The battle of the books (1704)

 Sir William temple- also his patron- Swift was his

secretary- did voracious reading in his library.
 Prose satire on the dispute bw anceints and
moderns which was then a serious cultural issue.
Written in the defense of his patron. In 1690, temple
had published Essay Upon the Ancient and Modern
Learning which unfavourably attacked new learning and
all it represented
 Temple’s defense of the ancient works was
answered by clergyman William Worton in
Refelctions upon Ancient and Modern Learning in
1694. In the second edition Dr.Richard Bently a
noted scholar and librarian of the Royal Library in
St.James’s palace entered the fray and he utilized
the appendix for his dissertation attacking the
authenticity of 2 reknowned ancients Phalaris and
Aesope. Bentley questioned the authorisation and
authenticity of the Aesope fables.
Pahalris was a Sicilian tyrant in the 6th c bc. He was
known to have written some epistles which came out to
be forgeries from a later period and Bentley succeeded
 Phalaris was recently edited by Charles Boyle but
he by no means could be said to have been
attached to the view that epistles of Phalaris were
genuine. Thus, Wotton and Bentley with the
moderns and Boyle with the ancients.Wotton’s
 defense of his work in 1705 contained the attack of
Swift’s Tale of the Tub.
 He extols ancient works.
This is his reply on his patron’s behalf.

A FULL AND TRUE ACCOUNT OF THE BATTLE FOUGHT

LAST FRIDAY BETWEEN THE ANCIENT AND THE MODERN
BOOKS IN SAINT JAMES’S LIBRARY.

 “Whoever examines, with due circumspection, into the annual records of

time, will find it remarked that War is the child of Pride, and Pride the
daughter of Riches”.
 In the beginning the author refers to the internecine warfare that goeson
among the dogs of the street for one great bone to be seized on by some
leading dog.
 The right of possession is common, jealousies and suspicious abound
among men as they do among dogs as a result of which the street (the
world) is reduced to a manifest state of war, of a citizen against a citizen.
 thus, want and lust are the main causes of quarrels.
After having discussed this, the author turns to the disputes between
 After having discussed this, the author turns to the disputes between the
inhabitants of the Parnassus.(the Ancients and the Moderns for the right
to live on the highest peak of Parnassus)
 “But the issue or events of this war are not so easy to conjecture at; for
the present quarrel is so inflamed by the warm heads of either faction”

 “This quarrel first began, as I have heard it affirmed by an old dweller in

the neighbourhood, about a small spot of ground, lying and being upon
one of the two tops of the hill Parnassus; the highest and largest of
which had, it seems, been time out of mind in quiet possession of certain
tenants, called the Ancients; and the other was held by the Moderns.” - 2
peaks for parnassus- the ancients on the highest and the moderns on the
lowest.
 Jealousy and heart burning lie at the bottom of their hostile attitude
towards the superior beings
 The Moderns send an emissary to the Ancients asking
them to step down to a lower position otherwise the
Modernswould use shovels and level the said hill as
low as they would deem proper.
 To which the Ancients made answer, how little they expected such a
message as this from a colony whom they had admitted, out of their own
free grace, to so near a neighbourhood. (ancients- aboriginals. So to talk
to them about their removal surrender was a language they did not
understand). the ht on their side of the hill shortened the prosopect of
moderns, it was something they could not help with and they also asks
the moderns not to forget the advantage of shade and shelter it gave
them. It was the ignorance and folly of the moderns to think that they
could destroy that entire rock - it would only harm them.
 The Moderns are advised to raise their own side of
the hill. They assure them of their assistance above
the liscense to do so -rejected by moderns- thus
started the long war.
 maintained on the one part by resolution, and by the
courage of certain leaders and allies; but, on the
other, by the greatness of their number, upon all
defeats affording continual recruits. “In this quarrel
whole rivulets of ink have been exhausted, and the
virulence of both parties enormously augmented.”
(ink- grt weapon for the learned, shot throigh quill
towards the enemy - as if there were an engagement
of porcupines)
 A spirit- brutum hominis hovers over the books until
it is truned to dust and worms consume it- a restless
spirit haunts over every book. For some books its only
for days but for some its frover. There for the books
of controversy are never put toghether in shelves coz
 of this fear. They are confined in a separate lodge
from the rest for the fear of mutual violence .
 The reason for the first fight: When the works of
Scotus first came out, they were carried to a certain
library, and had lodgings appointed them; but this
author was no sooner settled than he went to visit his
master Aristotle, and there both concerted together
to seize Plato by main force, and turn him out from
his ancient station among the divines, where he had
peaceably dwelt near eight hundred years, but to
keep quiet for the time being, books of larger size
were kept in a chain.
 5- swift says that he had adbised not to put such
books together but was not taken into
consideration;.he neglect of this caution which gave
occasion to the terrible fight that happened on Friday
last between the Ancient and Modern Books in the
King’s library.
 The guardian of the regal library, a person of great valour, but chiefly
renowned for his humanity, had been a fierce champion for the
Moderns, and, in an engagement upon Parnassus, had vowed with his
own hands to knock down two of the ancient chiefs who guarded a small
pass on the superior rock, but, endeavouring to climb up, was cruelly
obstructed by his own unhappy weight and tendency towards his centre.
 in replacing his books, he was apt to mistake and clap
Descartes next to Aristotle, poor Plato had got
between Hobbes and the Seven Wise Masters, and
Virgil was hemmed in with Dryden on one side and
Wither on the other.
 The moderns chooses one among them inorder to
evaluate their sources and strengths- This messenger
 performed all things very industriously, and brought
back with him a list of their forces.

 “While things were in this ferment, discord grew extremely high; hot
words passed on both sides, and ill blood was plentifully bred.”
An ancient tries to draw fair lines bw the two parties by saying that the
ancients had their merit of antiquity and of them being original.As for any
obligations they owed to the Ancients, they renounced them all.

 The second incident is about the spider and the bee. This is remarkable
for its artistic economy and satiric efficacy. There were many remnants
in the spider’s web. A bee enters there unknowingly. . The allegorical
significance of the episode is made explicit through Aesop. The bee
stands for the Ancients while the spider is the representative of the
Moderns.
 The quarrel is summarised by Aesop who identifies
the Moderns with the spider and the ancients with
the bee