In his voyage to the country of the Houyhnhnms, Gulliver describes the horses’ experience with death saying, “If they can avoid casualties, they die only of old age, and are buried in the obscurest places that can be found, their friends and relations expressing neither joy nor grief at their departure; nor does the dying person discover the least regret that he is leaving the world, any more than if he were upon returning home from a visit to one of his neighbors (Swift, 162).” The horses’ approach to death is, pardon the irony, inhumane. In one instance, a Houyhnhnm is late to Gulliver’s place of residence because her husband died that morning and she had to bury him. The lack of emotion associated with death is chilling. Yet, to Gulliver, this approach is part of the peak of civilization.
In comparing the country of the Houyhnhnms to Europe, he finds Europe lacking. Yet, at least regarding death, Europe, and specifically the English, are similar to the Houyhnhnms. Just as the horses approach death without emotion, the English approach the death of peoples in their colonies with a similar lack of emotion. An uncountable number of African slaves died in the Atlantic Ocean and on inhumane plantations. Similarly, as ironically reflected in Swift’s A Modest Proposal, the English allowed the Irish to starve to the point that the only solution seemed to be “eating Irish babies.” In this case, the English could have and should have acted with more emotion. In fact, in many situations, indifference perpetuates injustice. Rather than universal rationality serving as the peak of human experience, a positive emotion, that of empathy, better serves humanity.
The indifference of the Houyhnhmns poses questions for the reader regarding what a “perfect” society is. Their lack of emotion regarding death is surprising, especially since their community is described as one that places emphasis on friendship, honesty, and peace. This reveals the Houyhnhmns nonbelief in the intrinsic value of life and people (or horses). The Houyhnhmns have a static society – they do nothing and they feel no need to improve. Is this desirable in a world with change that comes with conflict and suffering? Emotion results in passion, empathy, and love but also wars and oppression. How can we balance this?
I believe that the juxtaposition of emotion and rationality in Gulliver’s travels combined with the idea of enslavement argues for a delicate balance between being overly emotional and overly rational. The Lilliputians are rather emotional in the making of their laws, creating codes to punish people simply for cracking their eggs in a certain fashion. The Houyhnhmns have no emotion and rely only on reason to function, yet they enslave the Yahoos of their country. Both of these peoples also arrive at the point where they discuss committing murder; the Lilliputians plot to murder Gulliver while the Houyhnhmns plot to exterminate the Yahoos. Both nations are guilty of enslavement and plotting to commit murder even though their mindsets are on opposite ends of the emotional-rational spectrum. I think that Swift thinks humans need to value both rationality and emotion in order to build a society that can function both logistically and morally.
I think that this lack of emotion and/or empathy is an excellent point to examine in Gulliver’s Travels, and what it points to in real-world England as well. I found it interesting, too, that only certain races were found to be worthy of displaying any sense empathy. Gulliver was fully adamant that he could never enslave a free and proud people (the Blefuscudians, who were similar enough to the Lilliputians and a “higher race”). This statement is immediately contradicted, however, when he meets the Yahoos (a supposed “inferior race”). While he does see the Yahoos being enslaved by the Houyhnhmns, he doesn’t have any empathy for that because they are getting what they deserve, in his eyes. I think this is a poignant point Swift was trying to relate to his audience at the time.