A Modest Proposal | Quotes

A Modest Proposal Quotes

"These mothers instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in stroling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country, to fight for the Pretender in Spain or sell themselves to the Barbadoes" (p. 2).

"The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which number I subtract thirty thousand couple, who are able to maintain their own children, but this being granted, there will remain an hundred and seventy breeders. I again subtract fifty thousand, for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by accident or disease withing the year. There only remain an hundred and twenty thousand children...
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