient Greeks or Romans any more than of Christians (II.4, 123). In Aristotle’s Politics, of the cities with the three best actual regimes, only two (Sparta and Crete) are Greek; the third, Carthage, is a community of Asians settled in North Africa (1272b24 ff.). In Plato’s Republic, Socrates suggests the rule of philosopher kings is possible in “some barbaric [i.e. non-Greek] place”; 499c. On the gentleman in Aristotle and elsewhere see Lowith.
- 55.
Generally speaking the proportion between small person and large in the first two voyages is 1 to 12, but this doesn’t always work perfectly. See Chapter III on how Lilliputian calculations can be assessed.
- 56.
The appearance of huge Gulliver threatens their “cosmology,” which consists of believing there is nothing more than the two little empires (I.4, 50–51). The debate about transubstantiation seems confined to the most superficial actions concerned with egg-breaking; there is no theology or metaphysics.
- 57.
See NE VI.5, VI.7, 1141a21 ff.
- 58.
II.3, 110–12; 114–15.
- 59.
II.6, 138–9. The Master Houyhnhnm later seems to agree to some extent, saying that it is “no Shame to learn Wisdom from [small] Brutes, as Industry is taught by the Ant, and Building by the Swallow”; IV.9, 307. One might learn some things from some small creatures; it does not follow that small ones are generally smarter than big ones. The King had earlier inferred from Gulliver’s behavior that even “insects” have some sense of dignity and importance, greatly exceeding any reality (II.3, 115); if they can rationalize and invent, it seems to follow that they can reason in a way.
- 60.
1254b 27–39, Bloom (1990), 39–40. There was a bronze statue of the late Quebec Premier René Lévesque in Quebec City that was “realistic” at 5-foot-5; it was replaced by one that was 8 feet tall.
- 61.
In fact we seem to encounter one of Gulliver’s lies here. Who has ever heard of any evidence that in the England of Swift’s time—or anywhere else, at any time—tall people tend to be cognitively lacking? Asimov, unusually for him, does not address this dubious pseudo-scientific observation. At best there may be a dim echo here of the notion that Aristotle’s magnanimous man is big in body as well as soul, but somewhat lacking in intellectual virtue; or there may be an oral tradition, partly captured in the giants’ treatise for children (II.7, 150–1), that there were giants in the past, a terrible threat to smaller people, and the former were ultimately defeated thanks to the guile or craft of the latter, our ancestors.
- 62.
II.3, 114–15; II.6, 138–9.
- 63.
The King, we are told, listened carefully over five audiences, “each of several Hours,” and “heard the whole with great Attention; frequently taking Notes … as well as Memorandums of several Questions he intended to ask me”; II.6, 140. In the fourth voyage, the Master Houyhnhnm is curious about everything—especially comparisons between modern Europeans in general, Gulliver, and the Yahoos in Houyhnhnm-land. The two of them speak “at several times for above two years” (IV. 5, 274, and generally IV.3–4, 266–71 and following). One obstacle to Gulliver talking about things back home is that the truth sounds like a pack of lies. There is so much conversation about such things that Gulliver has had to do some editing; IV.5, 274; IV.7, 291.
- 64.
Patey (1995) says the successful appeal to reason answers a Swiftian question, “what is there in us that survives comparison—what that cannot be rendered ludicrous, shameful, or disgusting when magnified to Brobdingnagian proportions or shrunk to Lilliputian?.” The Swiftian answer is apparently that “our proper dignity” must “reside” with reason (233–4). This seems true, but with some limitations. Gulliver and the King may be able to communicate across the gap or chasm between very big people and very small ones, but the chasm remains.
- 65.
The Lilliputians “are most excellent Mathematicians, and arrived to a great Perfection in Mechanicks”; I.1, 23–4, I.3, 45–6. They demonstrate that a number of small calculations might allow for building impressive machines or devices—potentially even for making scientific discoveries. This insight is taken to dramatic extremes in modern science, and in the third voyage of the Travels. The great-souled man, unlike the Lilliputians, does not engage in small calculations; NE 1122b8, Politics 1337b15–17.
- 66.
Gardiner suggests a contradiction: Gulliver seems to be pro-tyrant, using new technology, here, whereas he is more or less anti-tyrant and anti-technology elsewhere; Gardiner 2004. In the present case, tiny Gulliver is trying to think of some way to impress the huge and authoritative giant; he is still somewhat inclined to think like a modern.
- 67.
One might be reminded of the Randy Newman song, “Political Science.”
- 68.
See generally II.7, 148–9, including the desirability of growing two blades of grass instead of one.
- 69.
II.7, 146–9.
- 70.
Asimov #4, p. 124; see Aristotle NE 1095b23–96a4.
- 71.
The King of the giants has scholars come up with a classification of Gulliver’s species (II.3, 111–12); earlier the King guesses on his own that Gulliver is an example of “clock-work”; II.3, 110–11. Neither of these assessments seems to have any effect on how the King treats Gulliver. See generally II.3, 111–15; II.6, 138–9, 143–5.
- 72.
The little people don’t want their cosmology, consisting of two empires of small people, disrupted (I.4. 50–51). The King of the giants confidently enters into conversation on such matters, confident that nothing Gulliver says can possibly disrupt him or his worldview.
- 73.
I.1, 16. When he gets to speak to the dead in a kind of afterlife, he knows the names of some authors whom he wishes to hear from (III.7, 219–20; III.8, 221–2); perhaps the wisest, as in Dante’s Inferno, is Aristotle.
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Robertson, L.W. (2022). Little People and Big People. In: Political Philosophy in Gulliver’s Travels. Recovering Political Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98853-1_2
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