In the school of political projectors Gulliver was poorly entertained. The professors there seemed to him wholly out of their senses. Such a scene, he writes, never fails to make him melancholy.
These unhappy people were proposing schemes like these. To persuade princes to choose favourites for their wisdom, ability and virtue. To teach ministers to consult the public good. To reward merit, great abilities and eminent service.
To teach princes to know their true interest by setting it on the same foundation as their people’s. To choose for each post people qualified to hold it. And many more of the same kind.