ABSTRACT
Over the years, Swift’s idea of integrity changed subtly but deeply. In his early twenties he had come straight from Trinity College, Dublin, to live in England with Sir William Temple, who was then a retired statesman of great distinction and a confidant of the new king, William III. Employed as Temple’s secretary, Swift had hoped that his master’s connections with the royal court might fix even a penniless provincial in a secular career; and he weighed this hope against another inclination, to be an Anglican priest.
