Headnote

Possibly composed c. 1710; posthumously published; copy text 1762 (see Textual Account).

The precise dating of this posthumously published fragment is uncertain: it may well be related to a project that Swift had included in his first sketch of contents for a projected collection of his works, drafted in 1708; but although the extant portion appears in polished form, it was apparently never completed, and the fragment would not be published until after his death. It seems to assume an English audience, and closes, indeed, with a slight on the conversation of Scots that would not be unusual at any stage of Swift's career, butmight have had particular point around the time of themuch-resented Act of Union in 1707. Davis suggests a date c. 1710, close in time to Tatler 230. It is placed in the present volume with two other posthumously published and partially overlapping treatments of related themes (‘On Good-Manners and Good-Breeding’, ‘Hints on Good Manners’). Loveman discusses political dimensions of the views here expressed; and for Swift's wider thinking on conversation, see Introduction above. Sheridan would in 1728 devote Intelligencer no. 13 to a discussion of talents and faults in conversation, particularly focusing on the desirability of brief and apposite story-telling.

HINTS TOWARDS AN ESSAY ON CONVERSATION.

I have observed few obvious Subjects to have been so seldom, or, at least, so slightly handled as this; and, indeed, I know few so difficult, to be treated as it ought, nor yet upon which there seemeth to be so much to be said.

Most Things, pursued by Men for the Happiness of publick or private Life, our Wit or Folly have so refined, that they seldom subsist but in Idea; a true Friend, a good Marriage, a perfect Form of Government, with some others, require so many Ingredients, so good in their several Kinds, and so much Niceness in mixing them, that for some thousands of Years Men have despaired of reducing their Schemes to Perfection: But in Conversation, it is, or might be otherwise; for here we are only to avoid a Multitude of Errors, which, although aMatter of some Difficulty, may be in every Man's Power, forWant of which it remaineth as meer an Idea as the other.