The title “A Modest Proposal” is the clearest of all irony throughout the satire since it is indeed, not a modest, but a grossly inhumane proposal. It is also ironic in another way, in that Swift does not consider his proposal to be inhumane because the country is already declining from the inside out. To further his ironic plan, Swift states that some advantages are “it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children” (BL 1139) and “instead of being a

The final piece in making “A Modest Proposal” absolutely captivating is the tone created by Swift’s choice of words. A simple phrase like “carcass of a good fat child” (BL 1141) has far more impact than the ‘body’ of a good fat child because it creates a more shockingly realistic picture. To further equate children with animals he says, “I rather recommend buying the children alive, and dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs” (BL 1141). In painting such a graphic picture, he forces the reader to recognize the horror in considering cannibalism to be the answer to social improvement.

charge upon their parents or the parish ... they shall, on the contrary, contribute to the feeding and partly to the clothing of many thousands” (BL 1139). In offering this solution, Swift points out that in this way, the murdering of children will benefit the country. There will no longer be meaningless deaths among infants. Continuing on in his sincere idea, he offers “that of the hundred thousand children already computed, twenty thousand may be reserved for breeding, whereof only one fourth part to be males, which is more than we allow to sheep, black cattle, or swine” (BL 1140). This rationalization for the production of child cannibalism distances the reader from the reality behind what is being suggested. Children are now comparable to simple farm animals that are slaughtered daily

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