Satire, Sincerity, and Swift's "Exploded" Gospel

This essay examines Jonathan Swift's satire An Argument against Abolishing Christianity in order to re-evaluate the conventions of sincerity. Whereas the Argument is typically recognized as satirizing insincere Christian belief, my literary-historical approach focuses on Swift's references to public opinion and the speaker's claim that the Gospel "is generally antiquated and exploded." For Swift, public opinion has a distorting effect on communication, and yet he participates in the public sphere nevertheless. This performative contradiction provides an instructive addition to Christian debates concerning the moral dangers of assimilation and taking on a role.