Question

I was just reading the "Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift when I read something that seem ironic. The narrator said that women were "breeders" or "dams" but then the last sentence of the last paragraph states that he has a wife past childbearing age and his youngest child is 9. Emphasis on the youngest child and ignoring the fact that these women were beggars . He must of have more than one one child . So would he consider his wife a breeder too? He also said that he's has no child that he can use to beg for money. Which brings to the another question: Were they poor also before this publication? Was he kind of also referring his family to do

Answer 1

Are you sure he was writing autobiographically? Or maybe writing for political purposes?

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/modestproposal/section5.rhtml