The Clash of Polarity and the Pursuit of Happiness

Samuel Johnson uses antithetical structures in his story Rasselas to show the dangers of living in accordance with a single ideology. By comparing the lifestyles of a mad astronomer and a group of young hedonists, the reader can interpret the failure of both ends of the antithetical as a push towards a balanced lifestyle rooted in experience. Thus, Johnson shows that the more intellectually engaging experiences one has in life, the greater the chances are for one to attain temporary happiness. Jonathan Swift uses a similar antithetical structure in Gulliver's Travels to show the ineffectuality of the pursuit of prolonged happiness. Gulliver's confrontation with a community of sagacious speaking horses and their grotesque human-animal slave counterparts shows the impossibility of maintaining a philosophy against one's own nature. By using an antithetical structure to contrast two opposing ideologies, Samuel Johnson and Jonathan Swift effectively prove the inability to sustain happiness in the mortal world and suggest that the only way to live a satisfying existence is to balance experience between opposing ideologies.

Johnson uses the life of the mad astronomer to depict the failure of an existence based solely on internal pursuits. Imlac tells Rasselas of the astronomer's life and states, "He who has nothing external that can divert him must find pleasure in his own thought, and must conceive himself what he is not; for who is pleased with what he is?" (Johnson 2733-34). The astronomer in Rasselas lives a life without external stimulus and must therefore rely on his imagination for pleasure, which causes him to go insane. This is a clear warning against an ideology rooted in secluded learning. Johnson defines "diversion" in his dictionary as "something that unbends the mind by turning it off from care" (A Dictionary of the English Language). By looking at the definition in tandem with Johnson's own views on imagination, the reader can see that external stimuli is necessary for a man to be happy, or to at least have the chance of attaining temporary happiness.

In contrast to the astronomer, Johnson uses the group of young hedonists in Chapter 17 to portray the failure of a life devoted to sensationalist activities. He writes, "Perpetual levity must end in ignorance; and intemperance, though it may fire the spirits for an hour, will make life short or miserable" (2703). The criticism of ignorance and intemperance shows Johnson's values in the pursuit of knowledge and the restraint of overindulgence. To Johnson a short life in small bursts of fabricated happiness does not allow for a satisfying existence, yet in the previous paragraph it can be seen that Johnson believes a diversion from internal pleasures is also necessary to promote happiness. The reader must wonder how Johnson criticizes and idolizes both internal and external pursuits.
The antithetical lifestyles of the astronomer and the group of young hedonists should thus be taken as a warning against a single choice of life. As follows, happiness only comes when one acquires balance between the two. Hardy comments on this notion when he writes, "That which 'diverts' must not only be something outside the self, but something that engages and exhilarates the mind (rather than the senses)" (140). This suggests that both internal and external experiences are necessary to promote happiness; adhering to only one will end in misery. If the reader understands the failures of the astronomer and the hedonists as being rooted in their decision to adhere to a particular ideology, then Rasselas' ultimate failure to find a choice of life is not seen as a failure at all. Instead, Rasselas refusal to make a choice of life will allow him an existence free from ideological restraint.

The first sentence of the final chapter in Rasselas provides the necessary metaphor that acts in the stead of a conclusion. Tomarken observes in Rasselas, "the choice-of-life quest functions not to arrive at a choice of life but to impel one along the stream of life" (102). Imlac and the Astronomer, the two wisest men in the novel, embody this way of life. Like Tomarken, Hardy also recognizes the river imagery, but makes the concrete connection to the Nile. He states, "from the outset the Nile has subtly accompanied them on their search, functioning at significant points of the story almost as a symbol of human life" (148). The correlation is clear; as the river flows and floods and recedes, so does life persist despite its cyclic highs and lows. In conjunction with the inconclusive journey of Rasselas, the consistent flow of the Nile seems to relate to the hope Johnson sees in the balanced journey through life. Rasselas acquired the tools to properly divert himself in intellectual discourse with friends and acquaintances. This balance of diversion may not lead to prolonged happiness, but it provides the possibility of achieving temporary states of pleasure.

In Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Swift also relies on the antithetical notions of internal and external to arrive at a conclusion of balance. He uses the Houyhnhnms, a community of sagacious horses, to depict a species dominated by the laws of pure logic. These laws are based on internal dispositions that allow the horses to create a utopia unburdened by the evils that plague humanity. Swift writes, "As these noble Houyhnhnms are endowed by Nature with a general disposition to all virtues [...]; so their grand maxim is to cultivate reason, and to be wholly governed by it" (2445). He describes the Yahoos, a species of seemingly distorted humans, as the fundamental antithesis to the Houyhnhnms. Swift writes, "The Yahoos appear to be the most unteachable of all animals [...]. Yet I am of opinion, this defect ariseth chiefly from a perverse, restive disposition" (2444). The Yahoos are also described as being governed purely by animal instincts. Thus, in both physical and mental description, the Houyhnhmns and the Yahoos are antinomical species.

One can reverse the antithetical claims of each species though, and argue that the Houyhnhnms have failures just as the Yahoos have virtues. In discussing the Houyhnhnms, Kathleen Williams points out that Swift "deliberately emphasizes their least attractive characteristic, their coldness" (191). The Houyhnhnms' strict devotion to reason leaves them devoid of emotion. They don't choose to act in any way; they are merely disposed to act in a logical manner. Similarly, the Yahoos' failure to reason leaves them subject to animal instinct. They have no control over their internal desires and are also subject to their inherent nature. This example of polarized lifestyles is prerequisite to understanding Gulliver as a balanced being.

Each species-specific lack of passion or reason, internal or external control, helps centralize Gulliver as a balance between the two extremes. Gulliver is half-Yahoo half-Houyhnhnm. He is able to reason, as is exemplified by his ability to learn the Houyhnhnms language, but he is also subject to passion, as is shown in his humility to "not expose those parts that Nature taught us to conceal" (2427). That "Nature" is human nature and, though he may try to fight it, Gulliver ultimately succumbs to the Houyhnhnms harsh decree. The satire that Swift creates from Gulliver's distinct humanity and his contrast to the fantastic land of the Houyhnhnms shows the ludicrousy of adhering to ideological extremes. Hypothetically, if Gulliver never sought the adventure to escape his human existence, he would not be so dissatisfied with his life upon return from his voyage. Swift seems to be suggesting that a polar existence will not cause happiness, rather it will cause misery.

Robert Fitzgerald states, "Gulliver had found his greatest happiness by denying a fundamental truth. The perfect society is the one that in the end makes him most unhappy" (260). It is impossible for Gulliver to maintain his happy existence with the Houyhnhnms because he is of a different nature. This failure to remain in a society governed by an inhuman rationale creates the tragedy of Gulliver's expulsion and shows the danger of living above one's means. Swift's backwards use of wise horselike creatures and animalistic humans shows that the world of the Houyhnhnms and Yahoos must be taken as complete satire. The real world in which Gulliver lives, and in which we assume represents Swift's own world, is not ideal. Trying to escape the hardships of life, though, only leads to misery. It can be argued that Swift uses the antithetical world of the Houyhnhnms to show humans must succeed in their own world and no amount of idealized reason can grant one eternal happiness.

Samuel Johnson's Rasselas, and Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, both use antithetical structures to idealize a life balanced between knowledge and experience, internal and external stimuli. Rasselas starts his journey in utopia and escapes because he is not happy. Conversely, Gulliver ends his voyage in utopia, but is kicked out because he does not belong there. Johnson uses the world outside Rasselas' utopia to show the ineffectuality of ideological pursuits. The conclusion of his story reflects the inability for one to secure his happiness on earth. Instead, he must divert himself with intellectual discourse and new experiences. Swift's conclusion also shows the dangers of an ideal life. Unlike Rasselas, Gulliver is able to attain true happiness, if only temporarily. What he finds is that his real world is not ideal and maintaining happiness in it is impossible. Human society is not perfect, but one's discontent with the world shouldn't be countered with attempts at escaping it. Rather, he should experience life for all that it is worth instead of talking to horses.

Works Cited

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Williams, Kathleen. Jonathan Swift and the Age of Compromise. Lawrence: University of Kansas P, 1958.